Proverbs, aphorisms, quotations (English) | by Linux fortune |
=== ALL USERS PLEASE NOTE ======================== CAR and CDR now return extra values. The function CAR now returns two values. Since it has to go to the trouble to figure out if the object is carcdr-able anyway, we figured you might as well get both halves at once. For example, the following code shows how to destructure a cons (SOME-CONS) into its two slots (THE-CAR and THE-CDR): (MULTIPLE-VALUE-BIND (THE-CAR THE-CDR) (CAR SOME-CONS) ...) For symmetry with CAR, CDR returns a second value which is the CAR of the object. In a related change, the functions MAKE-ARRAY and CONS have been fixed so they don't allocate any storage except on the stack. This should hopefully help people who don't like using the garbage collector because it cold boots the machine so often. | |
Speaking as someone who has delved into the intricacies of PL/I, I am sure that only Real Men could have written such a machine-hogging, cycle-grabbing, all-encompassing monster. Allocate an array and free the middle third? Sure! Why not? Multiply a character string times a bit string and assign the result to a float decimal? Go ahead! Free a controlled variable procedure parameter and reallocate it before passing it back? Overlay three different types of variable on the same memory location? Anything you say! Write a recursive macro? Well, no, but Real Men use rescan. How could a language so obviously designed and written by Real Men not be intended for Real Man use? | |
Briefly stated, the findings are that when presented with an array of data or a sequence of events in which they are instructed to discover an underlying order, subjects show strong tendencies to perceive order and causality in random arrays, to perceive a pattern or correlation which seems a priori intuitively correct even when the actual correlation in the data is counterintuitive, to jump to conclusions about the correct hypothesis, to seek and to use only positive or confirmatory evidence, to construe evidence liberally as confirmatory, to fail to generate or to assess alternative hypotheses, and having thus managed to expose themselves only to confirmatory instances, to be fallaciously confident of the validity of their judgments (Jahoda, 1969; Einhorn and Hogarth, 1978). In the analyzing of past events, these tendencies are exacerbated by failure to appreciate the pitfalls of post hoc analyses. -- A. Benjamin | |
So as your consumer electronics adviser, I am advising you to donate your current VCR to a grate resident, who will laugh sardonically and hurl it into a dumpster. Then I want you to go out and purchase a vast array of 8-millimeter video equipment. ... OK! Got everything? Well, *too bad, sucker*, because while you were gone the electronics industry came up with an even newer format that makes your 8-millimeter VCR look as technologically advanced as toenail dirt. This format is called "3.5 hectare" and it will not be made available until it is outmoded, sometime early next week, by a format called "Elroy", so *order yours now*. -- Dave Barry, "No Surrender in the Electronics Revolution" | |
Felix Catus is your taxonomic nomenclature, An endothermic quadroped, carnivorous by nature. Your visual, olfactory, and auditory senses Contribute to your hunting skills and natural defenses. I find myself intrigued by your sub-vocal oscillations, A singular development of cat communications That obviates your basic hedonistic predelection For a rhythmic stroking of your fur to demonstrate affection. A tail is quite essential for your acrobatic talents: You would not be so agile if you lacked its counterbalance; And when not being utilitized to aid in locomotion, It often serves to illustrate the state of your emotion. Oh Spot, the complex levels of behavior you display Connote a fairly well-developed cognitive array. And though you are not sentient, Spot, and do not comprehend, I nonetheless consider you a true and valued friend. -- Lt. Cmdr. Data, "An Ode to Spot" | |
It BASICally Sucks Older versions of MS-DOS came with bundled programming languages including GW-BASIC and QBasic. Windows XP continues the Microsoft tradition of ruining budding programmers with horrible programming tools by including XPBasic, an interpreted language in which all of the customary BASIC keywords have been replaced with advertising slogans. Nike has paid a handsome amount to Microsoft for "keyword rights". Instead of saying PRINT "HELLO WORLD", XPBasic programmers must now type JUST DO IT "HELLO WORLD". Other common XPBasic statements include WHERE DO YOU WANT TO GOTO 20 TODAY? and DIM ARRAY(1 TO 20) AS INTEGER BROUGHT TO YOU BY VERIZON WIRELESS. -- from Humorix's review of Windows XP (eXceptionally Pathetic) |