From: scs@adam.mit.edu (Steve Summit)
Subject: "See Figure 1."
Reply-To: scs@adam.mit.edu
Organization: none, at the moment
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1992 18:13:48 GMT

Here's an old gem that deserves re-posting.  My copy is dated
June, 1986; I have no idea how long it's been around or who wrote
it.  (The author, if out there, should certainly step forward and
take credit.)

Among my associates who have seen this, the phrase "See Figure 1"
became instant jargon.  Is anyone else using it?

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Please stop submitting SPR's.  This is our system.  We designed it, we
built it, and we use it more than you do.  If there are some features
you think might be missing, or if the system isn't as effective as you
think it could be, TOUGH!  Give it back, we don't need you.  See Figure
1.

Forget about your silly problem; let's take a look at some of the
features of our operating system.

1)  Options.  We've got lots of them.  So many in fact, that you need
two strong people to carry the documentation around.  So many that it
will be a cold day in hell before half of them are used.  So many that
you are probably not going to do your work right anyway.   However,
the number of options isn't all that important, because we picked some
interesting values for the options and called them ...

2)  Defaults.  We put a lot of thought into our defaults.  We like
them.  If we didn't, we would have made something else be the default.
So keep your cotton-pickin' hands off our defaults.  Don't touch.
Consider them mandatory.  "Mandatory defaults" has a nice ring to it.
If you change them and your system crashes, tough.  See Figure 1.

3)  Language Processors.  They work just fine.  They take in source,
and often produce object files as a reward for your efforts.  You don't
like the code?  Too bad!  You can even try to call operating system
services from them.  For any that you can't, use the assembler like we
do.  We spoke to the language processor developers about this, and they
think a lot like we do.  They said, "See Figure 1".

4)  Debuggers.  We've got debuggers, one we support and one we use.
You shouldn't make mistakes anyway, it is a waste of time.  We don't
want to hear anything about debuggers; we're not interested.  See
Figure 1.

5)  Error Logging.  Ignore it.  Why give yourself an ulcer?  You don't
want to give us the machine to get the problem fixed and we probably
can't do it anyway.  Oh, and if something breaks between 17:00 and
18:00 or 9:30 and 10:30 or 11:30 and 13:30 or 14:30 and 15:30, don't
waste your time calling us; we're out.  See Figure 1.

6)  Command Language.  We designed it ourselves, it's perfect.  We like
it so much we put our name on it.  In fact we're so happy with it, we
designed it once for each of our operating systems.  We even try to
keep it the same from release to release, though sometimes we blow it.
See Figure 1.

7)  Real Time Performance.   We got it.   Who else could have done such
a good job?  So the system seems sluggish with all those priority 18
processes?  No problem, just make them priority 1.  Anyway, realtime
isn't important anymore like it used to be.  We changed our group's
name to get rid of the word realtime.  We told all our realtime users
to see Figure 1 a long time ago.

In conclusion, stuff your SPR.  Love our system or leave it, but don't
complain.


		---------------------------------
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		!              { }		!
		!	       | |		!
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		!	    .-.! !.-.		!
		!	  .-!  ! !  !.-.	!
		!	  ! !       !  ;	!
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		!	    !       :		!
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			    Figure 1.

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The above was re-posted, but was *not* written, by

					Steve Summit
					scs@adam.mit.edu
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers