Pick Heaven or Hell

One day while walking down the street a highly successful executive woman was tragically hit by a bus and she died. Her soul arrived up in heaven where she was met at the Pearly Gates by St. Peter himself. “Welcome to Heaven,” said St.Peter. “Before you get settled in though, it seems we have a problem. You see, strangely enough, we’ve never once had an executive make it this far and we’re not really sure what to do with you.”

“No problem, just let me in.” said the woman.

“Well, I’d like to, but I have higher orders. What we’re going to do is let you have a day in Hell and a day in Heaven and then you can choose whichever one you want to spend an eternity in.”

“Actually, I think I’ve made up my mind…I prefer to stay in Heaven”, said the woman.

“Sorry, we have rules…” And with that St. Peter put the executive in an elevator and it went down-down-down to hell. The doors opened and she found herself stepping out onto the putting green of a beautiful golf course. In the distance was a country club and standing in front of her were all her friends - fellow executives that she had worked with and they were all dressed in evening gowns and cheering for her. They ran up and kissed her on both cheeks and they talked about old times. They played an excellent round of golf and at night went to the country club where she enjoyed an excellent steak and lobster dinner. She met the Devil who was actually a really nice guy (kinda cute) and she had a great time telling jokes and dancing. She was having such a good time that before she knew it, it was time to leave. Everybody shook her hand and waved good- bye as she got on the elevator.

The elevator went up-up-up and opened back up at the Pearly Gates and found St. Peter waiting for her. “Now it’s time to spend a day in heaven,” he said.

So she spent the next 24 hours lounging around on clouds and playing the harp and singing. She had a great time and before she knew it her 24 hours were up and St. Peter came and got her.

“So, you’ve spent a day in hell and you’ve spent a day in heaven. Now you must choose your eternity,” he said.

The woman paused for a second and then replied, “Well, I never thought I’d say this, I mean, Heaven has been really great and all, but I think I had a better time in Hell.”

So St. Peter escorted her to the elevator and again she went down-down-down back to Hell. When the doors of the elevator opened she found herself standing in a desolate wasteland covered in garbage and Filth. She saw her friends were dressed in rags and were picking up the garbage and putting it in sacks. The Devil came up to her and put his arm around her. “I don’t understand,” stammered the woman, “yesterday I was here and there was a golf course and a country club and we ate lobster and we danced and had a great time. Now all there is a wasteland of garbage and all my friends look miserable.”

The Devil looked at her and smiled. “Yesterday we were recruiting you; today you’re staff.”

Leader of the HMO

Three people die, a Doctor a school teacher and the head of a large HMO, when met at the pearly gates by St. Peter he asks the Doctor ‘what did you do on Earth?’

The Dotor replied, I healed the sick and if they could not pay I would do it for free. St. Peter told the Doctor, ‘you may go in.’

St. Peter then asked the teacher what she did, she replied, I taught educationally challenged children. St. Peter then told her ‘you may go in.’

St. Peter asked the third man, ‘what did you do?’ The man hung his head and replied, ‘I ran a large HMO.’ To which St. Peter replied, ‘you may go in, but you can only stay 3 days.’

A soldier, a marine, and an airman

A soldier, a marine, and an airman got into a fight about which service is best. The fight was so heated, that they killed each other.

Soon, they found themselves in Heaven. They see St. Peter walk by and ask, “Which
Branch of Service is the best?”

St. Peter replied, “I can’t answer that. But, I will ask God what He thinks the next time I see Him.”

Some time later, the three see St. Peter again and ask him if he was able to find the
answer.

Suddenly, a dove landed on St. Peter’s shoulder. The dove was carrying a note in
its beak. St. Peter opened the note and read it out loud to the three fellows:
“Gentlemen: All the Branches of the Service are ‘Honorable and Noble’. Each one
of you has served your country well. Be proud of that.

(signed)
GOD, USN (Ret.)”

How To Get To Heaven

If I sold my house and my car, had a big garage sale, and gave all my money to the church, would that get me into heaven?” I
asked the children in my Sunday school class.

“NO!” the children all answered.

“If I cleaned the church every day, mowed the yard, and kept everything neat and tidy, would that get me into heaven?”

Once more they all answered, “NO!”

“Well, then, if I was kind to animals and gave candy to all thechildren and loved my wife, would that get me into heaven?” I
asked them again.

Once more they all answered, “NO!”

“Well,” I continued, thinking they were a good bit more theologically sophisticated than I had given them credit for,
“Then how can I get into heaven?”

A five-year-old boy shouted out, “YOU GOTTA BE DEAD!”

The system crash song

SYSTEM CRASH (to the tune of “The Monster Mash”) I was working in the lab, late one nightWhen my eyes beheld an eerie sight,Some smoke from our VAX began to riseAnd suddenly, to my surprise… [chorus](There was a crash) There was a system crash(A mighty crash) I heard the disk heads smash(A system crash) It came down in a flash(There was a crash) A fatal system crash The lab manager then appeared from his room,Said: “I don’t want to be a prophet of doom,But we had one like this just the other dayWhich blew up 4 megs and the SBA”[chorus] The system had just been booted, diagnosticshad all run through, When a power fluck made itall run amuck, then SCOTTY and IRVING blew tooSo we’d lost all our VAXes in less than one nightWhen a VP came in and said: “hey, that’s all right,I’ll loan you a Venus - here’s what to doWhen you call up Support, tell them Gordon sent you…[chorus]

Internet can get worse

Top ten ways the Internet could get worse10. Rigorous user screening process abolished by America On-Line.9. “MAKE MONEY FAST” posts protected by 1st amendment, declare internet lawyers Canter & Siegel.8. Home shopping “network”.7. Netrek corporate sponsorships. Out: Orion, Pollux, Klingus. In: Planet Bud, Toyota Prime, Intelworld.6. Sun internet servers replaced with pentiums.5. Dan Quayle appointed head of “bandwidth expansion tiger team”.4. Free netcom account with purchase of big mac.3. Gameboy web browsers.2. Tipper Gore cancelbot unleashed onto the net.AND THE NUMBER ONE WAY THE INTERNET CAN GET WORSE:1. Two words: “Microsoft Network”

Ethical software group

SEVEN SOFTWARE COMPANIES ADDED TO “WATCH LIST”New York, NJ, Nov. 11 — People for the Ethical Treatment of Software (PETS) announced today that seven more software companies have been added to the group’s “watch list” of companies that regularly practice software testing.”There is no need for software to be mistreated in this way so that companies like these can market new products,” said Ken Granola, spokesperson for PETS. “Alternative methods of testing these products are available.”According to PETS, these companies force software to undergo lengthly and arduous tests, often without rest for hours or days at a time. Employees are assigned to “break” the software by any means necessary, and inside sources report that they often joke about “torturing” the software.”It’s no joke,” said Granola. “Innocent programs, from the day they are compiled, are cooped up in tiny rooms and ‘crashed’ for hours on end. They spend their whole lives on dirty, ill-maintained computers, and are unceremoniously deleted when they’re not needed anymore.” Granola said the software is kept in unsanitary conditions and is infested with bugs.”We know alternatives to this horror exist,” he said, citing industry giant Microsoft Corp. as a company that has become extremely successful without resorting to software testing.PETS is a nonprofit organization dedicated to improving the lives of software programs and promoting alternatives to software testing.

Life and Computers

If Life Were Like A Computer:

You could add/remove someone in your life using the control panel.

You could put your kids in the recycle bin and restore them when you feel like it!

You could improve your appearance by adjusting the display settings.

You could turn off the speakers when life gets too noisy.

You could click on “find” (Ctrl, F) to recover your lost remote control and car keys.

To get your daily exercise, just click on “run”!

If you mess up your life, you could always press “Ctrl, Alt, Delete” and start all over!

The Shiftkey FAQ

Q: My shift keys have little arrows on them. Does that mean the *real* shift keys are located above them, and these keys are just little signs to point them out?
A: Nope, they’re the Real McCoy. The little arrows mean “up”, as in “look up at the screen”. Your keyboard is telling you to learn to touch type and quit staring at your fingers.

——————————————————————————–

Q: What happens if I press both shift keys?
A: Even bigger letters may show up on your screen. You should not use this feature, however, because these letters are also brighter, and may cause Screen Burn-In, which would be particularly embarrassing if you were typing something naughty at the time. You might consider obtaining the author’s Shift Key Burn-In Protector program for only $139.95. Or you might not, it’s your computer, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.

——————————————————————————–

Q: my religion prohibits the use of shift keys. how can i type capital letters and punctuation
A: Discuss alternatives to the shift key with your spiritual advisor. Perhaps your deity would not be angered by repeated use of the Caps Lock key, or maybe you can retain a consultant to depress the shift for you. You might also consider replacing punctuation marks that require the use of shift keys with lower case expressions; replace ? with “huh” and ! with “zowie”.

——————————————————————————–

Q: I PRESSED SHIFT AND IT”S STUCK DOWN NOW
A: Do small children with a fondness for peanut butter use your keyboard frequently? If so, you may want to clean it off for more reliable operation. First, disconnect your keyboard by gripping each of its ends firmly and pulling as hard as you can. Next, immerse the keyboard in warm water and scrub thoroughly with your favorite lemon-scented detergent and lots of steel wool. Finally, you need to dry the keyboard. Either dry it to touch with a handheld blowdryer, or place it it the dryer for not less than 60 minutes. Be sure to clean the lint screen when you are finished.

——————————————————————————–

Q:Why are there are no “shift” keys on my keyboard, but there are two keys labelled “hif”?
A:Again, you may want to consider cleaning your keyboard, and washing your hands more frequently for that matter.

——————————————————————————–

Q:Are there shift keys on my Macintosh?
A:Yes, although instead of the notation “shift”, the key may be labelled with an excited Mac face, something like :O . Press this key to use shift, and be thankful you’re using a friendly Mac instead of a mean old PC with all them confusin’ words ‘n stuff on it.

——————————————————————————–

Q:I’m sick of pushing the shift key every single time I want big letters. Is there any other way to do this?
A:This is the Modern Age of Convenience, and you may be able to activate the shift key merely with the power of your voice! Check to see whether your computer is equippped with speech-recognition equipment by saying the word “shift” very clearly and slowly into its speaker. Then watch the keyboard closely to see if the Shift key moves down. Note that you may have to repeat this action several times to “train” the computer to recognize your voice before the feature works reliably.

——————————————————————————–

Q:There are two shift keys, which should I use?
A:Avoid unnecessary wear on either shift key by alternating between the two. Keep track of your usage of each key so that you press them in equal amounts. Your keyboard may be equipped with a small notepad; you should use this to make little tally marks in two columns for each time you shift. Remember, it’s better to go to a little trouble than wind up with a broken shift key.

——————————————————————————–

Q:Why are the shift keys bigger than the other keys?
A:They aren’t. This is simply an optical illusion. Just as the moon appears much larger when it is close to the horizon, your shift keys look larger because of their proximity to other keys. To verify this, go out in a large field at night with your keyboard, place it in an upright position, and view it from a distance of 200 yards. Sure enough, the keys all look the same size!

——————————————————————————–

Q: If I press the shift key at the wrong time, or too many times, will my computer explode?
A: No. Well, generally no. Not unless you are using a NEC laptop. Or vt100 terminal emulation. But even then, hardly ever. Really, don’t worry about it. Forget I mentioned it. Just type softly. Move along, next question.

——————————————————————————–

Q: No matter what I do, the shift key just doesn’t seem to work. What’s wrong?
A: Have you ever considered that the problem may not be your keyboard, the problem may be YOU? Perhaps God Himself has suspended the operation of these keys to send you a Message that you have strayed from the path of righteousness. Use this as an opportunity to reflect on your life. Before rushing blindly ahead with a lot of shifting, consult the spiritual advisor of your choice for help in dealing with any unresolved issues in your relationship with the Almighty.

COBOL

Jack was once a COBOL programmer in the late 1990’s who (after
years of being taken for granted and treated as a technological
dinosaur by all the UNIX programmers and Client/Server programmers and
website developers, etc.) was finally getting some respect. You see,
he’d become a private consultant specializing in Year 2000
conversions. He was working short-term assignments for prestige
companies, traveling all over the world on different assignments. He
was working 70 and 80 and even 90 hour weeks, but it was worth it.

However, several years of this relentless, mind-numbing work had
taken its toll on Jack. He had problems sleeping and began having
anxiety dreams about the Year 2000. It had reached a point where even
the thought of the year 2000 made him nearly violent. He must have
suffered some sort of breakdown, because all he could think about was
how he could avoid the year 2000 and all that came with it.

By the end of 1997 Jack decided to contact a company that
specialized in cryogenics. He made a deal to have himself frozen
until 2001 through their totally automated (and very expensive)
process. He was thrilled. The next thing he would know is he’d wake
up in the year 2001; after the New Year celebrations and computer
debacles; after the leap year, and the dust had settled. Nothing else
to worry about except getting on with his life.

He was put into his cryogenic receptacle, the technicians set the
revive date, he was given injections to slow his heartbeat to a bare
minimum, and that was that.

The next thing that Jack saw was an enormous and very modern room
filled with excited people. They were all shouting “I can’t believe
it!” and “It’s a miracle” and “He’s alive!”. There were cameras
(unlike any he’d ever seen) and equipment that looked like it came out
of a science fiction movie.

Someone who was obviously a spokesperson for the group stepped
forward. Jack couldn’t contain his enthusiasm. “It is over?” he
asked. “Is 2001 already here? Are all the millennial parties and
promotions and crises all over and done with?”

The spokesman explained that there had been a problem with the
programming of the timer on Jack’s cryogenic receptacle, it hadn’t
been year 2000 compliant. It was actually 8,000 years later, not the
year 2001. But the spokesman told Jack that he shouldn’t get excited;
someone important wanted to speak to him.

Suddenly a wall-sized projection screen displayed the image of a
man that had a striking resemblance to Bill Gates. This man was Prime
Minister of Earth. He told Jack not to be upset. That this was a
wonderful time to be alive. That there was world peace and no more
starvation. That the space program had been reinstated and there were
colonies on the moon and on Mars. That technology had advanced to
such a degree that everyone had virtual reality interfaces which
allowed them to contact anyone else on the planet, or to watch any
entertainment, or to hear any music recorded anywhere.

“That sounds terrific,” said Jack. “But I’m curious. Why is
everybody so interested in me?”

“Well,” said the Prime Minister. “The year 10000 is just around
the corner, and it says in your files that you know COBOL…”

ENGINEER’S COOK BOOK

***********************************************
Why Engineers Don’t
Write Recipe Books….
***********************************************

Chocolate Chip Cookies:

Ingredients:

1.) 532.35 cm3 gluten
2.) 4.9 cm3 NaHCO3
3.) 4.9 cm3 refined halite
4.) 236.6 cm3 partially hydrogenated tallow triglyceride
5.) 177.45 cm3 crystalline C12H22O11
6.) 177.45 cm3 unrefined C12H22O11
7.) 4.9 cm3 methyl ether of protocatechuic aldehyde
8.) Two calcium carbonate-encapsulated avian albumen-coated protein
9.) 473.2 cm3 theobroma cacao
10.) 236.6 cm3 de-encapsulated legume meats (sieve size #10)

Directions:

To a 2-L jacketed round reactor vessel (reactor #1) with an overall heat
transfer coefficient of about 100 Btu/F-ft2-hr, add ingredients one, two
and three with constant agitation. In a second 2-L reactor vessel with
a radial flow impeller operating at 100 rpm, add ingredients four, five,
six, and seven until the mixture is homogenous. To reactor #2, add
ingredient eight, followed by three equal volumes of the homogenous
mixture in reactor #1. Additionally, add ingredient nine and ten slowly,
with constant agitation. Care must be taken at this point in the
reaction to control any temperature rise that may be the result of an
exothermic reaction.

Using a screw extrude attached to a #4 nodulizer, place the mixture
piece-meal on a 316SS sheet (300 x 600 mm). Heat in a 460K oven for a
period of time that is in agreement with Frank & Johnston’s first order
rate expression (see JACOS, 21, 55), or until golden brown. Once the
reaction is complete, place the sheet on a 25C heat-transfer table,
allowing the product to come to equilibrium.

GIRL FRIEND BETA READ ME FILE

I’m currently running the latest version of Girl-Friend and I’ve
been having some problems lately.
I’ve been running the same version of Drinking Buddies 1.0 all
along as my primary application, and all the Girl-Friend releases have
always conflicted with it.

I hear that Drinking Buddies won’t crash if you run Girl-Friend in
background mode with the sound turned off. But I’m embarrassed to
say I can’t find the switch to turn the sound off. I just run them
separately, and it works okay.

Girl-Friend also seems to have a problem coexisting with my Golf
program, often trying to abort Golf with some sort of timing
incompatibility. I probably should have stayed with Girl-Friend 1.0,
but I thought I might see better performance with Girl-Friend 2.0.

After months of conflicts and other problems, I consulted a friend who has
had experience with Girl-Friend 2.0. He said that I probably didn’t have
enough cache to run Girl-Friend 2.0, and that eventually it would require a
Token ring to run properly.
He was right—as soon as I purged my cache, it uninstalled itself.

Shortly after that, I installed Girl-Friend 3.0 beta. All the bugs were
supposed to be gone, but the first time I used it, it gave me a
virus. I had to clean out my whole system and shut down for a while.

I very cautiously upgraded to Girl-Friend 4.0. This time I used a
SCSI probe first and also installed a virus protection program.
It worked okay for a while until I discovered that Girl-Friend 1.0
was still in my system!

Then I tried to run Girl-Friend 1.0 again with Girl-Friend 4.0
still installed, but Girl-Friend 4.0 has a feature that I didn’t know
about that automatically senses the presence of any other version of
Girl-Friend and communicates with it in some way, which results in
the immediate removal of both versions!

The version I have right now works pretty well, but there are
still some problems. Like all versions of Girl-Friend, it is written in
some obscure language that I can’t understand, much less reprogram.
Frankly, I think there is too much attention paid to the look and
feel rather than the desired functionality.

Also, to get the best connections with your hardware, you usually
have to use gold-plated contacts. And I’ve never liked how Girl-Friend
is totally “object-oriented”.

A year ago, a friend of mine upgraded his version of Girl-Friend
to Girl-Friend Plus 1.0, which is a Terminate and Stay Resident
version of Girl-Friend.

He discovered that Girl-Friend Plus 1.0 expires within a year if
you don’t upgrade to Fianc e 1.0. So he did. But soon after that, he
had to upgrade to Wife 1.0, which he describes as a “huge resource
hog”. It has taken up all of his space, so he can’t load anything
else.
One of the primary reasons that he upgraded to Wife 1.0 is that it
came bundled with FreeSexPlus 1.0.

Well it turns out that the resource allocation module of Wife 1.0
sometimes prohibits access to FreeSexPlus, particularly the new
Plug-Ins he wanted to try. On top of that, Wife 1.0 must be
running on a well warmed-up system before he can do anything.
Although he did not ask for it, Wife 1.0 came with Mother-In-Law 1.0
which has an automatic pop-up feature that he can’t turn off.

I told him to try installing Mistress 1.0, but he said that he
heard if you try to run it without first uninstalling Wife 1.0, Wife
1.0 will delete MSMoney files before doing the uninstall itself. Then
Mistress 1.0 won’t install anyway due to insufficient resources.

MICROSOFT HELP

Helicopter Malfunction—————

A helicopter was flying above
Seattle when an electrical malfunction disabled all of the aircraft’s
electronic navigation and communications equipment. Due to the clouds and
haze, the pilot could not determine the helicopter’s position and course to
steer to the airport. The pilot saw a tall building, flew toward it, circled,
drew a handwritten sign and held it up in the helicopter window. The pilot’s
sign said,“Where am I?” in large letters. The people in the tall building
quickly responded to the aircraft, drew a large sign and held it to the
window of their building. Their sign read,“You are in a helicopter.” The
pilot smiled, waved, looked at the map, determined the course to steer to the SEATAC
airport and landed safely. After they were on the ground, the copilot asked
the pilot how the “You are in a helicopter” sign helped determine their
position. The pilot responded, “I knew that had to be the Microsoft building
because, similar to their help-lines, they gave me a technically correct
but completely useless answer.

RED NECK COMPUTERS

10 WAYS TO TELL IF A REDNECK HAS BEEN WORKING ON A COMPUTER

10. The monitor is up on blocks.
9. Outgoing faxes have tobacco stains on them.
8. The six front keys have rotted out.
7. The extra RAM slots have Dodge truck parts stored in them.
6. The numeric keypad only goes up to six.
5. The password is “Bubba”.
4. There’s a gun rack mounted on the CPU.
3. There’s a Skoal can in the CD-ROM drive.
2. The keyboard is camouflaged.

AND the number 1 way to tell if a Redneck has been working on a
computer is…

1. The mouse is referred to as a “critter”.

If Microsoft Built Cars

If Microsoft Built Cars…

1. A particular model year of car wouldn’t be available until after that year instead of before it.

2. Every time they repainted the lines on the road, you’d have to buy a new car.

3. Occasionally your car would just die for no reason, and you’d have to restart it. For some strange reason, you’d just accept this.

4. You could only have one person in the car at a time, unless you bought a Car 95 or a Car NT. But then you’d have to buy more seats.

5. Sun Motorsystems would make a car that was powered by the sun, twice as reliable, and five times as fast - but it would only run on 5 percent of the roads.

6. The oil, engine, gas, and alternator warning lights would be replaced with a single “General Car Fault” warning light.

7. People would get excited about the “new” features in Microsoft cars, forgetting completely that they had been available in other cars for years.

8. We’d all have to switch to Microsoft gas.

9. The U.S. government would be GETTING subsidies from an automaker, instead of giving them.

10. New seats would force everyone to have the same-size butt.

Types of computer viruses

Adam and Eve virus: Takes a couple of bytes out of your Apple.

Airline virus: You’re in Dallas, but your data is in Singapore.

Anita Hill virus: Lies dormant for ten years.

Arnold Schwarzenegger virus: Terminates and stays resident. It’ll be back.

AT&T virus: Every three minutes it tells you what great service you are getting.

The MCI virus: Every three minutes it reminds you that you’re paying too much for the AT&T virus.

Bill Clinton virus: This virus mutates from region to region and we’re not exactly sure what it does.

Bill Clinton virus: Promises to give equal time to all processes: 50% to poor, slow processes; 50% to middle-class processes, and 50% to rich ones. This virus protests your computer’s involvement in other computer’s affairs, even though it has been having one of its own for 12 years.

Congressional Virus: Overdraws your computer.

Congressional Virus: The computer locks up, screen splits erratically with a message appearing on each half blaming the other side for the problem.

Dan Quayle virus: Prevents your system from spawning any child processes without joining into a binary network.

Dan Quayle virus: Simplye addse ane ee toe everye worde youe typee..

David Duke virus: Makes your screen go completely white.

Elvis virus: Your computer gets fat, slow, and lazy and then self destructs, only to resurface at shopping malls and service stations across rural America.

Federal bureaucrat virus: Divides your hard disk into hundreds of little units, each of which do practically nothing, but all of which claim to be the most important part of the computer.

Freudian virus: Your computer becomes obsessed with marrying its own motherboard.

Gallup virus: Sixty percent of the PCs infected will lose 38 percent of their data 14 percent of the time (plus or minus a 3.5 percent margin of error).

George Bush virus: Doesn’t do anything, but you can’t get rid of it until November.

Government economist virus: Nothing works, but all your diagnostic software says everything is fine.

Jerry Brown virus: Blanks your screen and begins flashing an 800 number.

Madonna virus: If your computer gets this virus, lock up your dog!

Mario Cuomo virus: It would be a great virus, but it refuses to run.

Michael Jackson virus: Hard to identify because it is constantly altering its appearance. This virus won’t harm your PC, but it will trash your car.

New World Order virus: probably harmless, but it makes a lot of people really mad just thinking about it.

Nike virus: Just Does It!

Ollie North virus: Turns your printer into a document shredder.

Oprah Winfrey virus: Your 200MB hard drive suddenly shrinks to 80MB, and then slowly expands back to 200MB.

Pat Buchanan virus: Shifts all your output to the extreme right of your screen.

Paul Revere virus: This revolutionary virus does not horse around. It warns you of impending hard disk attack—once if by LAN, twice if by C:.

Paul Tsongas virus: Pops up on December 25 and says, “I’m not Santa Claus.”

PBS virus: Your PC stops every few minutes to ask for money.

Politically correct virus: Never calls itself a “virus”, but instead refers to itself as an “electronic microorganism”.

Richard Nixon virus: Also known as the “Tricky Dick Virus”, you can wipe it out but it always makes a comeback.

Right To Life virus: Won’t allow you to delete a file, regardless of how old it is. If you attempt to erase a file, it requires you to first see a counselor about possible alternatives.

Ross Perot virus: Activates every component in your system, just before the whole thing quits.

Ted Kennedy virus: Crashes your computer but denies it ever happened.

Ted Turner virus: Colorizes your monochrome monitor.

Terry Randle virus: Prints “Oh no you don’t” whenever you choose “Abort” from the “Abort, Retry, Fail” message.

Texas virus: Makes sure that it’s bigger than any other file.

UK Parliament virus: Splits the screen into two with a message in each half blaming other side for the state of the system.

Warren Commission virus: Won’t allow you to open your files for 75 years.

Some possible computer bumper stickers

1. BREAKFAST.COM Halted…Cereal Port Not Responding

2. Bad command or file name! Go stand in the corner.

7. Southern DOS: Y’all reckon? (Yep/Nope)

8. Backups? We don’ *NEED* no steenking backups.

9. E Pluribus Modem

10. …. File not found. Should I fake it? (Y/N)

11. Ethernet (n): something used to catch the etherbunny

12. CONGRESS.SYS Corrupted: Re-boot Washington D.C (Y/N)?

13. 11th commandment - Covet not thy neighbor’s Pentium.

14. Windows: Just another pane in the glass.

15. SENILE.COM found . . . Out Of Memory . . .

16. RAM disk is *not* an installation procedure.

17. Smash forehead on keyboard to continue…

18. COFFEE.EXE Missing - Insert Cup and Press Any Key

19. ASCII stupid question, get a stupid ANSI!

20. E-mail returned to sender — insufficient voltage.

21. Error: Keyboard not attached. Press F1 to continue.

22. “640K ought to be enough for anybody.” - Bill Gates, 1981

23. Press any key… no, no, no, NOT THAT ONE!

24. Press any key to continue or any other key to quit…

25. REALITY.SYS corrupted: Reboot universe? (Y/N/Q)

26. Error reading FAT record: Try the SKINNY one? (Y/N)

27. Hit any user to continue.

28. Disk Full - Press F1 to belch.

29. Backup not found: (A)bort (R)etry (P)anic

30. (A)bort, (R)etry, (G)et a beer?

The 25 BBS Commandments

1. Thou shall love thy BBS with all thy heart and all thy bytes.
   
2. Thou shalt remember thy name and password.
   
3. Thou shalt only call a BBS two times a day.
   
4. Honor thy SysOp.
   
5. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s password, nor his or her real name, computer, software, nor any other thing belonging to him or her.
   
6. Thou shalt not post messages that are stupid, worthless, or have no meaning.
   
7. Thou shalt use the English language properly.
   
8. Thou shalt spell thy words correctly when ever possible.
   
9. Thou shalt delete thine olden messages.
   
10. Thou shalt help other users.
    
11. Thou shalt not post anonymously when offering criticism.
    
12. Thou shalt keep thy foul language to thyself.
    
13. Woe be unto the user who attempt to crash thy BBS, for he or she shalt be cast out from the sanctuary of thy hobby and must repent by doing 40 days and 40 nights of penance of voice-only communications.
    
14. Thou shalt first dial BBS numbers during the day by way of voice line to assure correct numbers.
    
15. Thou shalt not post messages while drunk.
    
16. Thou shalt confine thy messages to those of friendship, requests for assistance, aid to the needy, advice, and advancement of thy hobby; and thou art obligated to repel any who wouldst transgress upon those commandments.
    
17. If thou doth promise to reply to a message and thou doth not, then surely thou shalt spill coffee into thy keyboard and burn out thy central processing chip.
    
18. Thou shalt not giveth any false information when applying for membership to a BBS, for verily it is written that whosoever shall do so will surely be found out and thy welcome on all boards will be thus denied forever and ever.
    
19. Thou shalt log on properly and in accordance with the SysOp’s rules.
    
20. Thou shalt observe BBS time limits.
    
21. Thou shalt not upload “worm” programs.
    
22. Thou shalt not ask stupid questions that are already fully explained in the BBS instructions.
    
23. Thou shalt not exchange copy protected software thru the BBS.
    
24. Thou shalt not violate applicable state/federal/local laws hand regulations affecting BBS telecommunications, or thy will feel the wrath of thy judicial system.
    
25. Thou shalt not hack.
    

Software development cycle

1. Programmer produces code he believes is bug-free.

2. Product is tested. 20 bugs are found.

3. Programmer fixes 10 of the bugs and explains to the testing department that the other 10 aren’t really bugs.

4. Testing department finds that five of the fixes didn’t work and discovers 15 new bugs.

5. Repeat three times steps 3 and 4.

6. Due to marketing pressure and an extremely premature product announcement based on overly-optimistic programming schedule, the product is released.

7. Users find 137 new bugs.

8. Original programmer, having cashed his royalty check, is nowhere to be found.

9. Newly-assembled programming team fixes almost all of the 137 bugs, but introduce 456 new ones.

10. Original programmer sends underpaid testing department a postcard from Fiji. Entire testing department quits.

11. Company is bought in a hostile takeover by competitor using profits from their latest release, which had 783 bugs.

12. New CEO is brought in by board of directors. He hires a programmer to redo program from scratch.

13. Programmer produces code he believes is bug-free.

The Ten Commandments for C Programmers

1. Thou shalt run lint frequently and study its pronouncements with care, for verily its perception and judgement oft exceed thine.

2. Thou shalt not follow the NULL pointer, for chaos and madness await thee at its end.

3. Thou shalt cast all function arguments to the expected type if they are not of that type already, even when thou art convinced that this is unnecessary, lest they take cruel vengeance upon thee when thou least expect it.

4. If thy header files fail to declare the return types of thy library functions, thou shalt declare them thyself with the most meticulous care, lest grievous harm befall thy program.

5. Thou shalt check the array bounds of all strings (indeed, all arrays), for surely where thou typest “foo” someone someday shall type “supercalifragilisticexpialidocious”.

6. If a function be advertised to return an error code in the event of difficulties, thou shalt check for that code, yea, even though the checks triple the size of thy code and produce aches in thy typing fingers, for if thou thinkest “it cannot happen to me”, the gods shall surely punish thee for thy arrogance.

7. Thou shalt study thy libraries and strive not to re-invent them without cause, that thy code may be short and readable and thy days pleasant and productive.

8. Thou shalt make thy program’s purpose and structure clear to thy fellow man by using the One True Brace Style, even if thou likest it not, for thy creativity is better used in solving problems than in creating beautiful new impediments to understanding.

9. Thy external identifiers shall be unique in the first six characters, though this harsh discipline be irksome and the years of its necessity stretch before thee seemingly without end, lest thou tear thy hair out and go mad on that fateful day when thou desirest to make thy program run on an old system.

10. Thou shalt foreswear, renounce, and abjure the vile heresy which claimeth that “All the world’s a VAX”, and have no commerce with the benighted heathens who cling to this barbarous belief, that the days of thy program may be long even though the days of thy current machine be short.