Manual, n.:
A unit of documentation. There are always three or more on a
given item. One is on the shelf; someone has the others. The
-information you need in in the others.
+information you need is in the others.
-- Ray Simard
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Many years ago in a period commonly know as Next Friday Afternoon,
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Speaking of the philosophy involved in moving humanity into space:
-Furniture will be a largely obsolete concept. Take for example the dresser
-my mom bought for me when I was a kid. I still have it, and by the
-standards of its era, it's an admirable household fixture. It is a massive
-construction of maple wood, expertly joined with cunningly fit pieces,
-fitted and glued with the strength of iron. It is set with massive brass
-fixtures, and looks today -- discounting the dust -- as new as the day it
-was purchased, a quarter century ago. So far, so good; a fine piece of
-furniture, you might say. But let's look at it objectively, as a machine,
-as an object with a purpose. Here sit a hundred pounds of hardwood with
-a compressive strength of 1500 psi, jointed by an expert craftsman into
-a rigid box that would easily support a bull elephant. And what is the
-sole purpose of this massive crate, this monument to a dead tree? -- it
-holds my socks.
-
-Not only is it blind engineering overkill of epic proportions, it is also
-an environmental disaster. The home to generations of squirrels, a
-sentinel post for falcons, an autumnal banner of golden glory, a living
-creature, was chopped down to enshrine some underwear. This, my friends,
-is no way to run a planet.
+Furniture will be a largely obsolete concept. Take for example the dresser my
+mom bought for me when I was a kid. I still have it, and by the standards of
+its era, it's an admirable household fixture. It is a massive construction of
+maple wood, expertly joined with cunningly fit pieces, fitted and glued with
+the strength of iron. It is set with massive brass fixtures, and looks today
+-- discounting the dust -- as new as the day it was purchased, a quarter
+century ago. So far, so good; a fine piece of furniture, you might say. But
+let's look at it objectively, as a machine, as an object with a purpose. Here
+sit a hundred pounds of hardwood with a compressive strength of 1500 psi,
+jointed by an expert craftsman into a rigid box that would easily support a
+bull elephant. And what is the sole purpose of this massive crate, this
+monument to a dead tree? -- it holds my socks.
+
+Not only is it blind engineering overkill of epic proportions, it is also an
+environmental disaster. The home to generations of squirrels, a sentinel post
+for falcons, an autumnal banner of golden glory, a living creature, was chopped
+down to enshrine some underwear. This, my friends, is no way to run a planet.
-- Marshall T. Savage, from The Millennial Project:
Colonizing the Galaxy -- In Eight Easy Steps
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- Letter to the Editor
- CROSSTALK, Journal of Defense Software Engineering
-
-The mention of "a feast of spaghetti code" ("Computer Collectives", CrossTalk,
-April/May 1992) prompted this response:
-
Nearly every software professional has heard the term spaghetti code as a
pejorative description for complicated, difficult to understand, and impossible
to maintain, software. However, many people may not know the other two
We need to go beyond the condemnation of spaghetti code to the active
encouragement of ravioli code.
-
- Raymond J. Rubey
- SoftTech, Inc.
- 3100 Presidential Drive
- Fairborn, OH 45324
- Voice: 513-429-8291
+ -- Raymond J. Rubey, in a letter to the editor of Crosstalk
+ magazine
+%
+63,000 bugs in the code, 63,000 bugs,
+ya get 1 whacked with a service pack,
+now there's 63,005 bugs in the code!!
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