• (disco) in reply to kupfernigk

    Please don't attribute other people's quotes to me, I say enough dumb shit without the add on.

  • (disco) in reply to kjordan2001
    kjordan2001:
    My question about this WTF is why were the links considered broken?
    You would have known if you’d read the whole article :) Here, I’ll help:
    the infamous Windows 7 Computer Maintenance. If there were more than 4 broken shortcuts on the desktop, it deleted them completely. (…) It ran its maintenance tasks once a week on startup, after the desktop icons loaded, but before the network drives finished mapping. That meant the database links were "broken,” and were therefore deleted.
  • (disco) in reply to locallunatic
    locallunatic:
    Please don't attribute other people's quotes to me, I say enough dumb shit without the add on.

    Sorry, fixed.

  • (disco) in reply to accalia
    accalia:
    if a rule (of law/society/squishy human stuff) has an exception, it's not a rule, it's a guideline.

    Note to self: @accalia thinks "don't run people over with my car" is a guideline not a rule.

  • (disco) in reply to locallunatic

    there's an exception to that rule?

    if so it's news to me.

    It certainly would be against the "Don't be an Asshole" rule to run someone over with my car, so you'll probably be safe either way.

  • (disco) in reply to kupfernigk
    kupfernigk:
    To put it another way, the desktop is a useful clipboard for files. I am not responsible for the people who abuse this facility and store everything there...

    I use Downloads for that purpose. Downloads is basically desktop except I don't have to minimize everything to look at it*. And the Desktop is inherently limited in how many files can be viewed there. And it can be hard to see the icons over a background image. And sometimes there are weird policies regarding what's there (like in this story).

    Looks like I'm the only one who agrees with celloguy.

    [*] Of course, you could always browse to Desktop, but then that's still no advantage over Downloads or any other temp folder.

  • (disco) in reply to accalia
    accalia:
    It certainly would be against the "Don't be an Asshole" rule to run someone over with my car, so you'll probably be safe either way.

    Yes, but what if by running them over you prevent 5 other people from getting killed by a runaway freight train?

    And then what if the person you run over is pregnant with quadruplets?

  • (disco) in reply to accalia
    accalia:
    there's an exception to that rule?

    There are many ways to do that which mean you aren't getting charged with breaking a law. So yeah, several.

  • (disco) in reply to Bort
    Bort:
    Yes, but what if by running them over you prevent 5 other people from getting killed by a runaway freight train?

    Well, i'm assuming you're not giving me enough time to choose a course of action that eliminates the requirement to run over anyone. in that case i would be forced to react in the moment, fueled by a rush of adrenaline and to only afterwards feel terrible about the action i had just performed and then try to rationalize it away by convincing myself i made the correct choice.

    Sometimes there are no correct solutions to a problem.

    locallunatic:
    There are many ways to do that which mean you aren't getting charged with breaking a law.
    Then we shall count it a good thing that i am sure most, if not all, of those loopholes would be closed by application of the "Don't be an asshole" rule
  • (disco)
    “Most of you small fries do when you come aboard,” the voice continued. “Sorry, but that’s our policy. Non-negotiable.”

    TRWTF is that, if most of the acquired companies have objected, at no point did MegaCorp think, "Hm, everyone keeps telling us it's a bad idea. Maybe we should do some research on it."

    The fact that nobody should be surprised that MegaCorp never thought this in no way makes it any less of a WTF.

  • (disco) in reply to accalia
    accalia:
    Well, i'm assuming you're not giving me enough time to choose a course of action that eliminates the requirement to run over anyone. in that case i would be forced to react in the moment, fueled by a rush of adrenaline and to only afterwards feel terrible about the action i had just performed and then try to rationalize it away by convincing myself i made the correct choice.

    What I just read:

    "I had no choice, right? They *had* to die. They *had* to die! Ha ha ha! They *all* must die! AAAAA haaaa!"

    [Pedal to the floor, engine roars]

    "I have to do it! AAAAAA ha ha ha ha!"

    [Panic, scream, sounds of guts splattered and skulls crushed]

    "I made the correct choice! I am perfectly rational!"

    [Carried off to insane asylum in straight-jacket]

    You're fucking sick!

    accalia:
    Sometimes there are no correct solutions to a problem.

    I don't believe in the no-win scenario.

  • (disco) in reply to Bort
    Bort:
    I use Downloads for that purpose

    Being a nitpicking pedant, I use Downloads for downloads. I realise the desktop metaphor is very old, but on my physical desktop I keep anything paper that I need to attend to in the next day or so (I still do get some paper stuff.) As I grew up before GUIs, I use the computer desktop the same way. But I don't keep documents, even short term ones, on the screen of my phone because in my get-off-my-lawn world a phone is just an item on my desktop.

  • (disco) in reply to Bort
    Bort:
    What I just read:

    hmm.... i may have failed to properly specify my intent. However i fail to see how you could interpret my words in the way you did without deliberate attempt to twist them into that form..... so.... well done i guess.

    Bort:
    You're fucking sick!
    well, yes, but not for the reason you posted above.
    Bort:
    I don't believe in the no-win scenario.
    so what would you do in the scenario you put me in, and more importantly how would you feel about yourself and your actions afterwards?
  • (disco) in reply to Remy
    Remy:
    What's funny is this version of the story is a fresh email that came in a few weeks ago. Those who don't learn from history are doomed, yada yada yada.

    I was going to say, someone took my story from a few years back and tweaked it for the front page?

    Ah well, too common of a :wtf: I guess.

    Maciejasjmj:
    What, doing the check every startup? Just put them in a goddamn folder if you really need to! Or disable the maintenance via a group policy.

    We did. Users complained it was "too much work" to double-click into the folder. :facepalm:

    Disabling maintenance was the only option left.

  • (disco) in reply to accalia
    accalia:
    Well, i'm assuming you're not giving me enough time to choose a course of action that eliminates the requirement to run over anyone. in that case i would be forced to react in the moment, fueled by a rush of adrenaline and to only afterwards feel terrible about the action i had just performed and then try to rationalize it away by convincing myself i made the correct choice.

    Sometimes there are no correct solutions to a problem.

    Train drivers who run over suicides often never return to work despite the fact that there was absolutely nothing they could have done to prevent the death. We're designed for solving dynamics problems involving no more than our own kinetic energy at velocities of a few metres per second. It's amazing we do as well as we do when handling high speed machinery, but unsurprising that our minds aren't well equipped to deal with the things that can go wrong. The only people who can deal unemotionally with life and death decisions in those circumstances are psychopaths - and they will automatically take the course of action most likely to ensure their own survival. Being emotionally involved in things you can't alter is part of being human.

    Bort:
    I don't believe in the no-win scenario.

    The universe doesn't care whether you believe in it or not, bad stuff happens.

  • (disco) in reply to kupfernigk
    kupfernigk:
    Being a nitpicking pedant, I use Downloads for downloads.

    It used to be that people would download files to the desktop since it was the temp working space. I found that it was easier to use a just-another-folder for this purpose. Then the C:\Users\Bort\Downloads folder was introduced and since that's where the downloads went, I considered that the temp working space.

    My approach isn't perfect either, but I don't see the use of the desktop.

    Full disclosure: I'm one of those weirdos that maximizes most windows.

  • (disco) in reply to accalia
    accalia:
    if a rule (of law/society/squishy human stuff) has an exception, it's not a rule, it's a guideline.
    The English language guideline says that past tense verb is made by adding -ed suffix to infinitive for every single word there is, except for this strictly defined set of words: (...).

    Since it's just a guideline, we don't have to follow it, right?

  • (disco) in reply to kupfernigk
    kupfernigk:
    and they will automatically take the course of action most likely to ensure their own survival.

    Uh, no. Psychopathy involves lowered empathy and increased risk taking tendencies, they don't always play out in the way you are stating.

  • (disco) in reply to kupfernigk
    kupfernigk:
    The universe doesn't care whether you believe in it or not, bad stuff happens.
    [image]
  • (disco)

    For some reason I think I've read this one before.

  • (disco) in reply to Gurth

    Ah, missed that sentence. So probably TRWTF is that they were using Access databases.

  • (disco) in reply to riking

    Because it happens so often? Just like Program Compatibility Assistant that randomly turns on don't-segfault-on-invalid-memory-read mode for the program I'm trying to debug?

  • (disco) in reply to Zadkiel
    Zadkiel:
    Eh, I'm with the corporate overlords on this one. As long as you have a reliable AV, for a company of 100 employees and 2 IT staff, it's my experience (and I have worked for the last 20+ years in just those environments) that local admin is preferable. Sure, you every now and again have to deal with a malware install, but it's preferable to having to deal with all the support requests you get from people having lack of admin, and worse, people not updating things like java, flash, acrobat reader, because the update requires admin and they can't be bothered to ask IT, AND it makes your users happier, lack of local admin frustrates people.

    I can see you've never had to support 150 Mortgage Salespeople before...

    Zadkiel:
    As for his deleted icons problem, easily solved by setting a windows setting 'wait for network on logon' which you can easily globally set for all users using Group Policy, or if you aren't running AD, you can set as a local policy on each machine.

    Interesting item you mention.

    Google reveals: [image]

    Yes, 3 mentions total of the phrase "wait for network logon" tied to group policy, one of which is this article! But no one specifies where it is. So apparently few people even thought to look for or mention this setting. I noted that one person posted this setting in 2005, which tells me this was purportedly available since at least Windows Server 2003 R2.

    We didn't have it then. We've upgraded since to Windows Server 2008 R2 AD (Forest and domain), still don't have it (core apps don't play nice with Server 2012, we're still waiting on clearance to upgrade to that). I looked at "All Settings" under Computer and User configuration. Closest I could find was "Wait for remote user profile" in wording, no "wait for network logon" to be found. To me, either the phrasing is wrong/incomplete, an add-on needs to be installed to expand GPO capabilities (which no one has mentioned), or the darn thing doesn't exist (which means someone made it up and a few people are doing copy/pasta without verifying).

    If anyone can point me to where this setting should be, I'd be most appreciative.

  • (disco) in reply to Maciejasjmj

    Pff, I am German and I think this is not funny. :sunglasses:

  • (disco) in reply to Michael_Mahn
    Michael_Mahn:
    I am German and I think this is not funny

    Isn't that standard state for a German?

    Filed under: I'm Polish and I think everything is funny given enough alcohol

  • (disco) in reply to redwizard

    http://columbiabrian.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/group-policy-always-wait-for-network-at.html

    Found through a not particularly hard search of

    gpo wait for network

    And the first related search on your search would have found it straight away too.

  • (disco) in reply to cellocgw
    cellocgw:
    The Desktop cannot be sorted by Name, Mod Date, Type, Size, or any of the other features the Explorer window allows.

    Ahem: [image]

    Although Blakey is right when he says:

    blakeyrat:
    Ok, you're wrong. But... if you weren't wrong that might be a slightly good reason a bit? Maybe? Too bad you're wrong.

    I don't think you were talking about looking there...

  • (disco)

    I'm unsure what the WTF is here.

    That a program installed on all of the machine turned out to be broken and lack of local admin was breaking it or that local admin was issues to everyone rather than to appropriate groups (a very minor wtf).

  • (disco) in reply to redwizard
    redwizard:
    I don't think you were talking about looking there...

    You don't have to look there:

    [image]

    Have you people even used Windows before? Sheesh.

  • (disco) in reply to blakeyrat

    This way of doing this is just as broken as @redwizard's.

  • (disco) in reply to Bort
    Bort:
    Full disclosure: I'm one of those weirdos that maximizes most windows.

    +1

  • (disco) in reply to knelmes
    knelmes:
    http://columbiabrian.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/group-policy-always-wait-for-network-at.html

    Found through a not particularly hard search of

    gpo wait for network

    +1

    Thank you.

    EDIT:

    knelmes:
    And the first related search on your search would have found it straight away too.

    Just goes to show that sometimes one can miss the obvious (such as the word ALWAYS in the screen shot, even though I did read the article).

    redwizard:
    To me, either **the phrasing is wrong/incomplete**, an add-on needs to be installed to expand GPO capabilities (which no one has mentioned), or the darn thing doesn't exist (which means someone made it up and a few people are doing copy/pasta without verifying).

    Point 1 of 3 (in bold) proven (save the screen shot I missed above).

    EDIT 2:

    Gaska:
    This way of doing this is just as broken as @redwizard's.

    Hmm, why would anyone store/work on files for any length of time on their desktop?

    Questions for you: So you don't use your desktop at work for processing paperwork? Do you have a desktop where you work? Where do you think the metaphor (and associated functionality) came from?

    I'm with @Blakeyrat on this one.

    Filed under: EDIT HELL IN DISSEDCOURSE...

  • (disco) in reply to accalia
    accalia:
    Any rule that has exceptions is not a rule, merely a guideline

    this is a problematic statement.

    • If you go by that rule it had to be a guideline because there are definitly exceptions (as shown further down this post)
    • But since it is not merely a guidline it doesnt have to be followed anymore. Making the rule that all rules have to be exceptionless merely a guideline. Thus negating its effect to make itself a guidline which in case turns it back into a rule.
    • By that it is actually turning itself into an exception to its own rule thereby proving expections exist!

    Filed Under: Thats a pretty paradoxon! :trollface:

  • (disco) in reply to redwizard
    redwizard:
    Question for you
    For me?
  • (disco) in reply to Kuro
    Kuro:
    as shown further down this post

    uhh...... how?

    the statement "Any rule that has exceptions is not a rule, merely a guideline" itself does not contain an exception. it is a clear statement that says any X that has condition Y is not a Z but rather is a Q.

    granted because of the use of the word rule for both X and Z there is a visual ambiguity, i'll grant your that. here. let me rephrase it to remove the ambiguity. "Any proposed rule that has exceptions is not a Rule, merely a guideline"

  • (disco)

    Is it just me, or does TRWTF have more to do with the maintenance routine?

  • (disco) in reply to kupfernigk

    ad ho·mi·nem ˌad ˈhämənəm/ adverb & adjective 1. (of an argument or reaction) directed against a person rather than the position they are maintaining. "vicious ad hominem attacks" 2. relating to or associated with a particular person. "the office was created ad hominem for Fenton"

    Frankly, the original and edited version of the text may not literally match definition 1, but you know as well as I do that calling someone an asshole is done with the full intent of undercutting his position as well. Unless you happen to write "Blakeyrat is absolutely right, but he's a pus-ridden offspring of a diseased camel-driver and his animal."

    And, finally, I'm damn proud to be an elitist. Apparently a lot of folks think "eliitist" means "rich asshole who hates everyone," It doesn'tl. Go look it up.

    And besides, I'm an OTTer , so there!

  • (disco) in reply to cellocgw
    cellocgw:
    And besides, I'm an OTTer , so there!
    [image]

    :question:

  • (disco) in reply to accalia

    Well, duh, he'd sneak in an reprogram the Kobayashi-Maru software. Did you really miss that reference? :smile:

  • (disco) in reply to accalia

    See xkcd.com/1190 and the forum thread thereof

  • (disco) in reply to cellocgw
    cellocgw:
    Did you really miss that reference?

    wot? me? [image] does this look like the face of someone who would miss a startrek reference?

  • (disco) in reply to Maciejasjmj
    Maciejasjmj:
    if you don't trust your programmers not to break their workstations and infest them with millions of viruses, then gee, maybe you shouldn't have hired them.

    Sysadmins are in charge of hiring developers now?

  • (disco) in reply to riking
    riking:
    For some reason I think I've read this one before.

    for some reason i think i've read this post before

  • (disco)
    kupfernigk:
    There is no conflict between risk taking tendencies and a desire to promote one's own survival.

    I didn't say there was. I was pointing out that lower empathy and increased risk taking don't have to lead to just the risky behavior you are talking about. Think of someone rushing into a burning building (risky behavior) to pull people out; the pulling people out doesn't have to be caused by care for them, but can instead come from "I'll get praise for this!" (which falls under lowered empathy). There are constructive uses for the (IIRC, and numerical changes due to diagnostic changes) like 1% of the population that qualifies under the label.

  • (disco) in reply to Jarry

    Hey, what can I say? I'm doing it wrong and replying before reading the thread.

  • (disco) in reply to riking
    riking:
    Hey, what can I say? I'm doing it wrong and replying before reading the thread.

    It is? Thought that was SOP. Oh wait, that's the Likes thread :arrow_right:

  • (disco) in reply to Maciejasjmj

    People in IT rarely, if ever, have a say in who other departments hire.

  • (disco) in reply to accalia
    accalia:
    does this look like the face of someone who would miss a startrek reference?

    Star Trek reference, or chicken piece? Which to choose? Which to choose? Trek or chicken.

    Trek… or chicken…

  • (disco) in reply to accalia

    what I was telling you is that as soon as you can assume the rule / statement you propose has an exception it loses its character as a rule. The problem with that is that since its no longer a rule that a rule with an exception can not be a rule (because it is now a guideline), it is not being enforced on said (now) guideline. Effectively making it a rule again. But now its a rule that a rule with an exception can not be a rule... et infintum.... (or whatever... my latin is years back).

    You have essentially created a deadlock or a race condition (to speak in programmers terms) or simply a paradoxon. . I tried to create some code for that... but its too late... sorry....

    Filed Under: imagine a race-condition / Deadlock / whatever terribleness you want

  • (disco) in reply to Kuro

    Filed Under: [imagine a race-condition on a human face -- forever] (#tag)

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