"sorting the news"

[pete]

On Feb 6, 6:18 pm, (e-mail address removed) (Kenny McCormack)
wrote:

Oh for crap's sake, no you did not. Not unless

YHBT HAND

http://catb.org/jargon/html/Y/YHBT.html

 

[Antoninus Twink]

I consider it short for "regular contributor".

No one cares.

I don't consider those posts to be contributions.

Of course not - a real "contribution" needs to berate someone for
top-posting.

 

[Antoninus Twink]

"regular" can mean whatever we want it to mean.
It's not like anybody is ever going write "clc regular" on a resume,
or on a tombstone.

Yeah, I mean anyone seeing that on a CV... "No hire! No hire! <cold
sweats> <shudder> No hire!"

Who in their right mind would employ one of the strutting peacocks in
the Clique? Though I don't suppose any of them would ever condescend to
actually programming C in the real world - imagine day 1 at the office:
"Not portable, that's not C, can't do it, won't do it!"

The word "regular" when used by the regulars,
is mostly used to distinguish themselves from new posters.

Almost as if they're positioning themselves in a kind of... Clique... or
something.

 

[Morris Dovey]

Yeah, I mean anyone seeing that on a CV... "No hire! No hire! <cold
sweats> <shudder> No hire!"

Who in their right mind would employ one of the strutting peacocks in
the Clique? Though I don't suppose any of them would ever condescend to
actually programming C in the real world - imagine day 1 at the office:
"Not portable, that's not C, can't do it, won't do it!"


Almost as if they're positioning themselves in a kind of... Clique... or
something.

Hmm - I think you've missed the target. Let me share a short
story that might expand your perspectives a bit...

Some years back I had a prospective client ask me to travel
halfway across the country for an interview. They had what they
considered to be a "show-stopper" throughput problem, and someone
who lurked (but to my knowledge has never posted) here suggested
that I might be able to solve their problem.

I protested that I lacked experience in their business area, that
I had no experience with any of their hardware, that I had no
experience with n-tier or multicast networking, and that surely
there were better choices closer to hand.

"We'd like you to come anyway. You may be right - but even if
that's the case, perhaps we'll both learn something." Intrigued,
I flew out and spent a day shooting the breeze about the process
of writing standard-conforming C and only briefly (altogether 10
minutes or less) about the problem they'd been experiencing. By
the end of the day I was fairly certain that they'd figured out
that I didn't have all the right stuff, but it _had_ been an
interesting experience and at least /I/ had learned a few new
things.

At four o'clock I was back in the project manager's office for a
recap of the day's converstations, and the PM finished up with:
"I know you feel that you're lacking experience with all this,
and we agree - but we think you'll acquire the experience and
deliver the kind of result we want within six months. Can you
take care of things at home and be back here to start next
Monday?"

I actually started on Tuesday (he'd forgotten that Monday was
Veterans' Day) and had his throughput problem solved in somewhat
less than six months - by a week before Christmas their multicast
throughput was just over 76 times what it had been when I arrived
- appropriate because the client was located in Philadelphia.

The "positioning" of which you speak has everything to do with
learning to produce reliable systems - and very little to do with
social or even professional elitism.

PHLX (the Philadelphia Stock Exchange) kept me around for almost
a year to help solve some lesser problems. Afterward, I posted
here to express my appreciation to "the strutting peacocks in the
Clique" for their time and effort in helping me learn enough to
qualify for one of the most interesting (and best-paid)
programming experiences of my life.

Of course, YMMV. You'll get out what you put in.

 

[Antoninus Twink]

Since Richard, Twink, and McCormack are all evil trolls, I invite
others to investigate my publications (URL below, download
section). Most is either public domain or under GPL.

We'll know CBF has really burned his bridges with the Clique when he
starts getting the same treatment dished out for his tedious adverts
that Jacob gets whenever he mentions his compiler. Then we'll know he's
back to playing by "the rules that apply to everyone else" rather than
"the rules that apply to The Clique".

 

[Kenny McCormack]

No one cares.


Of course not - a real "contribution" needs to berate someone for
top-posting.

Indeed. Quite so.

And also, it should hawk a useless library or out of print book.

 

[Kenny McCormack]

We'll know CBF has really burned his bridges with the Clique when he
starts getting the same treatment dished out for his tedious adverts
that Jacob gets whenever he mentions his compiler. Then we'll know he's
back to playing by "the rules that apply to everyone else" rather than
"the rules that apply to The Clique".

Excellent post. So true. So true.

We should start a pool on when this happens.

 

[Morris Dovey]

For the non-American readers, when is Veteran's Day? It seems like
knowing that is important to knowing how long it actually took you to
solve the problem.

(I suspect based on the times mentioned that it's November 11, known as
Remembrance Day in Canada and probably also marked under various names
in most of the western world, but that's not obvious from your post.)

My apologies for the confusion. That year Veterans' Day fell on
November 8th (and the US stock market was closed for the
holiday).

 

[dj3vande]

I actually started on Tuesday (he'd forgotten that Monday was
Veterans' Day) and had his throughput problem solved in somewhat
less than six months - by a week before Christmas their multicast
throughput was just over 76 times what it had been when I arrived
- appropriate because the client was located in Philadelphia.

For the non-American readers, when is Veteran's Day? It seems like
knowing that is important to knowing how long it actually took you to
solve the problem.

(I suspect based on the times mentioned that it's November 11, known as
Remembrance Day in Canada and probably also marked under various names
in most of the western world, but that's not obvious from your post.)


dave

 

[Randy Howard]

Could you explain what you think is "badly broken" about ggets()? It
would be refreshing to hear you talk about technical issues for a
change.

After waiting a few days, I can see that you don't have any ability to
explain this after all. As I suspected.

 

[Malcolm McLean]

On Wed, 6 Feb 2008 11:01:49 -0600, Randy Howard wrote


After waiting a few days, I can see that you don't have any ability to
explain this after all. As I suspected.

I originally thought that the ggets() interface was too complicated. Then we
had a thread on newline-bounded line input, and I changed my mind. In fact
ggets() was one of the simpler solutions, as far as calling went.

The main criticism is that it doesn't protect against a malicious denial of
service type attack, mounted by passing an emoronously long, but not
over-long, line.

My own view is that you inherently can't have an unbounded input length and
protection from denial of service, so this protection should be in the
malloc() layer. Thus the criticism is unjustified. However most regs don't
agree.

 

[Richard Heathfield]

Randy Howard said:

After waiting a few days, I can see that you don't have any ability to
explain this after all. As I suspected.

On the other hand, I could tell you exactly what's wrong with ggets. If
you'd like a list, just say the word. But Mr Twink? No. If he knew C, he
would be helping people out, right? The same applies to Mr McCormack and
Mr Richard "I Can't Remember My Surname" Riley.

 

[Randy Howard]

Randy Howard said:


On the other hand, I could tell you exactly what's wrong with ggets.

I suspect more than a few people here could. My comments were aimed at
Twink, who fired the shot, then ran away.

 

[Antoninus Twink]

Randy Howard said:


On the other hand, I could tell you exactly what's wrong with ggets. If
you'd like a list, just say the word.

Please do. It'd be worth putting up with your posturing to help increase
CBF's growing alienation in The Clique.

But Mr Twink? No. If he knew C, he would be helping people out, right?
The same applies to Mr McCormack and Mr Richard "I Can't Remember My
Surname" Riley.

You've conveniently forgotten that not so long ago I was helping /you/
out with some bad C code you'd hacked together.

"Helping people out" does a person no favors in this group - arrogant
put-downs are what give the kudos.

 

[Antoninus Twink]

You, along with the other snot-nosed, ill-behaved adolescents, should
heed the words of Farmer Yasser "I think it's a great thing you young
folks are doing, committing mass suicide." As for how you behave, he
continued that "long hair, short hair, what the hell's the difference
once the head's blowed off?".

One word: PSYCHO.

 

[Default User]

Antoninus Twink wrote:

Hmm - I think you've missed the target. Let me share a short
story that might expand your perspectives a bit...

Twink is troll. Please don't feed the troll.




Brian

 

[Malcolm McLean]

Please do. It'd be worth putting up with your posturing to help increase
CBF's growing alienation in The Clique.

One thing you can't have is a clique with partial members. By definition it
is a small, non-fuzzy set.

 

[Richard Heathfield]

Malcolm McLean said:

One thing you can't have is a clique with partial members. By definition
it is a small, non-fuzzy set.

TINC.

I note from your quote, by the way, that Mr Twink is trying to communicate
with me. I take this opportunity to point out that he, along with the
other trolls, is in my killfile. I don't read what the trolls write
(except in quotes such as the above) because I know from experience that
they write nonsense. If other people are daft enough to take their
writings seriously, that's up to them.

 

[Malcolm McLean]

Malcolm McLean said:


TINC.

I note from your quote, by the way, that Mr Twink is trying to communicate
with me. I take this opportunity to point out that he, along with the
other trolls, is in my killfile. I don't read what the trolls write
(except in quotes such as the above) because I know from experience that
they write nonsense. If other people are daft enough to take their
writings seriously, that's up to them.

Nilges over on comp.programming has lowered my tolerance threshold for
off-topic postings.
I'm just reading "Fuzzy Thinking" by Bart Kosko and couldn't resist.

 

[Randy Howard]

Please do. It'd be worth putting up with your posturing to help increase
CBF's growing alienation in The Clique.

In case you've forgotten, I've asked you to explain /yourself/ what you
think is wrong with ggets(), to elaborate on the statement you made
which is still quoted above. Any time you're ready.