Crowdsourcing ideas from a group of people who would like to see this thread churn out hilarious results may not necessarily be in your best interest. :)
Open up a spreadsheet or a Word document. Better, open one or more of each. Scatter enough open windows across your computer desktop that no one can sort out at a glance exactly what's going on there. Review your email intently. Adopt facial expressions of seriousness, thoughtfulness and occasional consternation. Type rigorously in said Word document or in an email reply.
I've found that these pretty much work in any situation if you're a white collar worker who sits in front of a monitor.
@joelmw I've got outlook up and some unix terminals. every once in a while I run a command that generates some screen noise. it's worked for the past 5 years.
@Lotsofgoats@brhfl I don't work with Unix anymore (sigh), but I find that folks are generally confused and/or impressed by any CMD window or anything that doesn't look like it came directly from Microsoft.
@mikibell (& @cengland0) Oh, yep, that's the one. As if vi/m doesn't scare folks enough, a screen full of hex combined with that modal interface is apparently pretty terrifying.
@brhfl I used to love vi when @unixrab and I did most of our work on solaris. I could edit a file so fast compared to Notepad using a mouse. Knew all those slash and colon shortcuts. Since it's been 15 years or so without using it, I'm sure I forgot them all. SHIFT-Z-Z
@unixrab No, the OS was definitely Solaris running on Sun Sparc workstations.
The U-WIN application you mentioned was an in-house developed application that did screen scraping from TSYS 3270 windows and consolidated several of those screens into a Universal Window (a.k.a U-WIN). That application is so unique that anyone that worked for the company during our time would recognize that name and know exactly what company we worked for.
@brhfl Now this is going way back so I'm going to try to remember. It was the pizza box and we used the authentic Sparc branded monitors too. Very expensive computers at the time. This is the early 90's that we are talking about so that was a long time ago.
Another thing I remember was the mouse. It was one of the first optical ones and required a special mouse pad. The pad was silver with a grid that had to be oriented the correct direction for the mouse to work properly. If you scratched it, you could have a dead spot where the mouse wouldn't work.
@dashcloud seriously, that works so well. I sit in a big bullpen area for this massive project we are undertaking. I was surfing for a place to stay with my daughter for our NYC vaca. The pmo for the entire project asked how what I was doing was work related.. I told her my program was compiling and flipped to a mainrframe monitoring screen which keeps track of processing transactions and blinks and has lots of numbers and pretty colors. She thoroughly bought it.
@cengland0 Those mice were very cool, in a 'holy shit this is the future' kind of way. Not always so cool in a functional kind of way, but then neither were the ball mice of the time.
@brhfl You know what I used to do as a joke to other employees? I would put a piece of masking tape on the bottom of their mouse to cover the sensor and then sit back and watch the frustration of them trying to figure out what was wrong with their computer. Ha! Those were the days.
We would also turn their mouse pad upside down. It was hard to tell it wasn't oriented correctly and the direction was important because it used color lines to determine the direction you were moving the mose. The mouse still worked but the pointer was very jerky as it moved around the screen. Many employees never caught on that it wasn't right and just continued to work that way all day. :)
@cengland0 I think I've known (sometimes multiple versions of) you wherever I've worked (since I started working technology a few decades back). It took me a while the first time. By the tenth time, I think I literally yawned as I tore the tape off and went back to work without missing a beat.
@cinoclav I hope you're not looking for confirmation. I cannot do that but I'm curious how you know so much about AT&T. Did you or do you work for them?
Regarding our U-WIN, I'm not sure who wrote that specifically. There was an entire team of people and I knew many of them and most were from India. Rajesh was one, for example. Not telling last names here. That David Korn that you're referring to doesn't sound familiar but I think he wrote the unix korn shell (ksh).
@cengland0 No, I originally went to college for Comp Sci and decided it wasn't for me. I'm more social than that. ;) I actually did some research to come up with David Korn, though when I did his name actually sounded familiar.
Not all people who majored in Comp Sci are weak when it comes to social skills. Just look at me. I went to college and majored in Comp Sci, and I turned out great...
@cengland0 I think different things? is the U-WIN you are talking about the one that lets you re-compile unix programs to run inside windows (I always used cygwin myself :) )? Because that is the one Korn wrote... I suspect that this "U-WIN" you are referring to ran on solaris... so I think there is some uwin confusion happening here. :)
@cinoclav I also started college toward a BS in Computer Science and did think it was for me but I ended up with a huge promotion at work without the degree so I stopped going to school after 3 years toward the 4 year BS.
I still regret not getting that degree because all my peers have master degrees now and I don't. It hasn't affected me much but it could one day. I'm getting old now and think if I get laid off, I would consider that a sign to retire.
@thismyusername The U-WIN we were referring to was an in-house built application that consolidated several 3270 mainframe screens into an easy-to-use program. It allowed our employees to access data without having to know mainframe codes and screens.
Previously they had to memorize and type in many 3-digit codes and could only see small snippets of data at any time. They couldn't see two screens at a time so it was hard to relate similar pieces of data together. This U-WIN application accessed all the server data at one time and consolidated it into an updateable screen.
@cengland0 Turning the mouse pad 180 would work fine, you had to turn it 90 degrees to mess them up. The grid printed on the aluminum "pad" was gray in one direction, and dark blue in the other.
@cengland0 It had always bothered me that I didn't finish my degree right after high school. I had gone back to community college and still had no clue what I wanted to do so I jumped into the workforce. It wasn't until I returned to school for my current career that I finally received my degree. I graduated from Thomas Jefferson U in Philly and an integral factor in going there (besides the outstanding rep) was that they are one of the few schools in the country to offer a dual modality radiology program that results in a BS. They push you to go for your masters but it really wouldn't help my career. The last thing I want to do is sit in an office pushing papers around. Been there, done that, despised it. The degree was more for my own sense of accomplishment than an absolute necessity for my job but I do have to admit, when clicking off questionnaires I always pause for a moment at the 'Highest education completed' question and reflect on how long it took me to get to the point where I could click 'College graduate.'
I have 3 more days of vaca..then I am right there with you.. I think I have about 1200 unread emails waiting for me. Since none of them spelled catastrophe, I am not reading them until Thurs morn when I get to the office (after coffee!). I hope my plan of gently easing into the work pays off ;)
@mikibell Huge fan of the "clean up folder" in Outlook here. Still, starting back to discover I am in email jail due to mailbox size is disconcerting. On how I long for the old days prior to so much work being in email.
@Pamtha I have rules set for most of the system notification emails that I receive each day..if it doesn't contain the word "failed", it goes straight to trash..so last I looked I was @1600 emails..sigh. Not looking forward to returning to work tomorrow!
@FroodyFrog It is after 1 pm. 1700k+ unread emails in my readable folders, 8k+ in unread system emails. The emails are coming in faster than I can read them :) It is like someone has my chair rigged with a notification that it is occupied.... Luckily, people are generally happy to see me !!
@FroodyFrog trying to figure out if I survived physically...I am running a fever and have the chills..but I ain't dead yet..also, it was 1700+, not 1700k+..thus why I wasn't a math major!
@dashcloud Today was weird..I even ate lunch away from my desk..this fact was noted and remarked upon by co-workers.. Thank you for the nice sentiment!
I go with the same approach as @joelmw. Excel spreadsheets, a Word document or two and Outlook all open and overlapping on my desktop make me look productive. I also have my headphones cranked and just stare straight ahead when people walk bye. The "I'm concentrating too hard to even notice your existence." works like a charm.
@jimmyd103 Headphones are my best friend. I started wearing them for pleasant noise to drowned out the office cacophony and mitigate the fact that I'm in a cube. But then I discovered the added insulation from human contact benefit. It's not that I don't like people . . . well, maybe it is that I don't like people.
@joelmw Acrobat is currently just flashing all its menus at me like a crazy person, simply because I tried to select (nearly) every tag in a 250pp document. But, I mean, it has to be done, so back to the waiting game…!
I have basically been off since the beginning of December, and I am not looking forward to going back Monday. I work in education and Monday will be the first day back. I may go in tomorrow to get ready for the rush. Tomorrow there is supposed to be a storm, maybe I will use that as an excuse to continue being lazy.
@medz This is truer than you might imagine. Even as I approach retirement (age; I don't have enough savings so I'll be working until they put me down), I consider making the abolition from the pointlessness of modern obligatory labor a life cause.
@Lotsofgoats It's Friday. They've used you up and are ready to spit you out. It helps to be limp and lifeless when they spit you out. So, you see, it's not just a natural consequence of the week's worth of abuse you've endured, it's functional too.
hi friends. so I'm pretty sure I was given a work item today that's entirely meant as busy work, being that it's a bulky "choose-your-own-adventure!" solution to something that would otherwise take me about 20 minutes...
so I think I figured out my job finally, I'm a professional punch card filler outer and timesheeter. thanks for all the help!
@Lotsofgoats Congratulations on finding your place in work, your "True Purpose", as it were, for that subset of your existence. Many never truly know what the hell they're supposed to be doing.
Here's a tip:
Crowdsourcing ideas from a group of people who would like to see this thread churn out hilarious results may not necessarily be in your best interest. :)
rodeo clown?
@carl669
I watched that for 3 minutes hoping that the bull would reach one of the people. Sadly it didn't.
Maybe if I'd watched longer...
@carl669 I do seem to be surrounded by a lot of bullshit so this seems like a promising suggestion
lemme see if I can find some makeup
@carl669 who's really in charge in that scene? Hard for me to tell. Great corporate sim.
Open up a spreadsheet or a Word document. Better, open one or more of each. Scatter enough open windows across your computer desktop that no one can sort out at a glance exactly what's going on there. Review your email intently. Adopt facial expressions of seriousness, thoughtfulness and occasional consternation. Type rigorously in said Word document or in an email reply.
I've found that these pretty much work in any situation if you're a white collar worker who sits in front of a monitor.
You're welcome.
@joelmw I've got outlook up and some unix terminals. every once in a while I run a command that generates some screen noise. it's worked for the past 5 years.
@Lotsofgoats I've noticed people leave me the hell alone if I have anything open in bvi.
@Lotsofgoats See? You got this.
@Lotsofgoats @brhfl I don't work with Unix anymore (sigh), but I find that folks are generally confused and/or impressed by any CMD window or anything that doesn't look like it came directly from Microsoft.
@joelmw i play freecell in my terminal, but i'm pretty sure it's recognizable as "not work"
@brhfl British Virgin Islands?
@katylava But you work for Mediocre, so . . .
@cengland0 binary visual editor? @brhfl
@mikibell (& @cengland0) Oh, yep, that's the one. As if vi/m doesn't scare folks enough, a screen full of hex combined with that modal interface is apparently pretty terrifying.
@brhfl I used to love vi when @unixrab and I did most of our work on solaris. I could edit a file so fast compared to Notepad using a mouse. Knew all those slash and colon shortcuts. Since it's been 15 years or so without using it, I'm sure I forgot them all. SHIFT-Z-Z
@cengland0 n.n.n.n.n.n.n.n.n.n.n.n.n.n.n.n.
@katylava But as a developer, you've got a great excuse:
@cengland0
http://www.lagmonster.org/docs/vi.html
🙂
@cengland0 I believe our OS was called U-WIN...
@unixrab No, the OS was definitely Solaris running on Sun Sparc workstations.
The U-WIN application you mentioned was an in-house developed application that did screen scraping from TSYS 3270 windows and consolidated several of those screens into a Universal Window (a.k.a U-WIN). That application is so unique that anyone that worked for the company during our time would recognize that name and know exactly what company we worked for.
@cengland0 Lunch or Pizza boxes?
@katylava hah! you do realize you just told on yourself? Right? LOL
@brhfl Now this is going way back so I'm going to try to remember. It was the pizza box and we used the authentic Sparc branded monitors too. Very expensive computers at the time. This is the early 90's that we are talking about so that was a long time ago.
Another thing I remember was the mouse. It was one of the first optical ones and required a special mouse pad. The pad was silver with a grid that had to be oriented the correct direction for the mouse to work properly. If you scratched it, you could have a dead spot where the mouse wouldn't work.
@cengland0 so it was.
@cengland0 AT&T?
@cinoclav This just the beginning of the flood of guesses. See what you did @unixrab ?
@dashcloud seriously, that works so well. I sit in a big bullpen area for this massive project we are undertaking. I was surfing for a place to stay with my daughter for our NYC vaca. The pmo for the entire project asked how what I was doing was work related.. I told her my program was compiling and flipped to a mainrframe monitoring screen which keeps track of processing transactions and blinks and has lots of numbers and pretty colors. She thoroughly bought it.
@cengland0 Those mice were very cool, in a 'holy shit this is the future' kind of way. Not always so cool in a functional kind of way, but then neither were the ball mice of the time.
@cengland0 so ergo bro
@brhfl You know what I used to do as a joke to other employees? I would put a piece of masking tape on the bottom of their mouse to cover the sensor and then sit back and watch the frustration of them trying to figure out what was wrong with their computer. Ha! Those were the days.
We would also turn their mouse pad upside down. It was hard to tell it wasn't oriented correctly and the direction was important because it used color lines to determine the direction you were moving the mose. The mouse still worked but the pointer was very jerky as it moved around the screen. Many employees never caught on that it wasn't right and just continued to work that way all day. :)
@cengland0 heh
@cengland0 I think I've known (sometimes multiple versions of) you wherever I've worked (since I started working technology a few decades back). It took me a while the first time. By the tenth time, I think I literally yawned as I tore the tape off and went back to work without missing a beat.
@cengland0 So, U-WIN was created by David Korn, who worked for AT&T...
@cinoclav I hope you're not looking for confirmation. I cannot do that but I'm curious how you know so much about AT&T. Did you or do you work for them?
Regarding our U-WIN, I'm not sure who wrote that specifically. There was an entire team of people and I knew many of them and most were from India. Rajesh was one, for example. Not telling last names here. That David Korn that you're referring to doesn't sound familiar but I think he wrote the unix korn shell (ksh).
@cengland0 No, I originally went to college for Comp Sci and decided it wasn't for me. I'm more social than that. ;) I actually did some research to come up with David Korn, though when I did his name actually sounded familiar.
@cinoclav
Not all people who majored in Comp Sci are weak when it comes to social skills. Just look at me. I went to college and majored in Comp Sci, and I turned out great...
Oh...
I see your point...
@cengland0 I think different things? is the U-WIN you are talking about the one that lets you re-compile unix programs to run inside windows (I always used cygwin myself :) )? Because that is the one Korn wrote... I suspect that this "U-WIN" you are referring to ran on solaris... so I think there is some uwin confusion happening here. :)
@cinoclav I also started college toward a BS in Computer Science and did think it was for me but I ended up with a huge promotion at work without the degree so I stopped going to school after 3 years toward the 4 year BS.
I still regret not getting that degree because all my peers have master degrees now and I don't. It hasn't affected me much but it could one day. I'm getting old now and think if I get laid off, I would consider that a sign to retire.
@thismyusername The U-WIN we were referring to was an in-house built application that consolidated several 3270 mainframe screens into an easy-to-use program. It allowed our employees to access data without having to know mainframe codes and screens.
Previously they had to memorize and type in many 3-digit codes and could only see small snippets of data at any time. They couldn't see two screens at a time so it was hard to relate similar pieces of data together. This U-WIN application accessed all the server data at one time and consolidated it into an updateable screen.
@cengland0 Turning the mouse pad 180 would work fine, you had to turn it 90 degrees to mess them up. The grid printed on the aluminum "pad" was gray in one direction, and dark blue in the other.
@cengland0 It had always bothered me that I didn't finish my degree right after high school. I had gone back to community college and still had no clue what I wanted to do so I jumped into the workforce. It wasn't until I returned to school for my current career that I finally received my degree. I graduated from Thomas Jefferson U in Philly and an integral factor in going there (besides the outstanding rep) was that they are one of the few schools in the country to offer a dual modality radiology program that results in a BS. They push you to go for your masters but it really wouldn't help my career. The last thing I want to do is sit in an office pushing papers around. Been there, done that, despised it. The degree was more for my own sense of accomplishment than an absolute necessity for my job but I do have to admit, when clicking off questionnaires I always pause for a moment at the 'Highest education completed' question and reflect on how long it took me to get to the point where I could click 'College graduate.'
@blaineg Ah, maybe 90 degrees is what I had to do. This was in the early 90's so we are talking over 20 years ago and my memory isn't so good.
I really hope you're not a pilot.
@cinoclav I think there's an autopilot button on this thing somewhere, look for it while I take a nap
@Lotsofgoats The autopilot has all the fun anyway.
I have 3 more days of vaca..then I am right there with you.. I think I have about 1200 unread emails waiting for me. Since none of them spelled catastrophe, I am not reading them until Thurs morn when I get to the office (after coffee!). I hope my plan of gently easing into the work pays off ;)
@mikibell Huge fan of the "clean up folder" in Outlook here. Still, starting back to discover I am in email jail due to mailbox size is disconcerting. On how I long for the old days prior to so much work being in email.
@Pamtha I have rules set for most of the system notification emails that I receive each day..if it doesn't contain the word "failed", it goes straight to trash..so last I looked I was @1600 emails..sigh. Not looking forward to returning to work tomorrow!
@mikibell
Tell ya what, if you survive (physically, mentally, and emotionally) then I'll post a picture of a cupcake here tomorrow night.
@FroodyFrog It is after 1 pm. 1700k+ unread emails in my readable folders, 8k+ in unread system emails. The emails are coming in faster than I can read them :) It is like someone has my chair rigged with a notification that it is occupied.... Luckily, people are generally happy to see me !!
@mikibell Glad to hear it! Hopefully tomorrow will an easier day.
@mikibell
So, did you survive physically, emotionally, and mentally?
@FroodyFrog trying to figure out if I survived physically...I am running a fever and have the chills..but I ain't dead yet..also, it was 1700+, not 1700k+..thus why I wasn't a math major!
@dashcloud Today was weird..I even ate lunch away from my desk..this fact was noted and remarked upon by co-workers.. Thank you for the nice sentiment!
I go with the same approach as @joelmw. Excel spreadsheets, a Word document or two and Outlook all open and overlapping on my desktop make me look productive. I also have my headphones cranked and just stare straight ahead when people walk bye. The "I'm concentrating too hard to even notice your existence." works like a charm.
@jimmyd103 Headphones are my best friend. I started wearing them for pleasant noise to drowned out the office cacophony and mitigate the fact that I'm in a cube. But then I discovered the added insulation from human contact benefit. It's not that I don't like people . . . well, maybe it is that I don't like people.
@jimmyd103 PowerPoint. Always have a PPT in progress.
@Pamtha I do a fair amount of the PPTing, but not so much that I can make it a daily thing.
PDFs, now. There's a lot one can do with a PDF, and I can pretty much justify that any day of the week.
@joelmw Acrobat is currently just flashing all its menus at me like a crazy person, simply because I tried to select (nearly) every tag in a 250pp document. But, I mean, it has to be done, so back to the waiting game…!
@brhfl Acrobat is funny that way. It's generally pretty solid, but when you find one of those things, holy shit.
oh crap a code review just came through, now I gotta like... code? I think that's what we do here :\
@Lotsofgoats Perhaps you just have to review? That sounds easier!
@brhfl true let me review it...
it suggests code changes. ok review done!
@Lotsofgoats Do a smoke-test. Go out for smokes, come back, say the website is fine.
@andipandi oh shit I have no idea how to make websites
I gotta study up fast O_O
@andipandi Smoke from the smoke test - that would be the "something went terribly wrong" Irk video when meh's website behaves in an uncooperative way?
ok so I have a bunch of code to redo "by Wednesday"
luckily there are a whole lot of Wednesdays
I have basically been off since the beginning of December, and I am not looking forward to going back Monday. I work in education and Monday will be the first day back. I may go in tomorrow to get ready for the rush. Tomorrow there is supposed to be a storm, maybe I will use that as an excuse to continue being lazy.
This work stuff is for the birds.
@medz
@medz
@carl669 - birdy arms!
@medz This is truer than you might imagine. Even as I approach retirement (age; I don't have enough savings so I'll be working until they put me down), I consider making the abolition from the pointlessness of modern obligatory labor a life cause.
@KDemo @carl669 Those birds have the right to bear arms.
@cengland0 @KDemo @carl669
@cengland0
why am i so tired all of a sudden help
@Lotsofgoats It's Friday. They've used you up and are ready to spit you out. It helps to be limp and lifeless when they spit you out. So, you see, it's not just a natural consequence of the week's worth of abuse you've endured, it's functional too.
Again, you're welcome.
hi friends. so I'm pretty sure I was given a work item today that's entirely meant as busy work, being that it's a bulky "choose-your-own-adventure!" solution to something that would otherwise take me about 20 minutes...
so I think I figured out my job finally, I'm a professional punch card filler outer and timesheeter. thanks for all the help!
@Lotsofgoats Congratulations on finding your place in work, your "True Purpose", as it were, for that subset of your existence. Many never truly know what the hell they're supposed to be doing.