HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: h2m@vax5.cit.cornell.edu (JA)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.college
Subject: Re: Computer Lab Operator Geeks
Date: 9 Oct 92 13:24:15 EDT
Distribution: world
Organization: Cornell University

Speaking of computer lab operator geeks.....
I find that as a user, ther are a lot of the operators don't know squat....
I frequently ask questions and get the response "Gee, I don't know, you'd have
to call the Service Help Desk" ... then when I ask if they have the number...
"ummm...No, but it's in the phone book"

The worst however was an experience in a lab in the Industrial and Labor 
Relations school.... I was with a friend who was working on a project, and I 
just wanted to check my mail while I was there.  So I ask the operator for a
networked machine so I can log on to the mainframe, so  she points me to a 
room, gives me a system disk (Mac SE's two floppy drives, no hard drive, on an 
ethernet LAN with an internet gateway) and a mouse pad inreturn for my ID. 
fine.... The machine boots up, and I get the system disk and a file server ont 
he desktop, with the communications software buried in the server.  It doesn't
work.  Why? because the TCP drivers were not installed in the System, nor was
there room on the system disk to copy the driver so I could reboot.....

I went back to the operator:
Me:do you have any system disks with the MacTCP drivers on them?
op:pardon me?
me:MacTCP is not installed in the system, so NCSATelnet doesn't work.
op:I have no idea what you are talking about.
me:ummm...Are these the only system disks you have? (thinking they might have 
some special ones for people doing mundae things like reading mail)
op:no, we have about 30 copies of the system disk
me:but they're all the same....
op: yes
me:do you know anything about Comet (Cornell's standard terminal emulator and 
communications package.... most everybody uses it)?
op: comet? what's that...
me: never mind....

(in this same lab, where there is an operator working, all the components 
of the machine are chained to the desk through a lock in the back, leaving you
with an effective 6 inches of mouse cord to work with..)


So..... the point is: not all students are annoying idiots and there are some 
operators out there that are dumb as a brick....

btw: if you people hate your jobs so much, why don't you quit and let somebody 
take your place that  actually enjoys helping people?


later.....
justin


-- 
               _____        |Justin 'Ja' Norfleet    h2m@vax5.cit.cornell.edu
              /    /        |Mechanical Engineering    j_norfleet@cornell.edu
             /    /         |Cornell University      DISCLAIMER:My opinions are.
    ____    /    / _______  |
   /   /   /    / /  ___  | |NYS EMS CFR             FF Co. 9 Ithaca FD
  /   /___/    / /  /  /  | |'Don't you think that's totally spam?  It's
 /            / /  /__/   | | lubricated! Well, I'm phasing.'     -Calvin
 \___________/  \______/\_\ |'Marvy. Fab. Far out.'               -Calvin's Dad
From: yuan1@husc10.harvard.edu (Nina Yuan)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.college
Subject: Re: Computer Lab Operator Geeks
Date: 15 Oct 92 23:20:54 GMT

sbrack@jupiter (Steven S. Brack) writes:

>jdahl@rchland.vnet.ibm.com (Jared Dahl) writes:
>: In article <OLDMAN.92Oct8163114@titan.ucc.umass.edu>, oldman@titan.ucc.umass.edu (Tig Stone) writes:
>: 
>: |> 	Sometimes, they ask ME, even when there IS someone on duty...	
>: 
>: But of course, it always helps if the person who needs help 
>: it an attractive young woman!!
>: 
>	Or just an attractive person.  8)

Indeed!

:-)

-nhy
-- 
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Nina H. Yuan                          User Assistance, Computer-Based Lab
Harvard College                       William James Hall 1232, 5-3811
yuan1@husc.harvard.edu                yuan@isr.harvard.edu
From: henrydm@HYDRA.ROSE-HULMAN.EDU
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.college
Subject: Virginity
Date: 14 Oct 1992 20:51:39 GMT
Organization: Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology
Reply-To: henrydm@HYDRA.ROSE-HULMAN.EDU
NNTP-Posting-Host: hydra.rose-hulman.edu

	Omar came up to me the other day and said, "I ah had fun in Minnesota
this weekend.  Well, let's just say I had something when I left but didn't
bring it back."  Omar grinned.

(I hope he meant his hearing aid.)

					-Henrydm@rosevc.rose-hulman.edu
From: henrydm@HYDRA.ROSE-HULMAN.EDU
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.college
Subject: A non-Omar story
Date: 12 Oct 1992 18:13:18 GMT
Organization: Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology
Reply-To: henrydm@HYDRA.ROSE-HULMAN.EDU
NNTP-Posting-Host: hydra.rose-hulman.edu



		There are a lot of other humorous things that happen on this 
       	campus.  Some that don't even have anything to do with Omar.  This
	particular story is about an Omarish fellow named Kevin Henson.

		Kevin was, in the nicest of terms, a complete and total
	spaz.  As a freshman, this individual lived in speed hall.  SPEED
	HALL, You'll never find a more wretched hive of......
	Well, anyway, speed is a home to football players most of the time
	and a lot of football players belong to Sigma Nu.  I'm not saying that
	they are stupid or anything lest I lose my life over it but some do 
	like to drink quite a bit.  The sigma nus hated Kevin.  They made fun
	of everything from the trilobyte he wore around his neck to the fact
	that he was a complete and total moron.  He retaliated by playing 
	tricks on them when they were drunk.  We happen to have a very large
	lake on campus and the Sigma Nus were known for laking Kevin.  He would
	often just lock himself in his room and pray, but this time he was
	outside.  A chase ensued around campus.  Kevin entered the library and
	went down to the basement.  He spied the revolving door of the darkroom
	and realizing that this was probably a good place to hide, quickly
	entered.  

		This would really have been a good place to hide so Kevin
	gets some points here.  However, once he got in there, he proclaimed
	"HA! Those stupid Sigma Nus will never find me in here."  What Kevin
	didn't realize though was that several Sigma Nus who were "out of	
	uniform", so to speak, were inside doing a project.  Of course, they
	proceeded to lake him.  What else could they do?


					-henrydm@rosevc.rose-hulman.edu      
	  
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.college
From: jdahl@rchland.vnet.ibm.com (Jared Dahl)
Subject: Re: Renaming Hallowed Institutions
Date: Fri, 09 Oct 1992 17:39:55 GMT
Disclaimer: This posting represents the poster's views, not necessarily those of IBM
Organization: IBM Rochester

At the University of North Dakota we affectionatly
refer to campus as:

University of Neural Deprivation
U Need Drinks
and
Unwanted Nickle&Diming (parking, tuition hikes, fees, bookstore)

Jared "OOOPS!  I graduated by accident! Honest!" Dahl
-- 
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
| Jared Dahl             | "My heart is human, my blood is boiling, | 
| Systems Programmer     |  my brain IBM"                           |
| IBM - Rochester, MN    |              -- STYX,  "Mr. Roboto"      |
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Opinions expressed are mine, not IBM's.
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: bmk@box.ssd.loral.com (Bruce Krawetz)
Subject: Re: WANTED: Unix administration horror stories !
Organization: Space Systems/Loral, Palo Alto, CA  USA
Date: Tue, 13 Oct 1992 23:08:48 GMT

Back when I was installing X-windows on a Sun-3, I accidently deleted
the console's font.  Not only would that machine not boot, it wouldn't
tell me _why_ it wouldn't boot.  It seems that without that font, /vmunix
dies most ungracefully very quickly.
Xref: sparky alt.folklore.computers:15045 comp.unix.admin:5533
From: matthews@oberon.umd.edu (Mike Matthews)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,comp.unix.admin
Subject: Re: WANTED: Unix administration horror stories !
Date: 12 Oct 92 18:00:25 GMT
Organization: /etc/organization

When I had first gotten my NeXTstation, it had the lil' 105M hard drive in
it.  I had a 330M external, but alas, no cable for it.  (Life was not fun
when I was essentially netbooting off a "test" machine.... ".. um, guys, did
you just reboot is-next?")

Finally got the cable, just in time for the winter holiday (read: no
network).  Brought the machine home, and I figured I'd just copy the
configuration files over from the internal to the external (as a nice gesture
to my users so they wouldn't have to change their passwords and everything).

The external was a brand new BuildDisk'd disk (had stock NeXTstep on it).
NeXT keeps the private information of each machine (/dev, /etc, stuff like
that) in a /private directory to make netbooting easier.

Hey, I'll just move /private from the 105M to /private on the external.  So I
deleted the external's /private and tried to move it via the workspace.

/dev is in /private.

/dev contains device files.  Can't move them.

BUT.  The workspace happily deleted all the files it DID copy, so the
internal couldn't boot (no /etc) and the external couldn't boot (no /dev).
This is before the advent of boot floppies so I was stuck for about a week at
home with $5000 of NeXT computer that I couldn't boot.

The moral?  *NEVER* move something important.  Copy, VERIFY, and THEN delete.
------
Mike Matthews, matthews@oberon.umd.edu (NeXTmail accepted)
------
There has been an alarming increase in the number of things you know
nothing about.

Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: spinuzzi@gab.unt.edu (Clay Spinuzzi)
Subject: Where did smileys come from?
Summary: Where did smileys come from?
Keywords: smiley
Organization: College of Arts and Sciences
Date: Tue, 13 Oct 1992 03:57:31 GMT

Does anyone out there know when smileys first appeared?  e.g. :) :[ :(

My local VAX admin says he started seeing them in the mid-80's.  Does anyone 
remember seeing them earlier?

======================================================================
Clay Spinuzzi        spinuzzi@gab.unt.edu        Thanks for tuning in.
From: Hinding.1@nd.edu (John E. Hinding)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: Screen colors (Was Re: Zork/Dungeon)
Date: 8 Oct 92 02:06:46 GMT
Followup-To: alt.folklore.computers,rec.games.int-fiction
Organization: University of Notre Dame

In article <Xs76RB1w164w@lorc.UUCP>, lowen@lorc.UUCP (Lamar Owen) wrote:
> 
> xeno@iastate.edu (Gary L Snethen) writes:
> > In <1992Oct1.215954.1465@ukw.uucp> lupe@ukw.uucp (Lupe Christoph) writes:
> > >nickel@cs.tu-berlin.de (Juergen Nickelsen) writes:
> > >>In article <1992Sep30.125808.15973@husc3.harvard.edu>
> > >>goodridg@husc8.harvard.edu (Andrew Goodridge) writes:
> > >>[...]
> > >>> My problem is my youth. I'm only 22; I was 7 or 8 when Zork was
> > >>> worked on.  I'm not very regretful; I got to see 16 million colors
> > >>> before I was 19.  But it means I'm starting at a disadvantage.
> > >>(Sorry, pet peeve:)
> > 
> > >>Where did you see 16 million colors? Not on *one* screen at a time, I
> > >>suppose, or I'd like to see that screen.
> > 
> > >Maybe he just went outside? :-P
> > 
> > Hmmm... First I was going to question why you suspected this was
> > unbelievable... since 24 bit graphics (16 million colors) has been around
> > for a long time...  But now it hits me...
> > 
> > That would be 4096 x 4096 resolution...  Pretty snazzy monitor!
> 
> This is very true.  But, even with a 4096x4096 screen, you still couldn't see
> 16 million colors.  Why?  The eye can only distinguish about 4 milllion colors.
> So, those other 12 million are just useless baggage.  Although using 24 bits
> for color info is easy on the hardware and the programmer, these days, due to 
> IBM's success at pushing 8-bit bytes.
> 
> > ---Xeno
> 
> --
> 
> Lamar Owen, Systems Consultant, GE Lighting Systems, Hendersonville, NC
> ***********************************************************************
>  Opinions expressed herein are the author's and do not reflect policy
>    or opinions of the General Electric Company or its subsidiaries.
> ***********************************************************************
Actually the eye is a lot better than you give it credit for. At JPL they
did studies where it was at around 24 bit that the eye couldn't tell the
difference. On a printed page the eye could tell a few million more
different shades. I believe the test involved printing text on shade
different from the background and seeing how far they had to go to not be
able to see the the text.	The eye is better at seeing reflected light than
direct light mostly likely since humanity evloved by looking at reflected
light and not Tvs and monitors.
Xref: sparky alt.folklore.computers:14968 rec.games.int-fiction:498
From: goodridg@husc8.harvard.edu (Andrew Goodridge)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,rec.games.int-fiction
Subject: Re: Screen colors (Was Re: Zork/Dungeon)
Date: 10 Oct 92 02:38:44 GMT
Organization: Harvard University Science Center


This is getting way out of hand.

I tried to indicate how far we've come in computer technology.
When I said I've seen 16 million colors when I was a teenager, I meant
that computers had a pallette of 16 million relative colors to choose from.
Once, we had a choice of 2. Black and White. Or Black and Green.

That's all. We should have a huge discussion about REAL relevant things,
like, well, what's the most peripherals you've ever seen a private citizen
hook to his machine?

- Sketch
Xref: sparky alt.folklore.computers:15061 alt.folklore.science:3723 alt.folklore.urban:25524
From: magnus@brisk.ii.uib.no (Magnus Alvestad)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,alt.folklore.science,alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: folklore and computing article
Date: 13 Oct 92 02:14:12 GMT
Reply-To: magnus@ii.uib.no
Organization: Computer Engineer Submarine School Royal Navy of Norway Computer
	Science student at University of Bergen, Norway

In article <Bw1EAt.8nt@acsu.buffalo.edu> boyd@acsu.buffalo.edu (Daniel F Boyd) writes:

   15.  Do you know of any instances where people claim that they
	have used the penis to perform magic?

Very good.

   29.  Do you know of any beliefs about viruses and penises?

Uhhm..

   51.  Have you heard anyone offer special advice about how to make
	an inoperative penis work (e.g., talk nicely to it, hit
	it, get the tech support guru to walk into the room, place a
	phone call to tech support, etc.)?

Ugh!

-Magnus
Xref: sparky alt.folklore.computers:15177 rec.games.int-fiction:582
From: lowen@lorc.UUCP (Lamar Owen)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,rec.games.int-fiction
Subject: Re: Screen colors (Was Re: Zork/Dungeon)
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 92 12:38:59 EDT
Organization: LORC Enterprises

jsvrc@rc.rit.edu (J A Stephen Viggiano) writes:
> This experiment is easy to do in Adobe Photoshop on the Macintosh, but you'll
> need a 24-bit display system to do it. Starting with a good full-color scene,
> perhaps one of the demonstration images they provide, verify that all levels
> are populated, at least in margin, by looking at the Red, Green, and Blue
> histograms under Image/Histogram. Then use the "Posterize" option to
> perform the quantization -- first to 128 levels (7 bits), then to 64 levels
> (6 bits), and finally to 32 levels (5 bits).

I tried this on my 40 plane Apollo system. (Actually, the Apollo board
is 40 bit, but the docs say "plane" to mean Bit-Plane instead of color
plane.)  A Custom program generated a plasma cloud fractal, another custom 
program did the "posterizing".  The transition from 24 bit to 23-bit was not
noticeable.  23 to 22 was not noticeable.  22 to 21 was noticeable.  The 
color mapping at 24 bit was (r,g,b) 8,8,8 bits.  23 was 8,8,7; 22 was 7,8,7;
and 21 was 7,7,7.
  
> The only reason some people are satisfied with 8-bit color mapped color
> displays, such as VGA, is that they haven't worked with true color systems,
> such as TARGA, VISTA, or 32-bit Quickdraw, or they're doing things such as
> business graphics, which can use a small pallette of colors. For natural
> color scenes, 24 bits per pixel is baseline performance.

Or even the 40-bit Apollo system.  It seems to be forgotten these days.

> Steve Viggiano, A.B., Sc.M., M.Stat.
> Senior Imaging Scientist
> Rochester Institute of Technology Research Corporation

I find it very intriguing the levels of expertise available in all sorts of
fields in a.f.c!

:-) :-)

--

Lamar Owen, Systems Consultant, GE Lighting Systems, Hendersonville, NC
***********************************************************************
 Opinions expressed herein are the author's and do not reflect policy
   or opinions of the General Electric Company or its subsidiaries.
***********************************************************************
From: mute@bigwpi.WPI.EDU (I can hear the voices dreaming...)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Re: Convergent Megaframe?? Anyone??
Date: 8 Oct 1992 18:00:20 GMT
Organization: Worcester Polytechnic Institute
Distribution: world,local
NNTP-Posting-Host: bigwpi.wpi.edu

In article <ping.02fa@ping.actrix.gen.nz> ping@ping.actrix.gen.nz (Peter Ingham) writes:

>Still being sold (by Unisys) as the  XE520, and XE530 series.

Neato. I had thought these had vanished long ago...

>The Primary OS for them is CTOS which is still being developed and enhanced.
>Unix is (or used to be) also available on some XE500 configurations.

How does CTOS compare to CTIX, the version of UNIX used on the
Convergent Miniframe, Mightyframe, and Megaframe back when they were
still called Convergent machines?

Does anyone besides me still use MiniFrames?

Josh Brandt
-- 
          ...said it was heaven just to breathe your air...   Severed Heads
                                         - mute@wpi.wpi.edu   Joshua Brandt -
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: kucharsk@solbourne.com (William Kucharski)
Subject: Re: Radio Shack testimonial
Organization: Solbourne Computer, Inc., Longmont, CO
Distribution: usa
Date: Fri, 16 Oct 1992 08:34:44 GMT

While reading article <1bl23jINNso5@network.ucsd.edu>, I noticed that
mbreen@sdacs.ucsd.edu (Michael Breen) said the following:
 >But if all you need is basic parts, or connectors, or the like, then
 >RS can save yer butt!

Save yer butt -- hell, if you live anywhere but the Bay Area and need chips/
LEDs/resistors/capacitors/miscellaneous parts where else CAN you get them
without using a catalog with a $20 or so minimum order?

On the other hand if you DO live in the SFO Bay Area, I guess there's only one
word I need to say:  Fry's.  (Hot dogs (sometimes), chips (potato and CMOS),
soda, books, and Playboy/Penthouse.  If they were open 24 hours some folks I
knew would have moved in... :-) :-) )
-- 
| William Kucharski, Solbourne Computer, Inc.     | Opinions expressed above
| Internet: kucharsk@solbourne.com   Ham: N0OKQ   | are MINE alone, not those
| Snail Mail: 1900 Pike Road, Longmont, CO  80501 | of Solbourne Computer, Inc.
| President, "Just the Ten of Us" Fan Club        | "Dittos from Longmont, CO"
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: Convergent Megaframe?? Anyone??
From: petrisko@evax2.engr.arizona.edu (William Petrisko)
Date: 7 Oct 92 00:47:44 MST
Reply-To: petrisko@evax2.engr.arizona.edu
Distribution: world,local
Organization: University of Arizona, College of Engineering and Mines, Tucson

Anyone here heard of a Convergent Technologies Megaframe?

I've got two of 'em.  I feel lucky....no installable OS.

Suggestions?  (besides using them for coffee tables, which i already am.)

-bill
--
bill petrisko                                  petrisko@evax2.engr.arizona.edu
   aka n7lwo                 ...!uunet!4gen!warlok!gargle!omnisec!thumper!bill
From: DONAHOE@acsnovell1.uta.edu (Sean Donahoe)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
Subject: RE: You know you've been...
Date: 14 Oct 1992 13:32:38 -0500
Organization: UTexas Mail-to-News Gateway
Reply-To: donahoe@acsnovell1.uta.edu
NNTP-Posting-Host: cs.utexas.edu

Ok, maybe this doesn't follow the thread very well, but;
I saw announcement on campus today stating that representatives from
Christian Science Monitor would be here.  My first thought was: "I
wonder what models and sizes they sell, and what's their lowest dot
pitch?" :-<>

______________________________________________________________________
   _    ___   ___
 // \\  |  \ || \\        | --"Hello Work?  I won't be coming in
 \\     |__/ || ||        |    today...religious holiday...it's
   \\   |    || ||        |    the ummm, feast of the maximum
\\_//   |    ||_//        |    occupancy."  Homer Simpson --
                          |
Sean Donahoe              | The views expressed here represent only
donahoe@acsnovell1.uta.edu| a portion of the opinions of the UTA
University of TX@Arlington| student body.
                          |
--"My farmer died." H. Ross Perot--

Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,rec.games.int-fiction
From: khchung@monu1.cc.monash.edu.au (Mr KH Chung)
Subject: Re: Screen colors (Was Re: Zork/Dungeon)
Followup-To: alt.folklore.computers
Summary: very few
Organization: Monash University, Australia.
Date: Tue, 13 Oct 1992 08:37:20 GMT

In article <Bvv3EK.FCz@unix.amherst.edu>, twpierce@unix.amherst.edu (Tim Pierce) writes:
> In article <1992Oct8.003300.38853@datamark.co.nz> david@datamark.co.nz (David Rowland) writes:
> 
> >4 Million Now. A few messages back, it was 350 000 colours. Does any
> >one know the exact number of colours the human eye can see?
> 
> Eighty-seven.

The human eye can't really distinguish that many colours, it only has red
blue and green receptors.  It can, however, readily distinguish some 111
shades of grey (you can find it in some old article in Science xy, a now
non-existent magazine that used to be published by the AAAS).
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,alt.religion.kibology
From: xexeo@dxcern.cern.ch (Geraldo Xexeo)
Subject: Re: Oldest BIFF posting?
Organization: CERN European Lab for Particle Physics
Date: Wed, 7 Oct 1992 15:30:39 GMT

As you can find in the net.celebrities file, version 1.102.5, available
for anonymous ftp from hplaa02.cern.ch:

> %N Joe Talmadge
> %A jat@cup.hp.com
> %G formerly, alt.flame and talk.bizarre, now just rec.martial-arts
> %L I'm not on the net much anymore, but I'm the guy who first did BIFF.
> %L Richard Sexton, who got hold of BIFF from me and posted him everywhere,
> %L got the credit for BIFF, but if you'll check his old notes you'll
> %L see he always tried to pass the credit over to me.  I also did the
> %L System Administrator Man spoofs (occasionally on news.admin you'll
> %L hear someone derisively refer to someone else as System Administrator
> %L Man, my postings were the source of this),
> %L Steve Supportive (soc.singles reader for 2 years!),
> %L and the Flamer's Bible.  The Flamer's Bible is plagiarized in various
> %L forms on a regular basis (I last saw it slightly re-written as the
> %L Soc.women's Flamer's Guide), and also somehow got submitted and printed
> %L in some magazine (I *think* I was given credit in the magazine, but
> %L I'm not sure).
>

   For the files,

                 Jerry

-- 
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Geraldo Xexeo      |internet: xexeo@dxcern.cern.ch | "Cristo Redentor,    
CERN - PPE Division|bitnet:   gxexeo@cernvm.bitnet |  Bracos abertos sobre a
1211 Geneve 23     |decnet:   vxcern::xexeo        |  Guanabara...
Switzerland        |FAX:      (41) (22) 785 - 0207 |  Rio, eu gosto de voce!"
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers
From: mdw@theory.TC.Cornell.EDU (Matt Welsh)
Subject: You know you've been hacking too long when...
Organization: Cornell Theory Center
Date: Fri, 9 Oct 1992 17:48:21 GMT


...when you've been working on VMS for a few hours, decide to take a break and
switch on the TV set. "Ren and Stimpy" is on, and you wonder what the Stimpy
command does...

mdw

-- 
Matt Welsh    mdw@tc.cornell.edu        +1 607 253 2737
Systems Programmer, Cornell Theory Center
  "Yow! Up ahead! It's a DONUT HUT!!"
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers