So you want to be a computer programmer when you grow up?

[jrandom]

1.7 million lines of C++.

That's the size of the project I have loaded into Visual Studio 2005 right now.

Throughout vast quantities of it that haven't been touched in the last five years, STL (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Template_Library) iterators are treated as equivalent to pointers, and STL vectors are treated as equivalent to arrays.

The pointers dance their cryptic shuffle across what are supposed to be generic template containers, while iterators are randomly dereferenced and picked up again via the address operator on anything that happens to be the same type.

All of this has been masked up until now, because the product has spent its last 7 years being built with the STLport libraries. It so happens that these libraries are implemented in a way which quietly works with the above treatment.

Naturally, nobody who wrote any of the relevant code still works here.

And now, The Powers That Be have decided that they must Move With The Times, and therefore The Product must be built with the Visual Studio STL, rather than relying on a dusty old open-source third-party library.

The task of doing whatever is necessary to achieve this, Dear Reader, has fallen upon me.

All hell is breaking loose as Microsoft's standards-compliant compiler and libraries start gagging and dying on the horrible way that this vast wad of vomit is abusing them.

I pick my way through the sea of incomprehensible 30-line error messages, one at a time, my psyche slowly dessicating with each successive file that I find myself checking out of Visual SourceSafe.

Ladies and gentlemen, contract software engineering on MIS products will steal your soul. What good is a fine-sounding hourly rate when you shuffle home every night with deadness in your eyes and no spring in your step?

I really just wanted to be a lumberjack.

[Finn]

Shouldn't be a problem for you old chap. You've done 2.8 million lines on KB in just 6 months.

[tide]

hahahaha coding makes my head hurt...

thats why grew up to be a network engineer... :chase::lol:

[yod]

try finding the extra dot in a 1270 script site WITH NO DEBUGGER....:oi-grr:

[davo]

Im a sysadmin.. users make my head hurt

[yod]

hahahaha coding makes my head hurt...

thats why grew up to be a network engineer... :chase::lol:

:lol:

and how are those endless compliance exams working out for ya?

[yod]

Im a sysadmin.. users make my head hurt

IT would be such a pleasant industry if there were no users.....

[dogsnbikes]

IT would be such a pleasant industry if there were no users.....

when did you grow up:rolleyes:

[-df-]

And people wonder why I switched from C++ to C#

Much nicer coding, and you get paid as much if not more now-a-days

[marioc]

Sounds like fun tbh

[MisterD]

1.7 million lines of C++.

<snip>

I really just wanted to be a lumberjack.

It looks like English, but why don't I understand a word of it, except that last sentence?

So here's a photo of a mighty Larch:

http://www.flowerphotographer.net/roth/attributes/bigimages/golden%20larch.jpg

[sels1]

Thats funny...I thought this was a motorbike forum....:dodge::innocent:

[Finn]

Thats funny...I thought this was a motorbike forum....:dodge::innocent:

Nerds ride motorbikes too you know.

[ManDownUnder]

Im a sysadmin.. users make my head hurt

I'm a KBer. Wankers make my head hurt

[jrandom]

Wanking makes my head hurt

Try using lube.

:niceone:

[davo]

IT would be such a pleasant industry if there were no users.....

Funny cos its true :niceone:


Sounds like fun tbh

I haven't meet you, but Im pretty sure there is something wrong with you. and its not a small thing either ;)

[davo]

I'm a KBer. Wankers make my head hurt

And yet you keep coming back to KB for more. Fetish? :buggerd:

[ManDownUnder]

Try using lube.

:niceone:

Don't you make your own? (...cunt...)


And yet you keep coming back to KB for more. Fetish?

Birds of a feather....

[jrandom]

Nerds ride motorbikes too you know.

<img src="http://i31.tinypic.com/28qqe7a.jpg"/>

[ManDownUnder]

Image Removed

LOL sitting on the fence between IT and management... I can't fault it

[sels1]

Nerds ride motorbikes too you know.

Yes, Ive noticed
So do accountants, schoolteachers, and rugby players. If we all wrote threads about our work the site could get a little busy. No offence...just an observation

[forkoil]

1.7 million lines of C++.

That's the size of the project I have loaded into Visual Studio 2005 right now.

What good is a fine-sounding hourly rate when you shuffle home every night with deadness in your eyes and no spring in your step?

I really just wanted to be a lumberjack.
Well the hourly rate prob DOES help but I know exactly how u feel. Once youve fixed a couple of these type errors the rest are just f*cken boring. Cant you write a quick parser in perl and change / highlight the problem code? Spending most of my time shell scripting now, actually miss C++, and C#, forget it, if I wanted Java I would have it.

[Finn]

Yes, Ive noticed
So do accountants, schoolteachers, and rugby players. If we all wrote threads about our work the site could get a little busy. No offence...just an observation

Wouldn't rugby players find it a bit difficult? They'd have to work both hands and feet independently. They'd also struggle with the helmet buckle too I imagine.

[forkoil]

Yes, Ive noticed
So do accountants, schoolteachers, and rugby players. If we all wrote threads about our work the site could get a little busy. No offence...just an observation
Also offenders and fencers.... vee talk only about zee motobiclist here, verboten!!

[R6_kid]

I did two years of 'computer science' at Auckland University. I was mislead and told that i would end up doing lots of different computer stuff (web/graphic design etc etc)... turned out to just be java programming... didnt find that out until the second year though ffs.

Now i've got a student loan, and instead of being a pilot already i'm only just getting started, but im fucking glad im not a programmer thats for sure!

[jrandom]

If we all wrote threads about our work the site could get a little busy. No offence... just an observation

I know.

:o

Sorry. Just felt like I had to vent.

And we do seem to have had a fair handful of threads over the years from people asking about careers in IT, so I thought that a fresh and detailed perspective from the trenches might be a useful tidbit to add to the archives for posterity.

[tide]

And we do seem to have had a fair handful of threads over the years from people asking about careers in IT, so I thought that a fresh and detailed perspective from the trenches might be a useful tidbit to add to the archives for posterity.

BS :devil2:

:bleh::dodge:

[pzkpfw]

Sorry. Just felt like I had to vent.

Don't apologise - this is a community, that happens to have Motorcycles as its common theme.

This IS the rant or rave section - if you'd posted under "Sprotbikes" or something, then you'd have something to apologise for.

Cheers,

[EJK]

1.7 Million lines? omg....



During my last years practical test, 72 lines was what I did...
I'm quitting programming next semester! :lol:

Thanks for the warning Sir. J :niceone:

[martybabe]

I'd love to get involved,really I would, If I had the first spiggin clue what you lot are on about. c++, c#. admit it, you made it all up. :rolleyes:

Oh but I defend your right to post this,whatever it is, in RnR and congrats on the longest title I've seen to date. :D

[Gremlin]

IT would be such a pleasant industry if there were no users.....
Thats just what I think when people break shit .... constantly....

mmm Visual Studio... and coding within it... what a suppressed memory that is :eek: Funnily enough, I ran out of uni at the end of the degree thinking hah, how useless, I'll never code again, and walked straight into a job where the boss wanted me to write a program to process logs :laugh:

Since then, I've actually come to like batch files and vb scripting, as its mighty useful... so who knows... can be useful :rolleyes:

[Edbear]

I know.

:o

Sorry. Just felt like I had to vent.

And we do seem to have had a fair handful of threads over the years from people asking about careers in IT, so I thought that a fresh and detailed perspective from the trenches might be a useful tidbit to add to the archives for posterity.

Quite rightly, too. You have helped me immensely, I had no idea what you were talking about until the last line, therefore I have decided not to be a computer programmer...;)

Funnily enough, my second and third jobs were in forestry...

[Ixion]

C followed by anything is wanking. there is only C. Pure and simple. Port it to Cobol, it'll run faster and be easier to maintain.

[Bonez]

1.7 million lines of C++.

That's the size of the project I have loaded into Visual Studio 2005 right now.

Throughout vast quantities of it that haven't been touched in the last five years, STL (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Template_Library) iterators are treated as equivalent to pointers, and STL vectors are treated as equivalent to arrays.

The pointers dance their cryptic shuffle across what are supposed to be generic template containers, while iterators are randomly dereferenced and picked up again via the address operator on anything that happens to be the same type.

All of this has been masked up until now, because the product has spent its last 7 years being built with the STLport libraries. It so happens that these libraries are implemented in a way which quietly works with the above treatment.

Naturally, nobody who wrote any of the relevant code still works here.

And now, The Powers That Be have decided that they must Move With The Times, and therefore The Product must be built with the Visual Studio STL, rather than relying on a dusty old open-source third-party library.

The task of doing whatever is necessary to achieve this, Dear Reader, has fallen upon me.

All hell is breaking loose as Microsoft's standards-compliant compiler and libraries start gagging and dying on the horrible way that this vast wad of vomit is abusing them.

I pick my way through the sea of incomprehensible 30-line error messages, one at a time, my psyche slowly dessicating with each successive file that I find myself checking out of Visual SourceSafe.

Ladies and gentlemen, contract software engineering on MIS products will steal your soul. What good is a fine-sounding hourly rate when you shuffle home every night with deadness in your eyes and no spring in your step?

I really just wanted to be a lumberjack.Go for an evening ride.

[marty]

Now i've got a student loan, and instead of being a pilot already i'm only just getting started, but im fucking glad im not a programmer thats for sure!

what stage are you up to with flying? did you go with north shore ?

[xwhatsit]

And now, The Powers That Be have decided that they must Move With The Times, and therefore The Product must be built with the Visual Studio STL, rather than relying on a dusty old open-source third-party library.Erm, I'm not one of the fellas wot hired you, but isn't that kind of painting yourself into a corner? Proprietary STL, wont to change at the whim of a pack of idiots somewhere else in the world -- compared to something that, however dusty, you can always grab the source and fiddle with it yourself? And you're paying somebody how much to make this regression?

C followed by anything is wanking. there is only C. Pure and simple. Port it to Cobol, it'll run faster and be easier to maintain.
As much as people keep telling me I'll want to get excited about OOP to be successful, my mind and heart still iterate together in pure C.

Can't quite share your enthusiasm for COBOL, you syntax-happy, white-shirted, blue-suited old man :laugh:

[Ixion]

I *likes* Cobol I does. A very underrated language. You can do a lot with Cobol. Did you know that you can use ocx controls in Cobol?

[El Dopa]

a job where I process logs

I do that for free every morning. Get some peace and quiet to read a bike mag while I'm doing it, too. Let me know how I can get paid for doing it - that would make it perfect.

[doc]

Shouldn't be a problem for you old chap. You've done 2.8 million lines on KB in just 6 months.

Right on, he's a good counta cos he has just counted another 1.7 million.
I just count minutes to the next smoko and it is really hard sometimes.

[McJim]

So we don't program in Forth, Pascal or Basic anymore? :rofl:

[limbimtimwim]

I *likes* Cobol I does. A very underrated language. You can do a lot with Cobol. Did you know that you can use ocx controls in Cobol?But *why* would you do that?

[limbimtimwim]

The task of doing whatever is necessary to achieve this, Dear Reader, has fallen upon me.Just say 'no'.

[Ixion]

But *why* would you do that?

Sheer devilment.

[Tank]

C#, C++ cobol (FFS), Pascal, turtle, OOP, agile programming methods, 1.7 million lines of code.

Jesus and you wonder people point and laugh at nerds. :laugh:

I also work in IT - but if people ever ask me what I do for a living, I tell them Im a builder. Then I never have anyone utter words like syntax to me at a party!

[Tank]

what stage are you up to with flying? did you go with north shore ?

or Finsbury Park mosque?

[jrandom]

Erm, I'm not one of the fellas wot hired you, but isn't that kind of painting yourself into a corner? Proprietary STL, wont to change at the whim of a pack of idiots somewhere else in the world -- compared to something that, however dusty, you can always grab the source and fiddle with it yourself?

Your perspective is flawed, dear lad.

Microsoft invest very significant R&D in their development tools. Far more than has ever been invested or will be invested in the open-source library to which I referred earlier. Any bottom-line-focused software company is silly if they fail to leverage that.

While it may be the instinctive reaction of a student or unemployed Free-as-in-Speech hippie to grab the source and fiddle with it because they can't afford a couple of grand for an MSDN subscription, time is money, and quite frankly, the thought of maintaining someone else's STL implementation should quite rightly give any software company CTO the screaming heebie-jeebies when they're assembling project timelines.

The company I'm working for hasn't the faintest hope in hell of being able to meaningfully invest in developing an open-source library to the level of anything that Microsoft supplies in its branded development tools, and in the end, all that matters is delivering a high-quality product to customers on time and on spec. Philosophical niceties and penny-pinching be damned; the average licenced installation of this product is worth close to seven figures of revenue.

Welcome to the real world, where working software equals profit.

[cowpoos]

1.7 million lines of C++.

That's the size of the project I have loaded into Visual Studio 2005 right now.

Throughout vast quantities of it that haven't been touched in the last five years, STL (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Template_Library) iterators are treated as equivalent to pointers, and STL vectors are treated as equivalent to arrays.

The pointers dance their cryptic shuffle across what are supposed to be generic template containers, while iterators are randomly dereferenced and picked up again via the address operator on anything that happens to be the same type.

All of this has been masked up until now, because the product has spent its last 7 years being built with the STLport libraries. It so happens that these libraries are implemented in a way which quietly works with the above treatment.

Naturally, nobody who wrote any of the relevant code still works here.

And now, The Powers That Be have decided that they must Move With The Times, and therefore The Product must be built with the Visual Studio STL, rather than relying on a dusty old open-source third-party library.

The task of doing whatever is necessary to achieve this, Dear Reader, has fallen upon me.

All hell is breaking loose as Microsoft's standards-compliant compiler and libraries start gagging and dying on the horrible way that this vast wad of vomit is abusing them.

I pick my way through the sea of incomprehensible 30-line error messages, one at a time, my psyche slowly dessicating with each successive file that I find myself checking out of Visual SourceSafe.

Ladies and gentlemen, contract software engineering on MIS products will steal your soul. What good is a fine-sounding hourly rate when you shuffle home every night with deadness in your eyes and no spring in your step?

I really just wanted to be a lumberjack.


Need real work stories??

[RantyDave]

What good is a fine-sounding hourly rate when you shuffle home every night with deadness in your eyes and no spring in your step?
For rental of my soul? $200/hr.

Fine. Get some other fucker to do it then.

Dave

[jrandom]

Fine. Get some other fucker to do it then.

Oh, don't worry, I'm about to.

:yes:

[Pussy]

Need real work stories??

Yep, and here's me getting pissed off when I get cowshit all over the aeroplane... pales into insignificance

[jim.cox]

Ah, The joys of cutting code...

[Brett]

I respect what you guys can do. But I wont pretend to understand it!

[avgas]

Yes, Ive noticed
So do accountants, schoolteachers, and rugby players. If we all wrote threads about our work the site could get a little busy. No offence...just an observation
Dude its not like fight club or anything - we all have to bitch about work somewhere. Not all of us get paid to loose rugby games lol

[avgas]

So we don't program in Forth, Pascal or Basic anymore? :rofl:
Nope and my shed full of cards with holes in them is useless too

[tide]

Nope and my shed full of cards with holes in them is useless too

ah punch cards... those where the days... :dodge:thank f..k I grew up in the modern era... :whistle:

[Finn]

ah punch cards... those where the days... :dodge:thank f..k I grew up in the modern era... :whistle:

Yeah, now we punch our computers. I know I do.

[forkoil]

ah punch cards... those where the days... :dodge:thank f..k I grew up in the modern era... :whistle:
Agree with that (although it was fun using the IBM 029 duplicating and holding the source card to insert a column or 2 in the new card - who will remember THAT). But alot of things are worse now, like the proliferation of stuff, all too f*cken confusing now, theres absolutely no sense or comfort that you pretty much know everything anymore! And everythings TOO SERIOUS, wheres the FUN at work these days!!

[jrandom]

A few moments ago:

========== Rebuild All: 24 succeeded, 0 failed, 0 skipped ==========

:woohoo:

[xwhatsit]

Quick, it compiles, ship it!

[jrandom]

Quick, it compiles, ship it!

Or, at least, throw a build over to the QA department and duck behind the prepared wall of sandbags...

[Sanx]

or Finsbury Park mosque?

*snicker* Anyway, isn't it hard to find a plane you can fly with one eye and one hand?

As for coding: whilst C++ can be an elegant language, I've never failed to understand why they couldn't include a string variable type. You've got half a million different types for numbers, but nothing that can handle text without having to declare arrays and all the shit that goes along with that.

Give me VB any day.

[jrandom]

As for coding: whilst C++ can be an elegant language, I've never failed to understand why they couldn't include a string variable type.

(I assume 'never failed to understand...' was an unintentional double negative?)

C++ does. It's called std::string, and it's part of the library described by the language standard. It's as good as a basic type.

C doesn't, because the design philosophy of C was to abstract fundamental computer operations without hiding algorithmic complexity.

Almost any operation on a string requires processing time in the order of the length of the string rather than the constant time required for numeric operations, so forcing C programmers to be explicit about their handling of strings in memory was a conscious performance-driven decision.

Good old C, eh? All the power of assembly language combined with all the ease of use of assembly language.


Give me VB any day.

Try using Visual Basic to code a software driver for a CompactFlash socket that some bastard of an electronic engineer has hung off the data bus of a Mitubishi M16C processor.

Sometimes you really do need a language that simply and elegantly gives access to the basic operations that a CPU can perform, and nothing more.

[Tank]

pfffft you talk tough - but everyone knows real men program using LOGO.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logo_(programming_language)

[Ixion]

*snicker* Anyway, isn't it hard to find a plane you can fly with one eye and one hand?

As for coding: whilst C++ can be an elegant language, I've never failed to understand why they couldn't include a string variable type. You've got half a million different types for numbers, but nothing that can handle text without having to declare arrays and all the shit that goes along with that.

Give me VB any day.

C++ does . C doesn't because there is no such datatype as a "string". It's just an array of char types (and char is really just a small int). Those languages such as VB Java and C++ that pretend to have a string type really just define a very large array of chars.

That's why C (and Cobol! ) are good. What you see is exactly what you get.

[Ixion]

pfffft you talk tough - but everyone knows real men program using LOGO.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logo_(programming_language) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logo_%28programming_language%29)

Arrghh. LISP (Lotsa Irritating Silly Parentheses). Fetch garlic crosses and cold iron. And yes, I have programmed in LISP. I still wake up sometimes screaming at the memory.

[Tank]

Arrghh. LISP (Lotsa Irritating Silly Parentheses). Fetch garlic crosses and cold iron. And yes, I have programmed in LISP. I still wake up sometimes screaming at the memory.

I used to think KB was where all the cool kids hung out - Now I find its full of middle aged nerds like me. How terribly disappointing :baby:.


(p/t of course)

[forkoil]

C++ does . C doesn't because there is no such datatype as a "string". It's just an array of char types (and char is really just a small int). Those languages such as VB Java and C++ that pretend to have a string type really just define a very large array of chars.

That's why C (and Cobol! ) are good. What you see is exactly what you get.
I doubt that std::string does that, more likely it just adds "new" bits as required. oh and lets not overlook the irritating little terminating zero shall we with char type. And std::string is v v fast even compared with C char pointer handling.
"Old" cobol was just a file processing language, optimised for reading and writing files. Hardly low level, and not anything like C, maybe they changed it? Just remember those packed decimal fields!! aaarrgghh.

Note to myself, avoid turning this into an "I've been everywhere man" thread.

[jrandom]

I doubt that std::string does that, more likely it just adds "new" bits as required. oh and lets not overlook the irritating little terminating zero shall we with char type. And std::string is v v fast even compared with C char pointer handling.

std::string has to store its data as a contiguous null-terminated array to support its c_str() member function.

What string operations do you think are faster with std::string? I can't think of any.

Edit: Oh, right, sorry, you weren't saying it was faster, just that it wasn't slower.

[Ixion]

I doubt that std::string does that, more likely it just adds "new" bits as required. oh and lets not overlook the irritating little terminating zero shall we with char type. And std::string is v v fast even compared with C char pointer handling.
"Old" cobol was just a file processing language, optimised for reading and writing files. Hardly low level, and not anything like C, maybe they changed it? Just remember those packed decimal fields!! aaarrgghh.

Note to myself, avoid turning this into an "I've been everywhere man" thread.

Cobol is still evolving. It is far more than a file processing language. Cobol still contributes more lines of code to business applications than any other language.

Modern Cobol also runs under the .NET Framework, BTW.

[jrandom]

Cobol still contributes more lines of code to business applications than any other language.

I call bullshit.

What information are you basing that assertion on?

[forkoil]

Cobol is still evolving. It is far more than a file processing language. Cobol still contributes more lines of code to business applications than any other language.

Modern Cobol also runs under the .NET Framework, BTW.
lines of source or generated :rolleyes:

[Ixion]

I call bullshit.

What information are you basing that assertion on?

Gartner Group research. But don't ask me to find it now. Note also, the careful restriction to "business application". There are unthinkable amounts of Cobol code still running in the big US bank and insurance worlds.

Just think back to how much demand there was for Cobol programmers leading up to Y2K. Headhunters wouldn't have been paying megabucks an hour to lure oild programmers out of retirement unless there was a shit load of code to be inspected.

EDIT : 75% of the world's business data processed by Cobol according to Gartner - ref here (http://www.adtmag.com/article.aspx?id=7726&page=)

[jrandom]

Gartner Group research. But don't ask me to find it now. Note also, the careful restriction to "business application".

I did, but, personally, I'd consider any non-OS software used to facilitate operations in a corporate environment to be a 'business application'.

That includes Word, Excel, Oracle, SAP, SolidWorks, SPICE, PhotoShop, and every horrible little line of Java or Visual Basic that's ever been written to glue a front end to a CRM database.


There are unthinkable amounts of Cobol code still running in the big US bank and insurance worlds.

Define 'unthinkable'.

I would be quite surprised if any bank is running COBOL software with a total source linecount that exceeds that of Microsoft Office (which is probably in the order of 50 million lines or thereabouts).


75% of the world's business data processed by Cobol...

Oh, I can believe that, but that has nothing to do with your earlier statement relating to the size of the software involved.

[Ixion]

I did, but, personally, I'd consider any non-OS software used to facilitate operations in a corporate environment to be a 'business application'.

That includes Word, Excel, Oracle, SAP, SolidWorks, SPICE, PhotoShop, and every horrible little line of Java or Visual Basic that's ever been written to glue a front end to a CRM database.


I would disagree with that definition. That would make anything at all a "business application". Photoshop is most certainly not a business application, for instance. Nor is email. A business application is one which handles or processes business transactions, and is designed for that purpose. Yes , you could write an accounting package in Excel (or even Word, I've seen it done). That doesn't make ewither of them a business application.

A good rule of thumb, if it doesn't use a 'proper' database (not MS Access or such like crap) it *probably* isn't a business application. databases rule, DBAs are the true gods!



Define 'unthinkable'.

I would be quite surprised if any bank is running COBOL software with a total source linecount that exceeds that of Microsoft Office (which is probably in the order of 50 million lines or thereabouts).

180 to 200 billion lines of Cobol code according to the same source. WAY more than Word, even if you count word as a business application .

I can say from experience that any banking application in Cobol will indeed run to millions of lines of code. And there is only one Word code base. Whereas Cobol is mostly bespoke or heavily customised code, so every bank has a different codebase (f'instance - not just banks of course)

[jrandom]

180 to 200 billion lines of Cobol code according to the same source. WAY more than Word, even if you count word as a business application .

I can say from experience that any banking application in Cobol will indeed run to millions of lines of code. And there is only one Word code base. Whereas Cobol is mostly bespoke or heavily customised code, so every bank has a different codebase (f'instance - not just banks of course)

My bullshit detector wavers and falters; you paint a truly horrible and disturbingly believable picture.

I shall now shut up, lest it be indisputably proven true, and I begin to wake in the night to demonic visions of:

IDENTIFICATION DIVISION.
PROGRAM-ID. HELLO-WORLD.
PROCEDURE DIVISION.
MAIN.
DISPLAY 'Hello, world.'.
STOP RUN.

The use of COBOL cripples the mind; its teaching should, therefore, be regarded as a criminal offense".
- Edsger Dijkstra

[goodguy8]

Im a sysadmin.. users make my head hurt

im just abt to start at ames for Sysadmin.. apart from the users.. nethin i should kno abt?

[Sanx]

im just abt to start at ames for Sysadmin.. apart from the users.. nethin i should kno abt?

First skill to master; using the fucking spell checker in order to write proper English so as not to appear like dribbling knuckle-dragging retard.

[yod]

Haskell's the shizzle

[forkoil]

First skill to master; using the fucking spell checker in order to write proper English so as not to appear like dribbling knuckle-dragging retard.
Almost as bad as a bad tempered, self righteous, prat (or is it pratt?)

[jrandom]

Almost as bad as a bad tempered, self righteous, prat (or is it pratt?)

I'd rather have the latter than the former as my sysadmin.

[forkoil]

I'd rather have the latter than the former as my sysadmin.
Short term maybe, long term have to work with the guy, and with that attitude ...

[Sanx]

Almost as bad as a bad tempered, self righteous, prat (or is it pratt?)

No, a fairly even-tempered (hyphenation, please), self-righteous (no need for a comma here) prat (just one 't') with a very low idiot tolerance level.

[xwhatsit]

Arrghh. LISP (Lotsa Irritating Silly Parentheses). Fetch garlic crosses and cold iron. And yes, I have programmed in LISP. I still wake up sometimes screaming at the memory.
Now there we have to disagree. I may still be a student stuck with a whole bunch of biased academics, but Lisp is a delightful programmer's paradise. Sure, it's horribly abstracted and waaaaay to far away from the hardware compared to the Queen's C, but bar the silly syntax it's a wonderfully clean and powerful language.

Haskell is definitively not the shizzle.

I thought being bad-tempered and not suffering fools (i.e. all users) was a precursor to becoming a sysadmin?

[jrandom]

Short term maybe, long term have to work with the guy, and with that attitude ...

I've never worked with a good sysadmin who wasn't a grumpy, dismissive, arrogant bastard.

For some reason, in that business, being overly nice correlates with being ineffectual.

[goodguy8]

First skill to master; using the fucking spell checker in order to write proper English so as not to appear like dribbling knuckle-dragging retard.

Its called quick text my grumpy friend.. this is the new generation lingo that some people find it hard to understand.. not referring to anybody..:Playnice::buggerd:

[forkoil]

No, a fairly even-tempered (hyphenation, please), self-righteous (no need for a comma here) prat (just one 't') with a very low idiot tolerance level.
And a very course filter as to what constitutes an idiot.
I personally know alot of very very good developers and sysadmins who couldnt spell their way out of a paper bag.

[Sanx]

And a very course filter as to what constitutes an idiot.
I personally know alot of very very good developers and sysadmins who couldnt spell their way out of a paper bag.

Hence the reason I specified the first ability to learn should be how to use the spell-checker, not to learn how to spell. TXT-speak might be widely understood - even by me - but it is no substitute for using proper English.

A job as a sysadmin involves has many aspects other than administration of the systems themselves including communicating to users, writing documentation, preparing RFPs (or SOWs if you're on the consulting side), preparing reports. If you can't use coherent English, then you simply won't be effective.

[jrandom]

Its called quick text my grumpy friend...

Learn to type.

I can input proper English on a keyboard about twice as fast as I can your 'quick text'.

A computer professional who can't touch-type is a bit like a radio DJ with a stutter.

[goodguy8]

Learn to type.

I can input proper English on a keyboard about twice as fast as I can your 'quick text'.

A computer professional who can't touch-type is a bit like a radio DJ with a stutter.

Doubt it.. :spanking::Playnice:

[jrandom]

Doubt it...

Doubt what?

I've been touch-typing at 120wpm for a decade. Can you input your 'quick text' that fast?

[goodguy8]

Doubt what?

I've been touch-typing at 120wpm for a decade. Can you input your 'quick text' that fast?

i was born with laptops arnd me.:baby:.im pree sure i can touch type, as for 'quik txt' i can write a full paragraph in 'quik txt' faster than someone who is writing the same paragraph in full words.. if ya kno wat i mean.. :rolleyes::Playnice:

[forkoil]

Learn to type.
A computer professional who can't touch-type is a bit like a radio DJ with a stutter.
Still cant touch type, been a techie pro since '72 ... its the twisted brain that counts, the brain ...

[jrandom]

i was born with laptops arnd me.:baby:.im pree sure i can touch type...

And I'm pretty sure you can't.

Touch-typing needs to be learned properly.

I guarantee you I can accurately input, say, a page of text from a book, faster than you can type in the same page using your abbreviations.

[007XX]

And I'm pretty sure you can't.

Touch-typing needs to be learned properly.

I guarantee you I can accurately input, say, a page of text from a book, faster than you can type in the same page using your abbreviations.

I can vouch for that...Damn hard to keep up with you sometimes...at least if I want to keep my spelling spotless anyway:p

[jrandom]

Damn hard to keep up with you sometimes...

Yes; I'm good with my fingers, aren't I?

:love:

[007XX]

Yes, I'm good with my fingers, aren't I?

:love:

Shit, I fell into that one, didn't I? :laugh:

Admitedly, I do hold a strange fascination for your bionic thumb :love:

[forkoil]

Shit, I fell into that one, didn't I? :laugh:

Admitedly, I do hold a strange fascination for your bionic thumb :love:
ummm ... keep it seemly you two

[jrandom]

I do hold a strange fascination for your bionic thumb :love:

Yes; it's the titanium that makes it so stiff, you know.

[onearmedbandit]

Timely thread. Just when I'm considering training in software development/programming.

[007XX]

ummm ... keep it seemly you two

01101111011001100010000001100011011011110111010101 11001001110011011001010010110000100000011101110110 01010010000001110111011011110111010101101100011001 00011011100010011101110100001000000110010001110010 01100101011000010110110100100000011011110110011000 10000001100010011001010110100101101110011001110010 00000110111001100001011101010110011101101000011101 00011110010010000001101110011011110111011100101100 00100000011101110110111101110101011011000110010000 100000011101110110010100111111




Yes; it's the titanium that makes it so stiff, you know.

And there I was thinking it might have been me :crybaby: thanks for breaking my heart, you savage being...
I shall take my ravaged soul, broken into itsy bitsy pieces, and forlorn heart to a little corner of the room now...

[jrandom]

Timely thread. Just when I'm considering training in software development/programming.

Don't let my ranting put you off - I've spent the last eight years having a great time working as a programmer.

It just so happens that I've taken on the kind of contract this year that I always swore I'd never do, just to pay the bills, and I'm regretting it, just like I knew I would.

If you want to talk about software engineering training and job options, feel free to unblock me on MSN...

:laugh:

[jrandom]

... to a little corner of the room now

You imply that the room has corners of different sizes.

Are you working in a non-rectangular building?

:crazy:

[007XX]

You imply that the room has corners of different sizes.

Are you working in a non-rectangular building?

:crazy:

Indeed...and it is very well padded... the darn uniform is bloody restrictive though...:crazy:

[forkoil]

01101111011001100010000001100011011011110111010101 11001001110011011001010010110000100000011101110110 01010010000001110111011011110111010101101100011001 00011011100010011101110100001000000110010001110010 01100101011000010110110100100000011011110110011000 10000001100010011001010110100101101110011001110010 00000110111001100001011101010110011101101000011101 00011110010010000001101110011011110111011100101100 00100000011101110110111101110101011011000110010000 100000011101110110010100111111

haha very good
and a threesome would be
03752177764013245165423722315?
and foursome
07FACD3DF?

[goodguy8]

And I'm pretty sure you can't.

Touch-typing needs to be learned properly.

I guarantee you I can accurately input, say, a page of text from a book, faster than you can type in the same page using your abbreviations.

Arghhh... :Pokey: had enuf.. you win.. have fun..

[007XX]

haha very good
and a threesome would be
03752177764013245165423722315?
and foursome
07FACD3DF?

Hmmm greedy eh?...here is a little reference reading for ya then:

http://www.kiwibiker.co.nz/forums/showthread.php?t=61928&highlight=threesomes

Or:

http://www.kiwibiker.co.nz/forums/showthread.php?t=66096&highlight=threesomes

[forkoil]

Hmmm greedy eh?...here is a little reference reading for ya then:
http://www.kiwibiker.co.nz/forums/showthread.php?t=61928&highlight=threesomes
Or:
http://www.kiwibiker.co.nz/forums/showthread.php?t=66096&highlight=threesomes
Hey!! The trick was in the octal and hex numbers 007XX, NOT what youre talking about?? :rolleyes:

[Tank]

i was born with laptops arnd me.:baby:.im pree sure i can touch type, as for 'quik txt' i can write a full paragraph in 'quik txt' faster than someone who is writing the same paragraph in full words.. if ya kno wat i mean.. :rolleyes::Playnice:

for anyone starting out in IT - they need to know how to work with business people (unless you are a piss arse sysadmin in a internet cafe or the like).

And nobody tolerates quick txt in the real world. Even if you are right in saying you get to type faster - the upshot is that it wont matter because no decent business will promote and invest in someone who types like that. You will get thrown into the "immature, unprofessional pile" - not a place you want to be to have a good career.

[marioc]

We just sacked some fool on the helpdesk for continually logging calls in txt speak :niceone:

[Storm]

I pity the fool!





Sorry, just HAD to :D

[homer]

It looks like English, but why don't I understand a word of it, except that last sentence?

So here's a photo of a mighty Larch:

http://www.flowerphotographer.net/roth/attributes/bigimages/golden%20larch.jpg

thats a wicked pic
its NZs only deciduous conifer

[James Deuce]

good career.

In IT.

I sense a FABULOUS Fairy Tale in the making.

Once Upon a Time, there was a CFO who thought that all IT people pissed money up the wall for no good reason, but still wanted to be able to produce Year End reports for a 45 million dollar company in a nano second, including final tax statements with all the semi-legal dodges he could think of incorporated into a software package initially developed to manage production queues.

Naturally the IT Dwarf was very unhappy at being set up to fail yet again, but instead of retaliating in a childish fashion, he hired Sandal wearing Unix Trolls to baffle the CFO with talk of various Debian builds that could be compiled to run as stripped down reverse proxy and mail servers thereby reducing his annual spend on Internet traffic.

While the Unix Trolls lured the CFO under their bridge, the IT Dwarf made friends with the fierce Red Dragon who was also the CEO of the company, and managed to finagle enough funding to replace the server and desktop infrastructure with something that wasn't powered by Pixies and Wood Nymphs from the Woolworth's catalogue of 1978. Unfortunately the IT Dwarf in his stolid directness hadn't reckoned with the Red Dragon's capacity for underhanded dirty dealings, and the IT Dwarf was outsourced and sent to work at the swirling Vortex of Suck, far out of reach of all the pretty maidens the Red Dragon used to lure lumberjacks and advertising executives into his lair, to steal their gold and bind them to him with contracts of servitude that fashioned money making partnerships that lined his cave with precious baubles and enabled him to hire the Designing Elves, from the Gothics to the Flouncing-whilst-carrying-a-portfolio-bigger-than-a-house elvish sub-tribes, with their strange religious practices involving the God of iBigMac and something called the Adobe Font Suite.

[Tank]

In IT.

I sense a FABULOUS Fairy Tale in the making.

Once Upon a Time, there was a CFO who thought that all IT people pissed money up the wall for no good reason, but still wanted to be able to produce Year End reports for a 45 million dollar company in a nano second, including final tax statements with all the semi-legal dodges he could think of incorporated into a software package initially developed to manage production queues.

Naturally the IT Dwarf was very unhappy at being set up to fail yet again, but instead of retaliating in a childish fashion, he hired Sandal wearing Unix Trolls to baffle the CFO with talk of various Debian builds that could be compiled to run as stripped down reverse proxy and mail servers thereby reducing his annual spend on Internet traffic.

While the Unix Trolls lured the CFO under their bridge, the IT Dwarf made friends with the fierce Red Dragon who was also the CEO of the company, and managed to finagle enough funding to replace the server and desktop infrastructure with something that wasn't powered by Pixies and Wood Nymphs from the Woolworth's catalogue of 1978. Unfortunately the IT Dwarf in his stolid directness hadn't reckoned with the Red Dragon's capacity for underhanded dirty dealings, and the IT Dwarf was outsourced and sent to work at the swirling Vortex of Suck, far out of reach of all the pretty maidens the Red Dragon used to lure lumberjacks and advertising executives into his lair, to steal their gold and bind them to him with contracts of servitude that fashioned money making partnerships that lined his cave with precious baubles and enabled him to hire the Designing Elves, from the Gothics to the Flouncing-whilst-carrying-a-portfolio-bigger-than-a-house elvish sub-tribes, with their strange religious practices involving the God of iBigMac and something called the Adobe Font Suite.

Thats why you don't become a IT Dwarf.

oh - and have you been taking drugs this evening?

ps very funny and rightfully blinged for the laugh - esp the woolworths catalogue.