ode to spell checkers
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ODE TO A SPELL CHECKER by Jerrold H Zar I have a spelling checker. It came with my PC. It plane lee marks four my revue Miss steaks aye can knot sea. Eye ran this poem threw it, Your sure reel glad two no. Its vary polished in it's weigh. My checker tolled me sew. A checker is a bless sing. It freeze yew lodes of thyme. It helps me right awl stiles two reed, And aides me when aye rime. Each frays come posed up on my screen Eye trussed too be a joule. The checker pours o'er every word To cheque sum spelling rule. Bee fore a veiling checker's Hour spelling mite decline, And if we're lacks oar have a laps, We wood bee maid to wine. Butt now bee cause my spelling Is checked with such grate flare, Their are know fault's with in my cite, Of nun eye am a wear. Now spelling does knot phase me, it does knot bring a tier. My pay purrs awl due glad den With wrapped word's fare as hear. To rite with care is quite a feet Of witch won should bee proud, And wee mussed dew the best wee can, Sew flaw's are knot aloud. Sow ewe can sea why aye dew prays Such soft wear four pea seas, And why eye brake in two averse Buy righting want too pleas.
the computer prayer
Our Morning Prayer . . .
Our Hard Drive
Which art internal
Volume C by name;
Thy code be clean,
Thy fonts be seen
On screen as they are on paper.
Give us this day our documents,
And lead us not into fragmentation
But deliver us our data.
For thine is the SCSI,
And the EISA, and the NuBus,
Forever and Ever,
Amen.
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Our Hard Drive
Which art internal
Volume C by name;
Thy code be clean,
Thy fonts be seen
On screen as they are on paper.
Give us this day our documents,
And lead us not into fragmentation
But deliver us our data.
For thine is the SCSI,
And the EISA, and the NuBus,
Forever and Ever,
Amen.
computer help stories
This article is from the Wall Street Journal, Tuesday, March 1, 1994: Befuddled PC Users Flood Help Llines, and No Qquestion Seems To Be Too Basic
AUSTIN, Texas - The exasperated help-line caller said she couldn't get her new Dell computer to turn on. Jay Ablinger, a Dell Computer Corp. technician, made sure the computer was plugged in and then asked the woman what happened when she pushed the power button.
"I've pushed and pushed on this foot pedal and nothing happens," the woman replied. "Foot pedal?" the technician asked. "Yes," the woman said, "this little white foot pedal with the on switch." The "foot pedal," it turned out, was the computer's mouse, a hand-operated device that helps to control the computer's operation.
Personal-computer makers are discovering that it's still a low-tech world out there. While they are finally having great success selling PCs to households, they now have to deal with people to whom monitors and disk drives are as foreign as another language.
"It is rather mystifying to get this nice, beautiful machine and not know anything about it," says Ed Shuler, a technician who helps field consumer calls at Dell's headquarters here. "It's going into unfamiliar territory," adds Gus Kolias, vice president of customer service and training for Compaq Computer Corp. "People are looking for a comfort level."
Only two years ago, most calls to PC help lines came from techies needing help on complex problems. But now, with computer sales to homes exploding as new "multimedia" functions gain mass appeal, PC makers say that as many as 70% of their calls come from rank novices. Partly because of the volume of calls, some computer companies have started charging help-line users.
The questions are often so basic that they could have been answered by opening the manual that comes with every machine. One woman called Dell's toll-free line to ask how to install batteries in her laptop. When told that the directions were on the first page of the manual, says Steve Smith, Dell director of technical support, the woman replied angrily, "I just paid $2,000 for this stupid thing, and I'm not going to read a book."
Indeed, it seems that these buyers rarely refer to a manual when a phone is at hand. "If there is a book and a phone and they're side-by-side, the phone wins time after time," says Craig McQuilkin manager of service marketing for AST Research, Inc. in Irvine, Calif. "It's a phenomenon of people wanting to talk to people.
And do they ever. Compaq's help center in Houston, Texas, is inundated by some 8,000 consumer calls a day, with inquiries like this one related by technician John Wolf: "A frustrated customer called, who said her brand new Contura would not work. She said she had unpacked the unit, plugged it in, opened it up and sat there for 20 minutes waiting for something to happen. When asked what happened when she pressed the power switch, she asked, "What power switch?
Seemingly simple computer features baffle some users. So many people have called to ask where the "any" key is when "Press Any Key" flashes on the screen that Compaq is considering changing the command to "Press Return Key.
Some people can't figure out the mouse. Tamra Eagle, and AST technical support supervisor, says one customer complained that her mouse was hard to control with the "dust cover" on. The cover turned out to be the plastic bag the mouse was packaged in. Dell technician Wayne Zieschan says one of his customers held the mouse and pointed it at the screen, all the while clicking madly. The customer got no response because the mouse works only if it's moved over a flat surface.
Disk drives are another bugaboo. Compaq technician Brent Sullivan says a customer was having trouble reading word-processing files from his old diskettes. After troubleshooting for magnets and heat failed to diagnose the problem, Mr. Sullivan asked what else was being done with the diskette. The customer's response: "I put a label on the diskette and rolled it into the typewriter."
At AST, another customer dutifully complied with a technician's request that she send in a copy of a defective floppy disk. A letter from the customer arrived a few days later, along with a Xerox copy of the floppy. And at Dell, a technician advised his customer to put his troubled floppy back in the drive and "close the door." Asking the technician to "hold on," the customer put the phone down and was heard walking over to shut the door to his room. The technician meant the door to his floppy drive.
The software inside the computer can be equally befuddling. A Dell customer called to say he couldn't get his computer to fax anything. After 40 minutes of troubleshooting, the technician discovered the man was trying to fax a piece of paper by holding it in front of the monitor screen and hitting the "send" key.
Another Dell customer needed help setting up a new program, so Dell technician Gary Rock referred him to the local Egghead. "Yeah, I got me a couple friends," the customer replied. When told Egghead was software store, the man said, "Oh! I thought you meant for me to find couple of geeks.
Not realizing how fragile computers can be, some people end up damaging parts beyond repair. A Dell customer called to complain that his keyboard no longer worked. He had cleaned it, he said, filling up his tub with soap and water and soaking his keyboard for a day, and the removing all the keys and washing them individually.
Computers make some people paranoid. A Dell technician, Morgan Vergaran says he once calmed a man who became enraged because, "his computer has told him he was bad and an invalid." Mr. Vergara patiently explained that the computer's "bad command" and "invalid" responses shouldn't be taken personally.
These days PC-help technicians increasingly find themselves taking on the role of amateur psychologists. Mr. Shuler, the dell technician who once worked as a psychiatric nurse, says he defused a potential domestic fight by soothingly talking a man through a computer problem after the man had screamed threats at his wife and children in the background
There are also the lonely hearts who seek out human contact, even if it happens to be a computer techie. One man from New Hampshire calls Dell every time he experiences a life crisis. He gets a technician to walk him through some contrived problem with his computer, apparently feeling uplifted by the process.
"A lot of people want reassurance," says Mr. Shuler.
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AUSTIN, Texas - The exasperated help-line caller said she couldn't get her new Dell computer to turn on. Jay Ablinger, a Dell Computer Corp. technician, made sure the computer was plugged in and then asked the woman what happened when she pushed the power button.
"I've pushed and pushed on this foot pedal and nothing happens," the woman replied. "Foot pedal?" the technician asked. "Yes," the woman said, "this little white foot pedal with the on switch." The "foot pedal," it turned out, was the computer's mouse, a hand-operated device that helps to control the computer's operation.
Personal-computer makers are discovering that it's still a low-tech world out there. While they are finally having great success selling PCs to households, they now have to deal with people to whom monitors and disk drives are as foreign as another language.
"It is rather mystifying to get this nice, beautiful machine and not know anything about it," says Ed Shuler, a technician who helps field consumer calls at Dell's headquarters here. "It's going into unfamiliar territory," adds Gus Kolias, vice president of customer service and training for Compaq Computer Corp. "People are looking for a comfort level."
Only two years ago, most calls to PC help lines came from techies needing help on complex problems. But now, with computer sales to homes exploding as new "multimedia" functions gain mass appeal, PC makers say that as many as 70% of their calls come from rank novices. Partly because of the volume of calls, some computer companies have started charging help-line users.
The questions are often so basic that they could have been answered by opening the manual that comes with every machine. One woman called Dell's toll-free line to ask how to install batteries in her laptop. When told that the directions were on the first page of the manual, says Steve Smith, Dell director of technical support, the woman replied angrily, "I just paid $2,000 for this stupid thing, and I'm not going to read a book."
Indeed, it seems that these buyers rarely refer to a manual when a phone is at hand. "If there is a book and a phone and they're side-by-side, the phone wins time after time," says Craig McQuilkin manager of service marketing for AST Research, Inc. in Irvine, Calif. "It's a phenomenon of people wanting to talk to people.
And do they ever. Compaq's help center in Houston, Texas, is inundated by some 8,000 consumer calls a day, with inquiries like this one related by technician John Wolf: "A frustrated customer called, who said her brand new Contura would not work. She said she had unpacked the unit, plugged it in, opened it up and sat there for 20 minutes waiting for something to happen. When asked what happened when she pressed the power switch, she asked, "What power switch?
Seemingly simple computer features baffle some users. So many people have called to ask where the "any" key is when "Press Any Key" flashes on the screen that Compaq is considering changing the command to "Press Return Key.
Some people can't figure out the mouse. Tamra Eagle, and AST technical support supervisor, says one customer complained that her mouse was hard to control with the "dust cover" on. The cover turned out to be the plastic bag the mouse was packaged in. Dell technician Wayne Zieschan says one of his customers held the mouse and pointed it at the screen, all the while clicking madly. The customer got no response because the mouse works only if it's moved over a flat surface.
Disk drives are another bugaboo. Compaq technician Brent Sullivan says a customer was having trouble reading word-processing files from his old diskettes. After troubleshooting for magnets and heat failed to diagnose the problem, Mr. Sullivan asked what else was being done with the diskette. The customer's response: "I put a label on the diskette and rolled it into the typewriter."
At AST, another customer dutifully complied with a technician's request that she send in a copy of a defective floppy disk. A letter from the customer arrived a few days later, along with a Xerox copy of the floppy. And at Dell, a technician advised his customer to put his troubled floppy back in the drive and "close the door." Asking the technician to "hold on," the customer put the phone down and was heard walking over to shut the door to his room. The technician meant the door to his floppy drive.
The software inside the computer can be equally befuddling. A Dell customer called to say he couldn't get his computer to fax anything. After 40 minutes of troubleshooting, the technician discovered the man was trying to fax a piece of paper by holding it in front of the monitor screen and hitting the "send" key.
Another Dell customer needed help setting up a new program, so Dell technician Gary Rock referred him to the local Egghead. "Yeah, I got me a couple friends," the customer replied. When told Egghead was software store, the man said, "Oh! I thought you meant for me to find couple of geeks.
Not realizing how fragile computers can be, some people end up damaging parts beyond repair. A Dell customer called to complain that his keyboard no longer worked. He had cleaned it, he said, filling up his tub with soap and water and soaking his keyboard for a day, and the removing all the keys and washing them individually.
Computers make some people paranoid. A Dell technician, Morgan Vergaran says he once calmed a man who became enraged because, "his computer has told him he was bad and an invalid." Mr. Vergara patiently explained that the computer's "bad command" and "invalid" responses shouldn't be taken personally.
These days PC-help technicians increasingly find themselves taking on the role of amateur psychologists. Mr. Shuler, the dell technician who once worked as a psychiatric nurse, says he defused a potential domestic fight by soothingly talking a man through a computer problem after the man had screamed threats at his wife and children in the background
There are also the lonely hearts who seek out human contact, even if it happens to be a computer techie. One man from New Hampshire calls Dell every time he experiences a life crisis. He gets a technician to walk him through some contrived problem with his computer, apparently feeling uplifted by the process.
"A lot of people want reassurance," says Mr. Shuler.
the hacker syndrome
by Tad Deriso
There is some compelling force in all Hackers that seems to draw them to their computers every day. Why they get up at 4am to use the modem, and why they continue to rack up a truly incredible phone bill is beyond me.
Most computer areas, at your home or at your office, tend to be messy. Even you try to keep it clean, it is truly impossible. Whether it be empty Coke cans laying all around, soldering devices, electric diodes, computer parts, or integrated circuits, it is not only a pain for your mother to look at, but a prime Russian ICBM missile target as well.
There is much detail needed to explain a Hacker. For instance, instead of organizing his clothes by color, best ones, or style, he organizes his by pile. Also, he likes to sing songs such as, "Let's get Digital", "We all live in a yellow subroutine", and "Somewhere over the RAMbow".
Most Hackers do well in school. The reason is not to impress their teachers, not to get money from their parents, and not to be educated, but they do it so they can hopefully get a scholarship to MIT. You can't blame them, though, if they are looking out into space. It might be because they are worried if MCI traced the calls that they sent to NORAD.
All Hackers, big or small, love computers, whether they be Trash-80's or an IBM 360/VM workstation. When they get on one, it's mighty hard to get them off of it.
There are 2 types of Hackers. One who likes to crash local BBS's, and the one who writes programs in Assembly Language. The Hacker who crashes systems is the one that most people think that a Hacker is. A typical example of one is John Fredrickson (A.K.A. "The Phone Man"). He loves to crash computers, and break into illegal systems. The ones that he has gotten in to are MCI, CitiBank, school systems, IBM, Southern Bell, and Georgia Tech, not to mention all the ones in between.
The second type of Hacker is the programmer. He writes games, utilities, and anything else that he can think of. Take for example, John Harris, a freelance software writer for On-Line Software Co. John had a brainstorm one day, and decided to write Frogger for the Apple. He thought that it would take about 3 weeks to complete. He started on Frogger a week late, because of the complicated music set that he had to write. After two months, he was almost done. He decided to take a break and go to the Software Expo. He decided to take his nearly completed Frogger, and show it to the consumers at the show. He also took with him the only back-up copy, in case the main disk did not boot.
While at the fair, he was talking to the Manager about getting a booth. He had his disks with him. Then, when he got a booth reserved, he reached down to get his disks, and they were gone! All his hard work, including the MultiLevel character generator, music lines, disk subroutines, assembly routines, debugging programs, etc. All gone.
After that tragedy, John was in a deep depression. He finally started working on it again in 3 months. He completed it in 4 months and 3 days.
Part Two:
Hackers always take time off. There is always one way to notice a true Hacker. At a party, the true Hacker is the one in the corner talking about operating system security and how to get around it. At the beach, the True Hacker is the one drawing flow charts in the sand. At a football game, the true Hacker is the one comparing the football plays against a simulation printed on 11 by 14 fanfold paper.
Most Hackers work for the U.S. Government-- mainly the Department of Defense. You can see the best Hackers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California.
What sort of environment does a Hacker function best in? No, not a heated room with a clean table and disks organized neatly, but they do best in rooms that have line-printed Snoopy calendars from the year 1969. They do not know how to cook, so they survive on Twinkies and coffee. Instead of wasting electricity for a heater, they spend it on air-conditioners to cool of their computer system in mid-January when the temperatures are below freezing. They wear layers and layers of clothing to keep the body heat in. When you see one of these people, instead of a Hacker coming into your mind, you think that he is about to go on a Polar expedition somewhere in the North Pole.
Hackers also like to hang around arcades. (This is also true for kids, little old ladies, and fighter pilots.) There, secluded in their
own environment, Hackers can talk freely on computer hints and short cuts while playing Pac-Man, or Joust.
All Hackers like Graphics. They like low-resolution, but prefer high-resolution the best. These graphics, such as Sine waves, rotating 3-D boxes, and little balloons, are confined to the limits of a systems capability. The older more experienced Hackers are the ones who are lucky enough to get to work on a VAX system, and maybe even a CRAY-1 SuperComputer. If they use these, they have only the limits of their imagination to stop them.
Most Middle School Hackers between the ages of 10 through 14, like to use computers to do reports on, and play games. Some of these younger generation Hackers have gotten into BASIC programming.
Some people, like to impress real Hackers by making them think that they know everything. There is a name for this kind of person. He is a Sub-Hacker (Intillectuous dumbfoundeth). For instance, you come up to them one day, and say,"Hey so-and-so what does BASIC stand for?" and you could sit there for days, and he would act like the answer was on the tip of his tongue, when it was probably in his toes. It is people like this that give Hackers a bad name.
Part Three:
All Hackers have rules that they go by. One is to never call long distance on Monday, because of the high phone charge. If builders built buildings they way programmers wrote programs, the first woodpecker that comes along would destroy civilization. Another is, if the computer accepts a program on the first run without any errors, either there is a malfunction, or it must be a dream.
Hackers are a unique breed. Combining intelligence, personality, and a morale sense of good taste. A Hacker enjoys the environment that appeals to him the most. Such as, the computer room, the arcade, science lab, or the Atari downstairs. They like to be alone. Secluded in their own thoughts, thinking of what the password could be to log on to General Electric. Hackers are the people who are going to make our future brighter, and more exciting in the field of electronics, data processing, artificial intelligence, and programming. We need to support these people in all the ways that we can, so we will be insured of a more happier future in the world of technological advancements.
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There is some compelling force in all Hackers that seems to draw them to their computers every day. Why they get up at 4am to use the modem, and why they continue to rack up a truly incredible phone bill is beyond me.
Most computer areas, at your home or at your office, tend to be messy. Even you try to keep it clean, it is truly impossible. Whether it be empty Coke cans laying all around, soldering devices, electric diodes, computer parts, or integrated circuits, it is not only a pain for your mother to look at, but a prime Russian ICBM missile target as well.
There is much detail needed to explain a Hacker. For instance, instead of organizing his clothes by color, best ones, or style, he organizes his by pile. Also, he likes to sing songs such as, "Let's get Digital", "We all live in a yellow subroutine", and "Somewhere over the RAMbow".
Most Hackers do well in school. The reason is not to impress their teachers, not to get money from their parents, and not to be educated, but they do it so they can hopefully get a scholarship to MIT. You can't blame them, though, if they are looking out into space. It might be because they are worried if MCI traced the calls that they sent to NORAD.
All Hackers, big or small, love computers, whether they be Trash-80's or an IBM 360/VM workstation. When they get on one, it's mighty hard to get them off of it.
There are 2 types of Hackers. One who likes to crash local BBS's, and the one who writes programs in Assembly Language. The Hacker who crashes systems is the one that most people think that a Hacker is. A typical example of one is John Fredrickson (A.K.A. "The Phone Man"). He loves to crash computers, and break into illegal systems. The ones that he has gotten in to are MCI, CitiBank, school systems, IBM, Southern Bell, and Georgia Tech, not to mention all the ones in between.
The second type of Hacker is the programmer. He writes games, utilities, and anything else that he can think of. Take for example, John Harris, a freelance software writer for On-Line Software Co. John had a brainstorm one day, and decided to write Frogger for the Apple. He thought that it would take about 3 weeks to complete. He started on Frogger a week late, because of the complicated music set that he had to write. After two months, he was almost done. He decided to take a break and go to the Software Expo. He decided to take his nearly completed Frogger, and show it to the consumers at the show. He also took with him the only back-up copy, in case the main disk did not boot.
While at the fair, he was talking to the Manager about getting a booth. He had his disks with him. Then, when he got a booth reserved, he reached down to get his disks, and they were gone! All his hard work, including the MultiLevel character generator, music lines, disk subroutines, assembly routines, debugging programs, etc. All gone.
After that tragedy, John was in a deep depression. He finally started working on it again in 3 months. He completed it in 4 months and 3 days.
Part Two:
Hackers always take time off. There is always one way to notice a true Hacker. At a party, the true Hacker is the one in the corner talking about operating system security and how to get around it. At the beach, the True Hacker is the one drawing flow charts in the sand. At a football game, the true Hacker is the one comparing the football plays against a simulation printed on 11 by 14 fanfold paper.
Most Hackers work for the U.S. Government-- mainly the Department of Defense. You can see the best Hackers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California.
What sort of environment does a Hacker function best in? No, not a heated room with a clean table and disks organized neatly, but they do best in rooms that have line-printed Snoopy calendars from the year 1969. They do not know how to cook, so they survive on Twinkies and coffee. Instead of wasting electricity for a heater, they spend it on air-conditioners to cool of their computer system in mid-January when the temperatures are below freezing. They wear layers and layers of clothing to keep the body heat in. When you see one of these people, instead of a Hacker coming into your mind, you think that he is about to go on a Polar expedition somewhere in the North Pole.
Hackers also like to hang around arcades. (This is also true for kids, little old ladies, and fighter pilots.) There, secluded in their
own environment, Hackers can talk freely on computer hints and short cuts while playing Pac-Man, or Joust.
All Hackers like Graphics. They like low-resolution, but prefer high-resolution the best. These graphics, such as Sine waves, rotating 3-D boxes, and little balloons, are confined to the limits of a systems capability. The older more experienced Hackers are the ones who are lucky enough to get to work on a VAX system, and maybe even a CRAY-1 SuperComputer. If they use these, they have only the limits of their imagination to stop them.
Most Middle School Hackers between the ages of 10 through 14, like to use computers to do reports on, and play games. Some of these younger generation Hackers have gotten into BASIC programming.
Some people, like to impress real Hackers by making them think that they know everything. There is a name for this kind of person. He is a Sub-Hacker (Intillectuous dumbfoundeth). For instance, you come up to them one day, and say,"Hey so-and-so what does BASIC stand for?" and you could sit there for days, and he would act like the answer was on the tip of his tongue, when it was probably in his toes. It is people like this that give Hackers a bad name.
Part Three:
All Hackers have rules that they go by. One is to never call long distance on Monday, because of the high phone charge. If builders built buildings they way programmers wrote programs, the first woodpecker that comes along would destroy civilization. Another is, if the computer accepts a program on the first run without any errors, either there is a malfunction, or it must be a dream.
Hackers are a unique breed. Combining intelligence, personality, and a morale sense of good taste. A Hacker enjoys the environment that appeals to him the most. Such as, the computer room, the arcade, science lab, or the Atari downstairs. They like to be alone. Secluded in their own thoughts, thinking of what the password could be to log on to General Electric. Hackers are the people who are going to make our future brighter, and more exciting in the field of electronics, data processing, artificial intelligence, and programming. We need to support these people in all the ways that we can, so we will be insured of a more happier future in the world of technological advancements.
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