Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!ames!lll-winken!scooter!beep!kris
From: kris@beep.UUCP (Port'naybl)
Newsgroups: comp.misc
Subject: Re: Looking for Computer Folklore
Summary: Pithy comments
Message-ID: <447@beep.UUCP>
Date: 14 Feb 89 07:23:46 GMT
References: <7143@pyr.gatech.EDU> <532@geovision.UUCP> <4575@tekgvs.GVS.TEK.COM> <20373@coherent.com>
Distribution: usa
Organization: The Three Gadgeteers
Lines: 30

In article <20373@coherent.com>, dplatt@coherent.com (Dave Platt) writes:
> Another subclass of computer folklore is the occasional barbed comment
> that one can find when reading through source code.  Operating-system
> programmers seem particularly prone to witty, shamefaced, or other
> slightly-off-center comments in their code.

     Some years ago I inherited a control-store downloader program that I
was told to double the usable word-capacity from the original, which was
written in Pascal.  The original Pascal version took roughly half an hour
to download a 2Kword x 36-bit program; a standing joke was to start it,
then take a coffee break.  When I tried to re-compile the original, the
Pascal compiler said "Semicolon needed on Line XXX"; when I inserted a
semicolon where directed to, the compiler would say "Extra semicolon
on Line XXX".
Arrrgh!
I re-wrote the whole thing in C (I think they call it learning under
combat conditions).  and I figured that the program would take as
long as the Pascal version had, so after every ${down!up}load
operation, I sent a beep to the terminal with (something close
to) the following line:

	fputc (stdout, 7);	/* Awaken User */

     Actually, the C version went so fast that I thought that the
program didn't do anything except update the terminal screen.
-- 
						Port'naybl

scooter!beep!kris
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