Path: utzoo!utgpu!utstat!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!bloom-beacon!apple!vsi1!wyse!mips!prls!pyramid!lll-winken!tekbspa!optilink!cramer From: cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer) Newsgroups: comp.misc Subject: Re: Looking for Computer Folklore Message-ID: <961@optilink.UUCP> Date: 16 Feb 89 20:05:46 GMT References: <7143@pyr.gatech.EDU> <532@geovision.UUCP> <4575@tekgvs.GVS.TEK.COM> <1051@vsi.COM> Organization: Optilink Corporation, Petaluma, CA Lines: 36 In article <1051@vsi.COM>, friedl@vsi.COM (Stephen J. Friedl) writes: > 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. > > I've got three: > > The 3B2 defines a couple of magic numbers used by the firmware > to keep track of system state. defines some > of them to be: > > #define FATAL 0xFEEDBEEFL /* fatal error, reset system */ > #define VECTOR 0xA11C0DEDL /* reset goes to rst_handler */ > #define REBOOT 0x8BADF00DL /* reboot w/o diags for UN*X */ > #define REENTRY 0xADEBAC1EL /* reenter fw from a reset w/o failure mesage */ > Stephen J. Friedl 3B2-kind-of-guy friedl@vsi.com Many years ago, in high school, I learned about systems programming on a timesharing Interdata Model 15. (Yes, this is rather equivalent to multiple terminals timesharing a 4004). Certain error conditions would get your attention by trying execute an illegal instruction, where the instruction would be some signif- icant hex constant, which would drop you into the debugger. Parity error: 10FF (read the 0 as the letter "O") Correct debugger level disk I/O: BABE Incorrect debugger level disk I/O: B00B Of course, as we fiddled with this poor little operating system, we added various error conditions, with the obvious hex constant error codes: FECE, F00D, FEED. -- Clayton E. Cramer {pyramid,pixar,tekbspa}!optilink!cramer Disclaimer? You must be kidding! No company would hold opinions like mine!