Proverbs, aphorisms, quotations (English) | by Linux fortune |
A novice programmer was once assigned to code a simple financial package. The novice worked furiously for many days, but when his master reviewed his program, he discovered that it contained a screen editor, a set of generalized graphics routines, and artificial intelligence interface, but not the slightest mention of anything financial. When the master asked about this, the novice became indignant. "Don't be so impatient," he said, "I'll put the financial stuff in eventually." -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming" | |
Cosmotronic Software Unlimited Inc. does not warrant that the functions contained in the program will meet your requirements or that the operation of the program will be uninterrupted or error-free. However, Cosmotronic Software Unlimited Inc. warrants the diskette(s) on which the program is furnished to be of black color and square shape under normal use for a period of ninety (90) days from the date of purchase. NOTE: IN NO EVENT WILL COSMOTRONIC SOFTWARE UNLIMITED OR ITS DISTRIBUTORS AND THEIR DEALERS BE LIABLE TO YOU FOR ANY DAMAGES, INCLUDING ANY LOST PROFIT, LOST SAVINGS, LOST PATIENCE OR OTHER INCIDENTAL OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES. -- Horstmann Software Design, the "ChiWriter" user manual | |
***** Special AI Seminar (abstract) It has been widely recognized that AI programs require expert knowledge in order to perform well in complex domains. But knowledge alone is not sufficient for some applications; wisdom is needed as well. Accordingly, we have developed a new approach to artificial intelligence which we call "wisdom engineering". As a test of our ideas, we have written IMMANUEL, a wisdom based system for the task domain of western philosophical thought. IMMANUEL was supplied initially with 200 wisdom units which contained wisdom about such elementary concepts as mind, matter, being, nothingness, and so forth. IMMANUEL was then allowed to run freely, guided by the heuristic rules contained in its heterarchically organized meta wisdom base. IMMANUEL succeeded in rediscovering most of the important philosophical ideas developed in western culture over the course of the last 25 centuries, including those underlying Plato's theory of government, Kant's metaphysics, Nietzsche's theory of value, and Husserl's phenomenology. In this seminar, we will describe IMMANUEL's achievements and internal architecture. We will also briefly discuss our recent efforts to apply wisdom engineering to oil exploration. | |
A mathematician, a doctor, and an engineer are walking on the beach and observe a team of lifeguards pumping the stomach of a drowned woman. As they watch, water, sand, snails and such come out of the pump. The doctor watches for a while and says: "Keep pumping, men, you may yet save her!!" The mathematician does some calculations and says: "According to my understanding of the size of that pump, you have already pumped more water from her body than could be contained in a cylinder 4 feet in diameter and 6 feet high." The engineer says: "I think she's sitting in a puddle." | |
A ranger was walking through the forest and encountered a hunter carrying a shotgun and a dead loon. "What in the world do you think you're doing? Don't you know that the loon is on the endagered species list?" Instead of answering, the hunter showed the ranger his game bag, which contained twelve more loons. "Why would you shoot loons?", the ranger asked. "Well, my family eats them and I sell the plumage." "What's so special about a loon? What does it taste like?" "Oh, somewhere between an American Bald Eagle and a Trumpeter Swan." | |
"Trillian did a little research in the ship's copy of THHGTTG. It had some advice to offer on drunkenness. `Go to it,' it said, `and good luck.' It was cross-referenced to the entry concerning the size of the Universe and ways of coping with that." - One of the more preferable pieces of advice contained in the Guide. | |
Humorix Holiday Gift Idea #3 iTux Penguin Computer Price: $999.95 for base model Producer: Orange Computer, Co.; 1-800-GET-ITUX Based on the Slashdot comments, response to the Apple iMac from the Linux community was lukewarm at best. Orange Computer, Co., has picked up where Apple left behind and produced the iTux computer specifically for Linux users who want to "Think a lot different". The self-contained iTux computer system is built in the shape of Tux the Penguin. Its 15 inch monitor (17 inch available next year) is located at Tux's large belly. The penguin's two feet make up the split ergonomic keyboard (without those annoying Windows keys, of course). A 36X CD-ROM drive fits into Tux's mouth. Tux's left eye is actually the reboot button (can be reconfigured for other purposes since it is rarely used) and his right eye is the power button. The iTux case opens up from the back, allowing easy access for screwdriver-wielding nerds into Tux's guts. The US$995.95 model contains an Alpha CPU and all the usual stuff found in a Linux-class machine. More expensive models, to be debuted next year, will feature dual or quad Alpha CPUs and a larger size. | |
Jargon Coiner (#1) An irregular feature that aims to give you advance warning of new jargon that we've just made up. * WINCURSE: Loud expletive uttered when a Linux user comes face-to-face with a computer containing a WinModem. Example: "Eric wincursed when his mother showed him the new computer she bought from CompUSSR... which contained a WinModem and a WinSoundCard." * WIND'OH KEY: Nickname given to the three useless Windows keys that come on virtually all new keyboards. These keys are often hit by mistake instead of CTRL or ALT, causing the user to shout "D'oh!" * DE-WIND'OH!ED KEYBOARD: (1) A new keyboard produced without any wind'oh! keys or a "Enhanced for Windows 95/98" logo. Extremely rare. (2) A keyboard in which the wind'oh! keys have been physically removed. | |
Brief History Of Linux (#2) Hammurabi's Open-Source Code Hammurabi became king of Babylonia around 1750BC. Under his reign, a sophisticated legal code developed; Version 1, containing 282 clauses, was carved into a large rock column open to the public. However, the code contained several errors (Hammurabi must have been drunk), which numerous citizens demanded be fixed. One particularly brave Babylonian submitted to the king's court a stack of cloth patches that, when affixed to the column, would cover up and correct the errors. With the king's approval, these patches were applied to the legal code; within a month a new corrected rock column (Version 2.0) was officially announced. While future kings never embraced this idea (who wanted to admit they made a mistake?), the concept of submitting patches to fix problems is now taken for granted in modern times. | |
Brief History Of Linux (#26) On the surface, Transmeta was a secretive startup that hired Linus Torvalds in 1996 as their Alpha Geek to help develop some kind of microprocessor. Linus, everyone found out later, was actually hired as part of a low-budget yet high-yield publicity stunt. While other dotcoms were burning millions on glitzy marketing campaigns nobody remembers and Superbowl ads displayed while jocks went to the bathroom, Transmeta was spending only pocket change on marketing. Most of that pocket change went towards hosting the Transmeta website (the one that wasn't there yet) which, incidentally, contained more original content and received more visitors than the typical dotcom portal. Microsoft relies on vaporware and certain ahem stipends given to journalists in order to generate buzz and hype for new products, but Transmeta only needed Non-Disclosure Agreements and the Personality Cult of Linus to build up its buzz. When the secret was finally unveiled, the Slashdot crowd was all excited about low-power mobile processors and code-morphing algorithms -- for a couple days. Then everyone yawned and went back to playing Quake. It's still not entirely clear when Transmeta is actually supposed to start selling something. | |
DeCSS T-Shirt Used To Commit Piracy! College student Cody Potter stunned the world yesterday when he used a T-shirt with the printed DeCSS source code to illegally copy a DVD of "Star Trek XXI: We Promise This Is The Last One". Well, it wasn't the actual DeCSS source code. The shirt contained a Perl script which spits out a bash shell script which produces a GW-BASIC program which outputs a ROT13-encoded Python script that manufactures a Pig-Latin-encoded Java program that finally produces the real DeCSS C source code when executed. |