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From: xerox@eleazar.dartmouth.edu (James Osborne)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: It really happened (Broadcast Blues)
Message-ID: <18550@dartvax.Dartmouth.EDU>
Date: 17 Jan 90 00:43:50 GMT
References: <25184@brunix.UUCP> <25862@cup.portal.com> <25447@brunix.UUCP> <25942@cup.portal.com> <1990Jan15.173834.27744@phri.nyu.edu> <581@gargoyle.uchicago.edu> <19068@netnews.upenn.edu> <18541@dartvax.Dartmouth.EDU>
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Organization: Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH
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In article <18541@dartvax.Dartmouth.EDU> jalden@eleazar.dartmouth.edu (Joshua M. Alden) writes:

*lots of deleted stuff throughout*

>    Broadcast has a bad reputation among those of us who work at User
>Services here at Dartmouth.  A Broadcast message that pops up at a bad
>time can produce crashes that are much worse than what I've seen from a
>networking loss.  Also, if alot of people start using it (like our
>freshmen this year), the net slows measurably.
>
>-Josh.

   Being an in-dorm computer consultant, I was rudely woken up last Sunday
night at 1:30 AM by a distraught freshman from upstairs.  She was in shock.
It seems that she was writing page 6 of a 6-page paper that was due in 8 hours,
and she had JUST hit "Save" when she got a "Hey, what's up?" broadcast
from someone using a spurious chooser name.
     The problem was that, for some reason, the broadcsat dialog box would
not allow her to click on ok or answer.  It was as if the buttons didn't
exist.  Of course, she had not saved any of her previous work.  The computer
was acting perfectly normal, except that she couldn't do anything.
    I tried everything I could think of- sending her more broadcasts to see if
she could click ok on those, I tried interrupting and returning to shell, I
tried sending a broadcast while in the monitor.  Nothing.  Kaput.

    In the end she had to reboot and start from scratch, as none of her paper
was saved before the computer crashed.

    The professor DID NOT accept late papers.

It really happened...
--
DISCLAIMER (Dis-klam'-ur)  n- 1. The denial of a claim or association with an
           idea or position. 2. The right to screw up.
email--->  xerox@mac.Dartmouth.edu
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