• Steve (unregistered)

    public string Comment(int nestLevel) { string retVal = "I would like to"; for(int i = 0; i < nestLevel) { retVal += " comment on the "; } retVal += " comment about TopCod3r's comment";

     return retVal;

    }

  • Bob (unregistered) in reply to Mike
    Mike:
    Mr B:
    It's people like you, ie. anonymous no-sense-of-humour idiots which cause threads to be derailed far more than that other chap...see you've done it here now too!

    Seems like he's not the only one who should learn a little restraint.

    That is fucking bullshit, TopCod3r used fuck with every single post on this site. The unregistered anons have a shitload more useful input than TopCod3r. Fuck off you wannabee troll.
    Well if that's not constructive criticism, I don't know what is.

  • Mark (unregistered) in reply to DoctorFriday

    Hint: Name ended in 'tron', like the movie.

    Once, while doing support, one of the nice old ladies asked me if her screen saver was a virus. I also had to do remote dial up support on a 2400 baud modem. Yeesh!

    Moving at the speed of government while spending at the speed of government.

  • DMala (unregistered)

    Free TopCod3r!!

  • (cs) in reply to Anonymous
    Anonymous:
    TopCod3r:
    <snip>
    No disrespect to you but I have to agree with Alex's moderation. It is extremely frustrating to watch the comments section get ruined by flame bait on every single article. Repetition was your downfall - once in a while it's funny but you used to troll every single post here and now it seems you're paying the price for that. Maybe you should come back in a few months time with a different identity and a little bit of self restraint.

    The comments that get posted on the front page always follow the format "Something from the article with one of the words replaced by 'users' or 'comments'." Even today's: "ATTN Commentors: <snip> DICTATED BUT NOT READ, The Colonel." And you're complaining that the trolls are too formulaic? Alex and squares like you need to stop dictating what is and isn't funny, because your sense of humor is awful.

  • iToad (unregistered)

    Unfortunately, the Colonel never made the switch to civilian life. On top of that, he had to work with engineers and programmers, without a clue as to what they actually did to develop a viable product.

    Ex-jocks have a similar problem, except that they try to run the company like a sports team instead of a military unit.

  • Niki (unregistered) in reply to Flatline
    Flatline:
    http://www.how-to-tie-a-neck-tie.com/double-windsor.htm

    Many, many websites would disagree with you. I'm not quite sure why it has that name when it's clearly a full windsor but the Colonel can't really be wrong if it's a generally accepted term for the knot.

    This brings into question how you feel about the evolution of language. If enough people use a word incorrectly, does the incorrect usage become correct?

  • Ozz (unregistered) in reply to Niki
    Niki:
    This brings into question how you feel about the evolution of language. If enough people use a word incorrectly, does the incorrect usage become correct?
    It already has. You only have to look at the term "Hacker" compared to the more correct "Cracker"...
  • Ozz (unregistered) in reply to Bob
    Bob:
    I, too, enjoy his insights into best practices.
    I found many of TopCod3r's recommendations invaluable and I implemented them for my own business.

    DICTATED BUT NOT READ, The Colonel.

  • (cs) in reply to Anonymous
    Anonymous:
    Mr B:
    It's people like you, ie. anonymous no-sense-of-humour idiots which cause threads to be derailed far more than that other chap...see you've done it here now too!

    Seems like he's not the only one who should learn a little restraint.

    You don't know me, friend.
    AHHH Run!!! McCain is posting on TDWTF !!! Ok my friend, I must tell you that you, my friend, are using the phrase "my friend" way too much, my friend. Is there any way, my friend, that you could stop using it so much? Thank, my friend.

  • Dave (unregistered)

    That reminds me of my ex-boss. He was extremely uptight about people showing up late so he put in a rule that would take a half day off your vacation time for every minute you were late.

    I didn't stay much longer after that.

  • anon (unregistered) in reply to themagni

    Agree. The first time I read one of his comments - I took it seriously... I think it takes alot of imagination and skill to write them the way he does. Keep them going!

  • (cs)

    Wouldn't it be funny if The Colonel was really a nice guy who had adjusted well to the outside world and it was the secretary that was the complete asshole

  • (cs)

    If you end up in a situation like this, how do you explain it in job interviews? I fear that if it was me I'd sound like I had a contempt for authority. Unless I took actual printouts of the email to show just how bad it was. But would that make me look like a whiner?

  • Me (unregistered)

    Is it just me or was this story posted before? I know I've read it somewhere....

    But I see nothing in a web search. Was there another similar story about "the Colonel"?

  • Steve (unregistered) in reply to Ozz
    Ozz:
    Niki:
    This brings into question how you feel about the evolution of language. If enough people use a word incorrectly, does the incorrect usage become correct?
    It already has. You only have to look at the term "Hacker" compared to the more correct "Cracker"...

    Someone on another message board made the comment that not all hackers are crackers.

    I replied that this was correct, that some hackers are asian.

  • CodeTopp3r (unregistered) in reply to TopCod3r
    TopCod3r:
    Look everyone, I tried to give it a try again, but Alex has decided to delete my comments.
    ATTN TOPCOD#R:

    You were cought posting funny comments during work hours. To maintain hierarchy, you are no longer allowed to post on a hilarity level above .2398, as long as your direct supervisor ALEX stays on the .2400 level.

    SIGNED BUT NOT DELETED The Colonel

  • eric76 (unregistered) in reply to JD
    JD:
    I hate to draw sweeping conclusions but from my experience, most high ranking military retirees are domineering narcissists who will never again fit in to normal society. They are broken beyond repair. Just my experience.
    But not all.

    There was a story in a nation magazine, I think it was Atlantic Monthly, about thirty or so years ago that mentioned a weapons development program that the military wanted to kill.

    They assigned it to one general who actually made it work.

    If I remember the story correctly, the general was pretty much forced into early retirement as a result.

  • (cs)

    ATTN PROCESSES:

    It has come to my attention that certain processes have been performing co-operative multitasking. Effective immediately, all processes will conform to a scheduling algorithm for pre-emptive multitasking.

    There are no exceptions to this policy.

    DICTATED BUT NOT READ, The Kernel

  • (cs) in reply to halcyon1234
    halcyon1234:
    Glow-in-the-dark:
    You know, I would have LOVED to join that company for a couple of weeks (obviously with no intention of staying), just to get this guy beyond the point of no return for cardiac arrest.

    ...

    Now that's a great idea for a freelance firm if I've ever heard one. You hire out your services to the employees who need a boss like this gone. You get hired for two weeks, drive the dude over the edge, the ride off into the sunset after the men in the white jackets arrive.

    I'm not sure if provoking people with access to military grade weapons is a reasonable career move.

  • BJ Upton (unregistered) in reply to vt_mruhlin
    vt_mruhlin:
    If you end up in a situation like this, how do you explain it in job interviews? I fear that if it was me I'd sound like I had a contempt for authority. Unless I took actual printouts of the email to show just how bad it was. But would that make me look like a whiner?

    You don't need to mention it. You are correct that it will make you sound like a whiner. And HR where you are interviewing will screen you out if you aren't professional enough to know that you don't slag your previous employers.

    Just say that you are "looking for other opportunities". That bland phrase solves so many problems.

  • fraggle (unregistered)

    Reading this i couldn't help imagining "the colonel" as "the colonel" from fawlty towers

  • Mogri (unregistered)

    The Colonel must have been one confused guy after his secretary sent all those prank e-mails. The secretary, on the other hand, must have really had fun with his/her work.

  • (cs) in reply to Niki
    Niki:
    Flatline:
    http://www.how-to-tie-a-neck-tie.com/double-windsor.htm

    Many, many websites would disagree with you. I'm not quite sure why it has that name when it's clearly a full windsor but the Colonel can't really be wrong if it's a generally accepted term for the knot.

    This brings into question how you feel about the evolution of language. If enough people use a word incorrectly, does the incorrect usage become correct?
    That's "bad" ;)

  • Sanjay Kumar (unregistered)

    There was a company called Effective Immediately in Ottawa, Canada.

    Go here and search the page. http://web.ncf.ca/dw413/rw_swlst.htm

    Their address resolves to a link farm now.

  • (cs) in reply to Publius
    Publius:
    Anonymous:
    TopCod3r:
    <snip>
    No disrespect to you but I have to agree with Alex's moderation. It is extremely frustrating to watch the comments section get ruined by flame bait on every single article. Repetition was your downfall - once in a while it's funny but you used to troll every single post here and now it seems you're paying the price for that. Maybe you should come back in a few months time with a different identity and a little bit of self restraint.

    The comments that get posted on the front page always follow the format "Something from the article with one of the words replaced by 'users' or 'comments'." Even today's: "ATTN Commentors: <snip> DICTATED BUT NOT READ, The Colonel." And you're complaining that the trolls are too formulaic? Alex and squares like you need to stop dictating what is and isn't funny, because your sense of humor is awful.

    Up to a certain point, I have to agree with Anonymous, after a while it started to become boring to have a TopCod3r bait in every thread. However, what really became annoying was the exaggerated TopCod3r worshipping. As soon as he made his appearance, three or four people immediately posted "TopCod3r, you are the geatest", "TC, you are soooo funny" etc. Well, he often was funny, the people who fell for him (or pretended to do so?) sometimes even more, but the idolatry began to outweigh it, for me at least. I can live very well without TC for a while, though I'd enjoy to have him back soon, too. Just not every day.
  • (cs) in reply to BJ Upton
    BJ Upton:
    vt_mruhlin:
    If you end up in a situation like this, how do you explain it in job interviews? I fear that if it was me I'd sound like I had a contempt for authority. Unless I took actual printouts of the email to show just how bad it was. But would that make me look like a whiner?

    You don't need to mention it. You are correct that it will make you sound like a whiner. And HR where you are interviewing will screen you out if you aren't professional enough to know that you don't slag your previous employers.

    Just say that you are "looking for other opportunities". That bland phrase solves so many problems.

    I once had to explain away a very short-lived job. When pressed for details, I explained that: "The job had been completely misrepresented, and only tangentially utilized my skillset thus severely reducing my opportunities to contribute. Since one of my main criteria in a position is the ability to contribute and make a difference, it seemed prudent to seek another position". This way, you turn a negative into a positive!

  • Henry Miller (unregistered)

    Attention team,

    it has come to my attention that someone made a mistake on at least one line in the data conversion process. All staff is to immeadiatly focus on verifying each line of the conversion. The customer must not discover any more mistakes we made.

    DICTATED BUT NOT READ (much less spell checked), The Colonel.

  • (cs) in reply to jasites
    jasites:
    Joe the Programmer:
    ObCaptcha: "usitas". Wasn't he the old Baltimore Colts QB?

    that was Unitas, close, but not quite.

    Whoosh!

  • (cs) in reply to fraggle
    fraggle:
    Reading this i couldn't help imagining "the colonel" as "the colonel" from fawlty towers

    Nah.. the supressedly gay ex-military neighbor in American Beauty.

  • (cs) in reply to Anonymous
    Anonymous:
    TopCod3r:
    <snip>
    No disrespect to you but I have to agree with Alex's moderation. It is extremely frustrating to watch the comments section get ruined by flame bait on every single article. Repetition was your downfall - once in a while it's funny but you used to troll every single post here and now it seems you're paying the price for that. Maybe you should come back in a few months time with a different identity and a little bit of self restraint.

    Alex didn't moderate anything - he deleted comments because they annoyed him. Sure, delete the wow gold spam and random chinese posts that are almost certainly spam, but nuking comments for being somewhat disruptive is just nuts. This isn't a business meeting, and we don't have to all behave.

  • (cs) in reply to Steve
    Steve:

    Someone on another message board made the comment that not all hackers are crackers.

    I replied that this was correct, that some hackers are asian.

    Misdirection win!

  • (cs) in reply to Anonymous
    Anonymous:
    Mr B:
    It's people like you, ie. anonymous no-sense-of-humour idiots which cause threads to be derailed far more than that other chap...see you've done it here now too!

    Seems like he's not the only one who should learn a little restraint.

    You don't know me, friend.
    What??!?! Of course he knows you! You're "Anonymous"! You and he were practically roommates!

  • Michael (unregistered)

    Yeah, that's why we military types refer to officers like the colonel as REMFs.

  • (cs)

    I had a boss like "The Colonel" once. The guy didn't care about the working environment of his underlings. He didn't care what you did during the day, but you absolutely had to be in the office from 8:30am until 6:00pm. At exactly 6 he was out of his office and the building, no matter if there was a release that day.

    As I found out when I was quitting, he apparently had weekly spreadsheets where he counted every minute any employee was away from their desks (lunch, coffee, and restroom breaks included). All the monitors were on a raised platform so that he could observe the activities of his department from his office through a glass door (god forbid you opened up a web browser during working hours [lunch included]). Developers had phones on their desks, but were forbidden to make or receive personal calls. His idea of training new hires was giving them a log-in credentials to the source control, saying "Learn the systen", and then checking back after a week if they had learned the systen yet.

    Needless to say, the employee retention of the company suffered and not a single person had lasted over 3 months in that place. I had quit after 2 months, and still regard that job as the worst time of my career.

  • spellingnazi (unregistered) in reply to Niki
    Niki:
    Flatline:
    http://www.how-to-tie-a-neck-tie.com/double-windsor.htm

    Many, many websites would disagree with you. I'm not quite sure why it has that name when it's clearly a full windsor but the Colonel can't really be wrong if it's a generally accepted term for the knot.

    This brings into question how you feel about the evolution of language. If enough people use a word incorrectly, does the incorrect usage become correct?

    Not after a couple of years and a few websites, that's for sure.

    I don't know about this double windsor nonsense, but I am regularly annoyed by people who pull out the "but language changes" defense when it's pointed out to them that "begging the question" is not a fancy-pants way of saying "and so I ask you", "raises the problem of" or something similar. Or people who confuse their/they're/there, etc.

    People are regularly chastised here for making beginner coding mistakes. But people who speak English as a first language should immunity for beginner English mistakes? I don't think so.

    I don't care if a million people use it wrong every day. There's still plenty of people who know what it means, and we're free to view the rest of you as morons if we choose.

    Your question really only has one logical answer: that there isn't one "language" that we adhere to, people language is a tool that different people use differently. That doesn't mean that some people aren't better than others at it, or that objective reality goes out the window when enough stupid people band together and declare something to be so.

    In summary: yes language changes but ignorance is NOT a virtue, and does NOT make you a cowboy.

  • spellingnazi (unregistered) in reply to spellingnazi
    spellingnazi:
    people language is a tool that different people use differently. That doesn't mean that some people aren't better than others at it

    How ironic. I guess I am a tool.

    Captcha: validus (what I should do before posting, when in Rome)

  • Asiago Chow (unregistered)

    Years ago (my first real job, I was maybe 21) I had my own experience with military leadership. The difference was that I wasn't the new guy in an established environment.

    I was the youngest person at a little software shop when my boss (the guy who hired me) retired. We sent the old guy off with a party and afterwards the CEO announced he had found the perfect replacement... a newly retired USMC colonel with a technical background and an impressive education!

    The Colonel's first act was to interview all existing employees under his charge. We were given appointments and an otherwise empty office was designated the interviewing room.

    When my appointment came around I went into the office and... desk, nice chair, crappy stacking chair, and no Colonel. I looked at the crappy stacking chair. I looked at the nice chair. I looked again at the crappy stacking chair that was so clearly where the inferior was supposed to sit. I sat down. I put my feet up on the desk. I waited.

    The Colonel arrived a few minutes later and stood there for a moment staring at me. I stood, shook his hand, invited him to sit, and sat back down myself. He stared some more, then carefully repositioned the stacking chair to precisely face the front of the desk and primly sat with a notepad in his lap, obviously uncomfortable and determined to rise above it. We had our interview -- all classic BS questions; Him: "where do you see yourself in 5 years?" Me: "Taking your job." -- and at the end I stood, thanked him for his time, and left.

    It was beautiful. I was a total prick, I knew I was being a total prick, but he chose it when he chose a crappy chair for the employee and a nice chair for himself.

    The funniest part? It wasn't an isolated incident. We had a conference room with a long table and he was convinced that the end was where the leader was supposed to sit. I got into the habit (which I still have) of taking the seat at the "best" end of the table (whatever that is). He would come in and find me in "his seat" and half the time he would stand through the entire meeting rather than take an inferior seat.

    Within a year he was fired -- escorted out of the building -- because he simply couldn't lead (at least not people who hadn't been through boot camp indoctrination) and finally resorted to sending a bunch of long, sarcastic, and generally inappropriate memos to all the employees. He did type them himself though.

  • (cs) in reply to ObiWayneKenobi
    ObiWayneKenobi:
    And this is why idiots who don't know shit about software should be prevented from EVER being able to start a software company.

    Google, Apple, Microsoft... three best software companies in the world... all started by total computer geeks.

    QED

  • "Dictated but not read" (unregistered)

    I remember Dale Carnegie mentioning that phrase in How to Win Friends and Influence people. Apparently he found that phrase impressive when he was a young man, and used it in a letter to some eminent businessman from whom he sought advice. The response was "your bad manners are exceeded only by your bad manners."

    BTW, the bit about "that's a poor excuse for a double windsor" begs for a reply like "that's a poor substitute for a polite introduction, sir."

    -jcr

  • (cs) in reply to savar
    savar:
    ObiWayneKenobi:
    And this is why idiots who don't know shit about software should be prevented from EVER being able to start a software company.

    Google, Apple, Microsoft... three best software companies in the world... all started by total computer geeks.

    QED

    All of your examples were started by a guy who new business and a guy who knew computers (at least). Both are necessary.

  • Mikey (unregistered)
    The Colonel and the GIS system he had worked on, he verified that, four years later, they have yet to release their product.
    The real WTF is why the Colonel was still working at the same company four years later. Did the upper management not realise he was useless, and did nobody go over the Colonel's head in those four years?
  • Jason bean (unregistered)

    Wow, the whole Idea sounds kind of giddy to me.

    Jiff www.online-anonymity.kr.tc

  • (cs) in reply to Mikey
    Mikey:
    The Colonel and the GIS system he had worked on, he verified that, four years later, they have yet to release their product.
    The real WTF is why the Colonel was still working at the same company four years later. Did the upper management not realise he was useless, and did nobody go over the Colonel's head in those four years?

    From the sounds of it, he was the big cheese, so he'll succeed or the company will fold.

  • Anon (unregistered) in reply to spellingnazi
    spellingnazi:
    I don't care if a million people use it wrong every day. There's still plenty of people who know what it means, and we're free to view the rest of you as morons if we choose.

    Your question really only has one logical answer: that there isn't one "language" that we adhere to, people language is a tool that different people use differently. That doesn't mean that some people aren't better than others at it, or that objective reality goes out the window when enough stupid people band together and declare something to be so.

    In summary: yes language changes but ignorance is NOT a virtue, and does NOT make you a cowboy.

    Stubbornness is also not a virtue and following archaic uses of language doesn’t make you better. The rest of us are perfectly free to view you as an out of touch old fool who’s incapable of dealing with change. It doesn’t matter why or who started using a different definition but ignoring that definition once its taken hold is idiotic stubbornness. Language is a tool for communication and ignoring its actual usage just makes you a failure at using language for its proper purpose (ie: communication).

  • i have a big chair (unregistered)

    It's common for companies that need to get rid of people to make employees miserable so they'll quit. It avoids a lot of hassle from their end. It's quite possible this was a deliberate strategy.

  • atomicthumbs (unregistered) in reply to Jeff

    At least I get a second each day for leisure time.

  • Cash Master (unregistered)

    After a totally Sh**ty day at my batshit crazy job I'm glad I'm not the only one that doesn't work for complete morons.

  • (cs) in reply to Anon
    Anon:
    spellingnazi:
    I don't care if a million people use it wrong every day. There's still plenty of people who know what it means, and we're free to view the rest of you as morons if we choose.

    Your question really only has one logical answer: that there isn't one "language" that we adhere to, people language is a tool that different people use differently. That doesn't mean that some people aren't better than others at it, or that objective reality goes out the window when enough stupid people band together and declare something to be so.

    In summary: yes language changes but ignorance is NOT a virtue, and does NOT make you a cowboy.

    Stubbornness is also not a virtue and following archaic uses of language doesn’t make you better. The rest of us are perfectly free to view you as an out of touch old fool who’s incapable of dealing with change. It doesn’t matter why or who started using a different definition but ignoring that definition once its taken hold is idiotic stubbornness. Language is a tool for communication and ignoring its actual usage just makes you a failure at using language for its proper purpose (ie: communication).

    Archaic? I get that from people when I insist on using formal terms correctly. You can call me stubborn, but you're an idiot.

  • Herohtar (unregistered)

    What was the problem with people combining their breaks? Last I checked a fifteen minute break, half-hour lunch, and another fifteen minute break took exactly the same amount of time as a one hour lunch/break period...

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