100+ Computer Jokes

Donald Trump was asked " what is 2+2"?? "I have to say a lot of people have been asking this question. No, really. A lot of people come up to me and they ask me. They say, 'Sir!, What's 2+2?' And I tell them look, we know what 2+2 is. We've had almost eight years of the worst kind of math you can imagine. Oh my god, I can't believe it. Addition and subtraction of the 1s the 2s and the 3s. Its terrible. Its just terrible. Look, if you want to know what 2+2 is, do you want to know what 2+2 is? I'll tell you. First of all the number 2, by the way I love the number 2. It's probably my favorite number, no it is my favorite number. You know what, it's probably more like the number two but with a lot of zeros behind it. A lot. If I'm being honest, I mean, if I'm being honest. I like a lot of zeros. Except for Marco Rubio, now he's a zero that I don't like. Though, I probably shouldn't say that. He's a nice guy but he's like, '10101000101', on and on, like that. He's like a computer! You know what I mean? He's like a computer. I don't know. I mean, you know. So, we have all these numbers and we can add them and subtract them and add them. TIMES them even. Did you know that? We can times them OR divide them, they don't tell you that, and I'll tell you, no one is better at the order of operations than me. You wouldn't believe it. That I can tell you. So, we're gonna be the best on 2+2, believe me. OK? Alright. Thank you." Reporter 1: "But what actually is 2+2?" Trump: "Siddown. No, siddown. I've already answered your question. Haven't I already answered your question. This is what we get from news reporters, folks. Give me a nice question. Yes - you." Reporter 2: "Is your name Donald Trump?" Trump: "Now that's a nice question, folks. That's what I want." Edit. To all people spamming my inbox with hate message. It's literally just a joke. Learn to take a joke like a joke or don't browse r/Jokes. Edit 2:- to the person who called reddit care on me thanks for your concern but no thanks I don't need it. I am mentally sound and physically fit. Edit 3:- To the person who messaged >I will see how you joke after i share your address libtard. Yeah I gonna keep a tab on your I'd mf. Let's see where is your home. I will spare you the effort. I live in India. Come and get me bro. Your entitled ass won't survive 2 minutes in the heat and humidity of here. All jokes aside i am little scared how much people can get charged up over a innocent joke.

A policeman was interrogating 3 guys who were training to become detectives. To test their skills in recognizing a suspect, he shows the first guys a picture for 5 seconds and then hides it. "This is your suspect, how would you recognize him?" The first guy answers, "That's easy, we'll catch him fast because he only has one eye!" The policeman says, "Well...uh...that's because the picture I showed is his side profile." Slightly flustered by this ridiculous response, he flashes the picture for 5 seconds at the second guy and asks him, "This is your suspect, how would you recognize him?" The second guy smiles, flips his hair and says, "Ha! He'd be too easy to catch because he only has one ear!" The policeman angrily responds, "What's the matter with you two?!!? Of course only one eye and one ear are showing because it's a picture of his side profile! Is that the best answer you can come up with?" Extremely frustrated at this point, he shows the picture to the third guy and in a very testy voice asks, "This is your suspect, how would you recognize him? He quickly adds, "Think hard before giving me a stupid answer." The third guy looks at the picture intently for a moment and says, "The suspect wears contact lenses." The policeman is surprised and speechless because he really doesn't know himself if the suspect wears contacts or not. "Well, that's an interesting answer. Wait here for a few minutes while I check his file and I'll get back to you on that." He leaves the room and goes to his office, checks the suspect's file on his computer and comes back with a beaming smile on his face. "Wow! I can't believe it. It's TRUE! The suspect does, in fact, wear contact lenses. Good work! How were you able to make such an astute observation?" "That's easy..." the third guy replied. "He can't wear regular glasses because he only has one eye and one ear."

A man walks out to the street and catches a taxi just going by. He gets into the taxi, and the cabbie says, "Perfect timing. You're just like Frank." Passenger: "Who?" Cabbie: "Frank Feldman. He's a guy who did everything right all the time. Like my coming along when you needed a cab, things happened like that to Frank Feldman every single time." Passenger: "There are always a few clouds over everybody." Cabbie: "Not Frank Feldman. He was a terrific athlete. He could have won the Grand-Slam at tennis. He could golf with the pros. He sang like an opera baritone and danced like a Broadway star and you should have heard him play the piano. He was an amazing guy." Passenger: "Sounds like he was really something special." Cabbie: "There's more. He had a memory like a computer. He remembered everybody's birthday. He knew all about wine, which foods to order and which fork to eat them with. He could fix anything. Not like me. I change a fuse, and the whole street blacks out. But Frank Feldman could do everything right.” Passenger: "Wow, what a guy!" Cabbie: "He always knew the quickest way to go in traffic and avoid traffic jams. Not like me, I always seem to get stuck in them. But Frank, he never made a mistake, and he really knew how to treat a woman and make her feel good. He would never answer her back even if she was in the wrong; and his clothing was always immaculate, shoes highly polished too. He was the perfect man! He never made a mistake. No one could ever measure up to Frank Feldman." Passenger: "How did you meet him?" Cabbie: "I never actually met Frank. He died and I married his wife."

A woman brought a very limp duck into a veterinary surgeon.... A woman brought a very limp duck into a veterinary surgeon. As she laid her pet on the table, the vet pulled out his stethoscope and listened to the bird's chest. After a moment or two, the vet shook his head and sadly said, "I'm sorry, your duck, Cuddles, has passed away." The distressed woman wailed, "Are you sure?" "Yes, I am sure. Your duck is dead," replied the vet.. "How can you be so sure?" she protested. "I mean you haven't done any testing on him or anything. He might just be in a coma or something." The vet rolled his eyes, turned around and left the room. He returned a few minutes later with a black Labrador Retriever. As the duck's owner looked on in amazement, the dog stood on his hind legs, put his front paws on the examination table and sniffed the duck from top to bottom. He then looked up at the vet with sad eyes and shook his head. The vet patted the dog on the head and took it out of the room. A few minutes later he returned with a cat. The cat jumped on the table and also delicately sniffed the bird from head to foot. The cat sat back on its haunches, shook its head, meowed softly and strolled out of the room. The vet looked at the woman and said, "I'm sorry, but as I said, this is most definitely, 100% certifiably, a dead duck." The vet turned to his computer terminal, hit a few keys and produced a bill, which he handed to the woman.. The duck's owner, still in shock, took the bill. "$150!" she cried, "$150 just to tell me my duck is dead!" The vet shrugged, "I'm sorry. If you had just taken my word for it, the bill would have been $20, but with the Lab Report and the Cat Scan, it's now $150."

What’s the difference between a computer and an American? An American doesn’t have trouble-shooting.

A man walks into a library and says to the librarian, "Do you have that book for men with small penises?" The librarian looks on her computer and says, "I don’t know if it's in yet." "Yeah, that's the one!"

I'm politically active in the same way I'm sexually active. Pretty much only at my computer. Pete Stegemeyer @itspeterj ROFLBOT

How did the computer hackers get away from the scene of crime? They just ransomware.

A ten minute favor vs thousand euro bill Once, at a company where I worked as an architect, I used the company laptop’s Photoshop to make my daughter’s birthday invitation. It took maybe ten minutes. My boss saw it in the recent files while we were reviewing a project together and told me the computer was for work only. I just said “Ok”, because… well, what else was I going to say. That same week I traveled to another city to survey a building. I did everything with the tape measure and laser the company provided. When I got back, he asked if I had already downloaded the photos, because he wanted to see the inside of the building. I told him I hadn’t taken any photos, since my phone was personal. He was furious on the inside, but couldn’t show it, because months earlier I had asked the company for a work phone and they had refused. The next day, a brand new Samsung appeared on my desk. And off I went again to the same city, to take the photos, with the company paying for flights, hotel, and all the doubled expenses.

A woman brought a very limp duck into a veterinary surgeon. As she laid her pet on the table, the vet pulled out his stethoscope and listened to the bird's chest. After a moment or two, the vet shook his head and sadly said, "I'm sorry, your duck, Cuddles, has passed away." The distressed woman wailed, "Are you sure?" "Yes, I am sure. Your duck is dead," replied the vet.. "How can you be so sure?" she protested. "I mean you haven't done any testing on him or anything. He might just be in a coma or something." The vet rolled his eyes, turned around and left the room. He returned a few minutes later with a black Labrador Retriever. As the duck's owner looked on in amazement, the dog stood on his hind legs, put his front paws on the examination table and sniffed the duck from top to bottom. He then looked up at the vet with sad eyes and shook his head. The vet patted the dog on the head and took it out of the room. A few minutes later he returned with a cat. The cat jumped on the table and also delicately sniffed the bird from head to foot. The cat sat back on its haunches, shook its head, meowed softly and strolled out of the room. The vet looked at the woman and said, "I'm sorry, but as I said, this is most definitely, 100% certifiably, a dead duck." The vet turned to his computer terminal, hit a few keys and produced a bill, which he handed to the woman.. The duck's owner, still in shock, took the bill. "$1500!" she cried, "$1500 just to tell me my duck is dead!" The vet shrugged, "I'm sorry. If you had just taken my word for it, the bill would have been $50, but with the Lab Report and the Cat Scan, it's now $1500."

Jesus and Satan were having an on-going argument about who was better on the computer. They had been going at it for days, and frankly God was tired of hearing all the bickering. Finally fed up, God said, 'THAT'S IT! I have had enough. I am going to setup a test that will run for two hours, and from those results, I will judge who does the better job.' So Satan and Jesus sat down at the keyboards and typed away. They moused. They faxed. They e-mailed. They e-mailed with attachments. They downloaded. They did spreadsheets! They wrote reports. They created labels and cards. They created charts and graphs. They did some genealogy reports . They did every job known to man. Jesus worked with heavenly efficiency and Satan was faster than hell. Then, ten minutes before their time was up, lightning suddenly flashed across the sky, thunder rolled, rain poured, and, of course, the power went off. Satan stared at his blank screen and screamed every curse word known in the underworld. Jesus just sighed. Finally the electricity came back on, and each of them restarted their computers. Satan started searching frantically, screaming: 'It's gone! It's all GONE! 'I lost everything when the power went out!' Meanwhile, Jesus quietly started printing out all of his files from the past two hours of work. Satan observed this and became irate. 'Wait!' he screamed. 'That's not fair! He cheated! How come he has all his work and I don't have any?' God just shrugged and said, JESUS SAVES...

Don’t want me start before 8:00? Fine. Years ago I worked for this complete psycho at a semi public service type place. Moody, arrogant (my first week there, she must have mentioned having a PhD/doctorate/I’m a doctor *at least* half a dozen times), and the biggest goddam snob I’ve ever met. We had flexible work hours, spread of hours between 7:00 am & 6:00 pm, signing on in 15 minute increments. If I had a really good run in traffic, sometimes I’d get there in time to sign on at 7:30 or 7:45. Well, psycho Dr didn’t like that, and said I couldn’t start before 8:00, despite everyone else in the office being allowed to. I explained that sometimes if the traffic was good I got in earlier than that, but she wouldn’t have it. Told me if I got in early, I could read through my work emails but I couldn’t sign on before 8:00, so basically she expected me to give 15-30 minutes free labor. Yeah, nah, screw that. So if I got in early, and the weather was nice, I’d sit outside, or if it wasn’t, I’d sit at my desk and read. My Kindle. Or play on my phone. And didn’t switch my computer on until bang on 8:00. Her boss came by early one morning wanting to collect something she’d left in the office for him, and of course the office wasn’t open and she demanded to know where I was. I reminded her that I wasn’t allowed to start before 8:00, which I could tell royally pissed her off, but there was nothing she could do about as I had the email trail to back me up. Small potatoes in terms of malicious compliance, but it made me feel good.

I give to you a joke I made up when I was seven: Why did the computer crash? Because it had a bad driver! *drops mic*

What's the difference between a vegan and a computer programmer? One is disgusted by a rack of lamb and the other is disgusted by a lack of RAM.

Wife texts husband on a cold winter morning: "Windows frozen, won't open." Husband texts back: "Gently pour some lukewarm water over it and then *gently* tap edges with hammer." Wife texts back 10 minutes later: "Computer really messed up now."

Customer always found a mistake - so we complied This goes back to around 1990s. I was an independent designer for a few different printing businesses in the South suburbs of Chicago. Back then computers were fairly new and print shops were still old school. Those inserts you found in newspapers? They were still hand lettered back then!!! I'd design brochures and flyers, laser-print proofs, scan photos (a 150 dpi HP scanner was $1200 - that's like $5K today!) and so on. Anyway, one of the print shops had a customer that ALWAYS found an error, would demand a new proof, and not authorize the job until he signed off on the new proof. Every. Single. Time. "This line is crooked" "This word is too dark" and so on. So we came up with a solution. I'd do two proofs. One was the original, accurate one. The other has an obvious intentional mistake. He'd catch the "mistake" and ask for a new proof. He'd be told to come back in an hour (it was usually a day or two.) He'd come back and be shown the 2nd proof. He approved it every time. Demand that there's always a mistake? Here you go!

I like my women how I like my computer. On my lap. Turned on. Virus free.

A young man went into confession crying, and told the priest: “Forgive me father for I have sinned”. “What have you done?” asked the priest. “A few weeks ago I went to the library. I remained there until closing time and when I was about to go home, rain started pouring down. It was so intense I had to wait in the library. I had waited for a while with the librarian, a young attractive single girl, then one thing led to another, and I ended up sleeping with her”. The man stopped talking but kept weeping. “Well don’t cry, it’s a sin but it is not that bad. You should say 5 Hail Marys and it will be forgiven”. Said the priest. “But it doesn't end there” the man kept sobbing. “a few days later my elderly neighbor asked me to help her with her computer. Her husband was hospitalized and she couldn't send an email to her son. I went there and fixed the problem, but when I was about to leave, rain started pouring down. It was really stormy and I had to wait. One thing led to another and I ended up sleeping with the old lady” the man cried. “Oh dear well that makes it harder indeed, but still - you should say 15 Hail Marys and you will be forgiven” Said the priest. “Oh I’m afraid the worst part is still ahead” cried the man. “Yesterday I went to the barber. I was his last client that day. As soon as he finished and was about to close the shop rain started pouring down so intensely, I had to wait with him. One thing led to another and I ended up sleeping with him as well” the man cried. “Oh dear, it is indeed worse than I thought” said the priest. “So what should I do father?” the man asked. “Well” answered the priest, “you should get the fuck out of here before it starts raining!”.

I had a problem with my computer yesterday... So I called Eric, the 11 year old next door, whose bedroom looks like Mission Control and asked him to come over. Eric clicked a couple of buttons and solved the problem. As he was walking away, I called after him, 'So, what was wrong ? He replied, 'It was an ID ten T error.' I didn't want to appear stupid, but nonetheless inquired, 'An, ID ten T error ? What's that? In case I need to fix it again.' Eric grinned .... 'Haven't you ever heard of an ID ten T error before ? 'No,' I replied. 'Write it down,' he said, 'and I think you'll figure it out.' So I wrote down: ID10T I used to like Eric, the little bastard.

"You need to message me when finish with a client before going to the next one". As you wish. A few years ago, I worked as a tech support guy/salesperson at a small, family-owned computer store in my hometown. It wasn’t a franchise, just a local shop. The owner? A mustached, arrogant dude who could never admit when he was wrong. No matter what went wrong, it was always someone else’s fault. That constant blame game was a big reason why I ended up quitting, but that’s another story. At the time, my main job was delivering products to clients and doing on-site tech support at their homes or businesses. Now, for some context: My boss was obsessed with the idea that I was “too slow” during client visits. No matter how long I actually took, be it 5 minutes or 2 hours, it was always too much in his eyes. He couldn’t seem to understand that tech problems vary and can take different amounts of time to fix. And of course, he loved to compare us to past employees. “Back when So-and-So worked here, he was way faster than you!” Funny thing is, I knew that when *So-and-So* worked there, the boss used to say *he* was slow and someone *else* was better. That was just his thing: guilt-tripping whoever was working for him at the time. Fast forward a bit: One day, he was in an extra bad mood and decided that from now on, I should **message him every single time I finished with a client and wait for his reply before moving on**. Same thing when I arrived somewhere, message him to say I’d arrived. He wanted this done through WhatsApp, SMS, or even a phone call. If I didn’t have credit, I was supposed to make a *collect call* (where the person receiving the call pays, not sure how common that is elsewhere). Basically, he didn’t trust that I was working and thought I might be wasting time between clients or just riding around town. Spoiler: there’s not much to see. I was annoyed, but sure, whatever. Rules are rules. Day one: I followed the rule *to the letter*. Arrived at a client? Message. Finished the job? Message and wait. I lost way more time waiting for responses than I ever did between jobs, but okay. Day two: same deal. Morning went by. After lunch, I loaded up the bike with deliveries and gear and headed out. First client of the afternoon: Messaged when I arrived. He replied. Fixed the issue. It didn’t even take 30 minutes, so I messaged when finished. No response. Waited 5 minutes. Nothing. Called him. No answer. Waited another 5 minutes. Still nothing. So I sat down on the curb, under a tree, and waited. Watched some videos, scrolled through Facebook, chatted with friends. And I waited. And waited. Almost 3 hours passed. I just sat there, doing nothing, waiting on the guy who demanded that I never move on without his go-ahead. Eventually, my phone rang. Boss: “Where are you??” Me: “Still at client X’s place.” Boss: “STILL?? He was the first one this afternoon! The day’s almost over! Just go back here.” Me: “On my way back now.” I got back to the store and was greeted by him practically foaming at the mouth. “Why the hell did you take so long?! You’re so slow!” I looked him straight in the eye. “I was following your rule. You told me to notify you every time I finished a client and wait for your reply before moving on. You didn’t respond, so I waited. I’d never go against your orders.” He froze. Just stared at me. He didn’t know what to say. Then he tried to backpedal. “Well, you should use common sense! If I didn’t answer, it’s because I was busy!” Turns out he’d spent the whole afternoon dealing with contractors and problems at his house renovation, and just completely forgot he’d given me that rule. Needless to say, that rule was never mentioned again. I went back to the old way of doing things. But, of course, he still kept complaining that I “took too long” with clients. Some things never change.

Computer's frozen

I had a call from a scammer the other day Me: “Hello.” NOT-Microsoft support: “Hello. This is Bob Bobson from Microsoft Support. We are seeing a lot of virus activity from your device.” Me: “Oh no. My device? Are you sure?” NOT-Microsoft support: “Oh yes, we have many reports.” Me: “Oh jeez. How can I fix it?”>; NOT-Microsoft support: “It’s OK sir. We can help you right now. Are you in front of your device sir?” Me: “Yes. I was just about to use it. I’m glad you called.” NOT-Microsoft support: “Yes sir, we are going to help you. Can you please push the Start button?” Me: “I think it's already on.” NOT-Microsoft support: “Okay, sir. Now you want to click on Control Panel.” Me: “I don’t see that.” NOT-Microsoft support: “Do you see a bunch of information above the Start button?” Me: “Yes.” NOT-Microsoft support: “That is your Control Panel.” Me: “Wow, I didn’t realize it had a name.” NOT-Microsoft support: “Yes sir, now press on Internet Options.” Me: “Yeah, I definitely don’t see any Internet options. I don’t think I purchased that feature. This is just a cheap one.” NOT-Microsoft support: “They all have the Internet sir. Press the Start button again.” Me: “OK, it’s the same as before.” NOT-Microsoft support: “That’s OK sir. We are going to restart your device. Can you please turn it off?” Me: “Ummm…I don’t know how. I’ve never turned it off. Since I bought it, it just kind of stays on all the time.” NOT-Microsoft support: “There must be an off button on your device. How do you stop it when it’s running?” Me: “In those cases, I usually press the big button.” NOT-Microsoft support: “OK sir. Please press that button.” Me: “Ok.” NOT-Microsoft support: “Is your device off?” Me: “No. The door popped open.” NOT-Microsoft support: “Door? Is there a disc inside the door?” Me: “No, there’s a burrito.” NOT-Microsoft support: “Why is there a burrito in your computer?” Me: “Computer? I thought you said this was microwave support.”

You want me to answer your office phone for you while I am working from home? Several years ago, a friend ("Mark") started a home-based computer software business. He and his wife lived in their home for about 10 years and had a well-established home phone number. This was around the time that cell phones were just beginning to be popular, so 95% of people still used mainly landlines. Mark worked 2pm-10pm, the same shift as his wife, so his customers could be free to discuss their computer needs uninterrupted after their own businesses closed for the day. Most computer maintenance still had to be done in person instead of remotely, so customers could drop off devices after work and pick them up from Mark’s back porch on their way to work the next day. All went swimmingly for a few months until a new doctor opened up a practice in town, complete with a telephone number differing from Mark’s by one digit. Mark's number had a ‘3’ where the medical office had an ’8’ in the last 4 number combination. Misdialing was frequent. At first there were occasional calls to which Mark would patiently redirect the caller. As time wore on and the practice got more and more referrals from local hospitals to give Dr. Newintown an established client base, the calls began to come at all hours, 24 hours a day: weekends nights holidays you name it. The office still got calls after hours to an answering service for patients to find out who was on call, and for the hospital staff to reach doctors after hours. Mark had to unplug the phone just to have a conversation over lunch with his wife, and in order to sleep. Also not ideal when you have 3 daughters of dating age out after dark. Mark called the doctor’s office and asked them to please change their phone number so he and his family could get some peace and quiet, and so he could build his own business to support them. Since he had his phone longer, he felt the doctor should be gracious and change his number to a different one to stop the confusion. He was told in about so many words by the doctor that it was too bad, but nothing was going to be done, as advertising, stationery, business cards and signage were expensive to redo, not to mention convey the new information to all his patients, medical registries, the medical board and societies, and hospitals. "Just do the best you can, I'm sure the calls will stop soon. Good luck to you!" "Okey Dokey!! I'll do my best to take care of things!" Mark cheerfully replied. After that, Mark began to field all the calls that came in personally. "You've had the sniffles all morning after working in the yard around pollen? You'd better come right in!" “You start coughing every time you smoke a cigarette? Come on in!!” “Hmm…I’m not the doctor, but a temperature of 98.9 sounds a little high to me. We’ll see you right after lunch today.” "You're new in town and have kids who need physicals and shots for school next week? It just so happens we have an opening in an hour. No, no, don't worry we can take all 5 of them at once, today." Whatever the problem was, he started making appointments for each and every person calling. All were delighted to have such personal attention and prompt appointments. "Sure, we take ALL insurance plans. Come right in!" He also made routine checkup type appointments for 4:30 pm one Friday afternoon for 6 different people. Bright and early the next Monday morning, Dr. Newintown called and begged him to stop. Mark said :"I will if you will." The doctor had a new phone number before the end of the week.

I painted my computer black so it would run faster. Now it doesn't work. Then I painted my computer white so it would work. Now the whole system is corrupt.

I give to you a joke I made up when I was seven: Why did the computer crash? It had a bad driver! **bows ** I'll show myself out.

You want me to resign? Well, good luck without me! Disclaimer 1: On mobile and English is not my first language, so apologies for any mistakes and bad formatting. Disclaimer 2: Labor laws in my country probably differ from labor laws in your's, so I'll try to explain them when they are important to the story. It is going to be a long one, sorry about that For the last 10 years I've been working from home as automation engineer for a relatively small company what produced custom-built industrial gas treatment units (industrial chillers, compressors stations, that sort of thing). My job was to write algorithms for PLCs, design HMI, and setting up data transfer for customers SCADA systems. Basically I was the person who told machines what to do. I was getting significant below market pay for such position, but with only 4-5 project per year and each taking me 2-3 weeks to complete, I wasn't arguing, since I was getting paid for mostly doing nothing and I was fortunate enough to have considerable passive income thanks to lucky investments of my inheritance. Everything was great until couple years ago, when owner decided to retire and sold the company. So here comes new managment with new policies. In my country every worker entitled to at least 4 weeks of paid vacation time per year all unspent vacation is rolled other to the next year, but you have to take at least 2 uninterrupted weeks per year, so if you only take your mandatory vacation, you accumulate 14 additional days per year. Given how much free time I actually had I rarely used more than mandatory 2 weeks per year, always making sure what there be no commissioning or maintenance planned during my vacation (During these events I would remotely access maintenance engineer's laptop to make neccessary adjustments to the algorithms, so everything works perfectly in real working conditions). But one of the first policies new managment implemented was schedule based vacations. So now O had to decide when I take my 2 weeks at the start of the year. I chose first weeks of April. In early March I get a call from manager of the development team who asks me to come on a quick 3 day work trip to help maintenance engineer switch plc and upload new project. Apparently thanks to new maintenance team manager a lot of maintenance engineers quit and they are short stuffed and the only one they can send atm is bad with computer. "Where isn't much for me to do, since we had identical station going through the same plc switch month prior, so I'll just fly there, chill, until electrical panel is rewired, new plc is installed, when I just upload new project to plc and fly home" - I thought for myself and agreed to go. Apparently maintenance engineer not only bad with computers, but also knows nothing about electrical work, so I had to do everything myself which I am not actually qualified to do, but at this point I don't want to disappoint client, who turned out to be a bunch of really nice people, so after a week and with only 3 burned down fuses I finished. After returning home I inform my manager what I am not going to any more business trips since I don't get paid enough to also do maintenance engineer's work. First say of my vacation comes and I get another call. Despite my poor judgment I decided to answer: - Hey, we need tou to go on another business trip starting next Monday, it will just take a week, it for *this project* - I'm not familiar with that project, it was done while I was on paternity leave (in my country either parent can take paternity/maternity leave up to 3 years and after first 6 months my wife asked me to switch). - Yeah, we had to contract a specialist to do that project while you are on leave, I'll send it to you along with documentation right away. *disconnects* I check recieved project and it is huge - 7 PLC's, 6 HMI panels, everything has to work as a single system, and project is a total mess, nothing would work, you just has to do everything from scratch, will probably take me close to a month to finish. And that is with doing everything from comfort of my own home where I am more productive. So I call back: - Yeah, I looked at this project and that's a mess, it's not in the working condition and no way to finish it in a week. I'll do what I can do, but as I said last time, I'm doing it remotely, as always, I won't go on another business trip, especially now, I have to many things planned for the next few weeks, I can't go. - But reception on site is terrible, you won't be able to access it remotely. And we already missed all deadlines on this project, client is pissed and we are looking at huge fines. CEO is breathing down my neck, we need it fixed yesterday. - Then I'll email maintenance engineer project with changes each eavning once he is in hotel with decent reception and he can email me list of things what need fixing, it's not the first time we done it that way. - Ok, I hear you, I'll have to speak with CEO abo

My wife texted me this morning, "Windows frozen." I responded, "Pour some lukewarm water over it." She answered… "Computer completely screwed now."

Creepy dean asks creepy request, IT complies. Around 2000, 2001, in Argentina, I did a network admin course. The guy that taught the course was also an admin in an university (let's call him ITProf) and he told us this story. The department of the university ITProf worked for dealt mostly with Philosophy and Philosophy-related careers. and it was around 95% female students, mostly high school graduates but also a lot of people that, once retired, started the career as a hobby (in Argentina, university can be free of charge). In Argentina, IDs are numbered and sequential. So, for instance, if an ID starts with 28 million, you can estimate what year that person was born in. There's only one caveat: foreign-born people that have gained citizenship get a number that starts with something like 80 million... The dean (let's call him CreepyDean) at that department was a 50-55 something old dude with, you guessed it, a pretty creepy behaviour. ITProf could access browsing history of every single person in the department and, let's just say, his wasn't pretty nor university related. CreepyDean taught a couple of mid-career courses, he was one of several professors that taught this courses. Every year, each university assigns the students to the courses they ask for and divides them between all available professors. Sometimes this is done by hand, sometimes it's randomized somehow, this is handled by each department. In this case, it was done by a computer program that randomized everything so each course had a wide array of different students. This program was something that ITProf created, because, prior to that, this was done manually. One day, CreepyDean calls ITProf and tells him "I want, in my courses, just female students, with IDs starting at 35 million or more, get it done" and remarked to ITProf that his job was on the line if he didn't comply. Since 95% of the faculty was female, this is a creepy request but CreepyDean knew that it wouldn't be as notorious (he could always blame it on chance) and, at that time, this behaviour was not something that could have gotten CreepyDean fired, but the university board members wouldn't be too happy about this behaviour either. ITProf understood that 35 million or more on the ID was for people that were roughly 21-22 years old or younger, CreepyDean wanted some eye candy and who knows what else... But CreepyDean just said "female, 35 million or more...". So ITProf complied. He assigned all foreign female students, with IDs starting 80 million, and all older than 65 to CreepyDean courses. CreepyDean was furious the first day of classes. He wanted ITProf fired. ITProf told him "I've complied with your request even though it was weird and something that I'm sure the board members wouldn't be to happy to find out about". ITProf told us CreepyDean got "dishonorably" discharged as dean a couple months after this story, there were some speculations but he never found out exactly why. **TLDR: Dean wants an entire class of young female students, IT manages to give him the exact opposite.**

On a cold winter's morning Wife texts husband on a cold winter’s morning: "Windows frozen, won't open." Husband texts back: "Gently pour some lukewarm water over it." Wife texts back 5 minutes later: "Computer is really screwed up now.”

Only do this task in the last 30 minutes of your shift! - OK Karen, I’ll do nothing for the rest of the day... I was working at an organization where part of my job was organizing thousands of high quality photos of students’ artworks from the main computer I worked on, and transfer them to a network server. The goal was to make high quality images accessible to other staff remotely. To do it correctly, the process was time consuming. It involved making medium resolution JPGs from hi-res Photoshop files (that part was easy to do via batch processing). The time consuming part was each image needed to be individually labeled with specific details about the artwork and its creator, dimensions etc. My department manager had emphasized the importance of this task, as these labeled images were important for various organizational needs for other staff. But my new (ish) supervisor Karen (not her real name) was a major micromanager and said, *“Why are you spending so much time on this project? I only want you to work on this task in the last 30 minutes of your shift.”* I tried to convince her it wasn't an efficient use of my time, arguing that flexibility in my workflow was necessary. I explained that on many days, this task would be an ideal "fill-in" activity, allowing me to stay productive during otherwise slow periods. *“Nope, just do it in the last 30 minutes of your shift.”* “Ok you got it.” Cue malicious compliance. On some days there were literally no other productive tasks to carry on with. I could have made great progress on that task, but nope, I would sit there trying to look busy or would walk around the campus with a few sheets of paper in hand. I would try to invent ways to be/look productive, but sadly, in actual fact, I was doing very little at all. This went on for months, when one day I had a call from the Dept Manager asking *"Why hasn’t this project been completed yet?"* *“I’ve been specifically instructed by Karen not to spend any time on this task – except for the last 30 minutes of my shift."* Karen didn’t stay with the organization for much longer after that. edit: punctuation, grammar, spelling

Don't want to play, no problem I've worked in computer security for a very long time. A security policy that I'm sure most of the audience here is familiar with is that you always lock your computer when you walk away. Even if you're an accountant or receptionist, you just can't leave your machine unlocked ever. About 10 years ago my team would have fun with this. If you ran to the bathroom or even had a conversation with your back turned someone would sneak up to your computer and jump on the chat client or even email and say something silly or stupid like "Does anyone know the meaning of life" or some other random thing. A lot of the teams would do this and it was mostly harmless but also was supposed to "shame" you into remembering to lock your computer before you walk away, without reporting you to security for your formal reprimand (retraining -> write-ups -> disciplinary action -> job hunt). Everyone knew it was good-natured and when the messages went out everyone had a good laugh. One day a new guy shows up and he leaves his computer unattended. I introduce myself, shake his hand, chat him up a bit and finally tell him he needs to lock his computer when he walks away, it's company policy, he probably ignored that in the training but it's a big deal. Sent him the documentation, because he thinks it's stupid (again, we're in the *security* umbrella). He says "whatever". I shrug walk away, and he and walks away making a show of not locking his computer. He got multiple warnings over his first few weeks from his team and other, but was a complete butt about it. After a while the team decides he's had enough warnings (and started being granted access to sensitive stuff) and so he was fair game. Not long after I walked by him on his way to the elevator atrium, so I know he's going to be gone for a while. I sit down, find his email client and type out a silly message to his team's DL and hit send. As I'm standing up he's walking back. He finds me and demands to know what I was doing. I shrug, say "whatever" and walk away. Later that day his manager walks up and tells me that he explained the situation to his new employee, and that the new guy "didn't want to play that game" and was considering reporting me to security for impersonating him. Really? Okay. No problem, Mr Manager (we were on very good terms), we will not play "the game" with your newbie. I will follow standard procedures. I got my team and a few others on chat to tell them that under no circumstances should anybody fire a message from him when they saw his computer unlocked. No "shame" reminders for newbie. Just follow the standard procedure. Almost 50 security violation tickets were logged in the next two days. \[his desk happened to be closer to the elevator atrium, break room, and bathrooms so a lot of normal traffic\] He was in security retraining the following Monday. We were in an open floor plan and I could see how mad he was talking to his manager and gesturing in my direction quite a bit. Not my fault, I had only opened two tickets. His manager asked me to let up. Sorry, just following standard procedure, if I don't report these violations I'm liable. Dude's computer was locked for the rest of that Monday only. The following day as I walked by, there was his email, for all eyes to see and newbie nowhere to be found... He happened to be getting coffee, which was my destination as well, and I told I noticed he forgot to lock his computer. He cussed me out and speed-walked back. The damage was done. He'd already had a dozen tickets opened by others. And the security policy had changed at some point. Now it was a quick retraining then straight to disciplinary action (no write-up). He had to attend a meeting with his boss, director, and some security folks (I would find out much later that he got put on a security related PIP). He was gone in a week. No one was out to ruin anyone's career here, but if you want to work in security and flagrantly violate policy because... I don't know why, well, you don't belong there.

You accuse us of time theft and being unproductive? Then look forward to an inbox full of unnecessary reports. I work in premium customer service at a bank, where we serve the bank's higher-value customers. This usually gave us more freedom because, unlike in traditional customer service, the focus is more on quality than quantity. However, since regular customer service team leaders took over the project, our freedoms have become more restricted. We were accused of time theft because we didn't log out for two minutes to go to the bathroom. All of a sudden we had to report whenever we are not productive. Many of us were threatened with warnings that could lead to us losing our jobs, and even if we just needed to talk to other colleagues about a customer case, we had to let them know, otherwise we could be accused of unproductive behavior. And well, we complied. A little too ambitious. Every time we went to the bathroom, we reported it to our project managers by email. Every time we went to get a drink, we reported it. Every time we took a break, we reported it. Every time we talked to a colleague about a customer case, each of the two colleagues reported it separately to the project managers by email. Every time we left our computers, no matter what for, we reported it by email to the project managers' mailbox. After a while, the project managers' mailbox was so full that even important emails were overlooked because there were too many of them. The project managers were completely overwhelmed. And shortly afterwards, the rules were abolished again.

Student made demands regarding a project and found out the hard way. One of the degree modules I teach involves students working on a group programming project. Nothing too elaborate, but the aim of the module is to develop skills they will need if they go on to work in the IT field. After all if you're doing a Computer Science degree, you must be thinking of going down that route? This one student is an absolute entitled nightmare. He uses GenAI for a lot of his work and it really does show. He always pushed back on the written remarks on his work but every time I sit him down and ask him to explain the code he produces, he struggles and often has no idea how the code he submitted works. In this project he came up and told me he cannot work with others in the group and must work alone. I explained that there are specific group activities and efforts I would be marking and that I needed to see his input within the group. There was no way I could excuse him from the group activities in the module, however I could see he was not going to budge and therefore complied with his demand to work on the project alone. All the students in my class had been assigned to their groups and I did check in with all of them on a weekly basis. This one guy was steadfastly refusing to work with the rest of his group and as I had complied with his request, he was working on his own project alone. In my interim feedback at the end of each stage I repeated that he really should work with the group or he risked a failing mark for the module. I made sure this feedback was sent to him both in hardcopy and also via email with read receipts which I kept. Cue the end of the module and the submission for marking. Sure enough, the one student submitted a project based just on his own work and had not engaged with the group he was asked to work with. There were several issues with his project, first and most important was it didn't meet the brief. The code simply didn't do what we asked for. He lost marks for that aspect of the project. As he had not worked with others in the group, he was not awarded any of the group marks allocated for the work. Because his code was so far away from the specification, I called him in for a Viva Voce to explain the code and he demonstrated a complete lack of understanding of the code he submitted, more marks dropped. His eventual mark for this assignment was a hard fail. He must now resit the entire module. There is of course one real downside of this whole thing that affects me. I've got him in my group again for the resit of the module.

No home equipment? No problem! So I work for an agency, and ever since I started 8 years ago I've always had my own computer equipment like keyboards, mice, etc.. and no one has questioned it, not even IT. I get moved to a new small shared office, bring in an extra monitor from home so that I have 3 monitors, and get to work. I receive a call after they "investigate" my office saying it's against policy to use home equipment, despite me having done so previously and IT being aware of it. Immediately I make a list of all the stuff I'm using that the company should then provide for me, like headphones, a docking station, and monitor for working at home. I unplug my monitors, mousepad, keyboard and mouse, plug back in the companys hardware and slow down my work output drastically. I then take the monitor they gave me and plug it in to replace the monitors I had to take down, and look at them with a shit-eating grin when management came to check if I complied. Well you get what you wish for and now since my work output has dropped, they're forced to re-balance the workload.

I got a call from a scammer yesterday. Me: “Hello.” Scammer: (thick, heavy accent) “Hello. This is Tom Smith from Microsoft Support. We are seeing a lot of virus activity coming from your device.” Me: “Oh no. My device? Are you sure?” Scammer: “Oh yes, Madam. We have many reports.” Me: “Oh, jeez. How can I fix it?” Scammer: “It’s okay, Madam. We can help you right now. Are you in front of your device?” Me: “Yes. I was just about to use it. I’m glad you called.” Scammer: “Good, Madam. Please push the Start button.” Me: “I think it’s already on.” Scammer: “Okay, Madam. Now click on Control Panel.” Me: “I don’t see that.” Scammer: “Do you see a bunch of information above the Start button?” Me: “Yes.” Scammer: “That is your Control Panel.” Me: “Wow. I didn’t realize it had a name.” Scammer: “Yes, Madam. Now press Internet Options.” Me: “I don’t see any Internet options. I don’t think I bought that feature. This is just a cheap one.” Scammer: “All devices have Internet, Madam. Press the Start button again.” Me: “Okay. Same as before.” Scammer: “That’s fine, Madam. We will restart your device. Please turn it off.” Me: “Um… I don’t know how. I’ve never turned it off. It kind of just stays on.” Scammer: “There must be an off button. How do you stop it when it’s running?” Me: “I usually press the big button.” Scammer: “Okay, Madam. Press that button.” Me: “Okay.” Scammer: “Is your device off?” Me: “No. The door popped open.” Scammer: “Door? Is there a disc inside?” Me: “No. There’s a burrito.” Scammer: “Why is there a burrito in your computer?” Me: “Computer? I thought you said this was microwave support.”

A teenage boy was playing in his room on his computer when his grandfather came in and sat on the bed. “I know you love your computer,” said the grandfather, “but you really should get out of the house more and experience life. After all, you’re eighteen now. When I was eighteen, I went to Paris, went to the Moulin Rouge, drank all night, had my way with the dancers, pissed on the barman and left without paying! Now that is how to have a good time!” A week later, the grandfather came to visit again. He found the boy still in his room, but this time with a broken arm in plaster, two black eyes and no front teeth. “What happened to you?” he asked. The boy said: “I did what you did. I went to Paris, went to the Moulin Rouge, drank all night, had my way with the dancers, pissed on the barman and he beat the hell out of me!” “Oh dear!” said the grandfather. “Who did you go with?” “Just some friends. Why? Who did you go with?” “The Third Panzer Division.”

My granddad asked me how to print on his computer. I told him it’s Ctrl-P. He said he hasn’t been able to do that for ages.

My boyfriend said he doesn't feel anything sexually and asked me for help. I said, "What can I do? I'm just a computer engineer." "Oh, come on," he said, "you can try." "Okay," I said. So I slowly unbuttoned myself, removed my bra and shirt, and started unzipping. He was starting to get turned on... and then I immediately stopped. "WTF?" he said. "Just trying to turn you off and on again," I replied.

You Want Me to Log Every Minute? Sure Thing, Boss! A few years back, I worked as a junior analyst at a mid-sized consulting firm. Our team was known for delivering quality work, often going above and beyond to meet tight deadlines. We had a flexible work culture, and as long as the work got done, no one micromanaged our hours. Enter our new manager, Karen (not her real name, but fitting). Karen came from a corporate background and was obsessed with metrics and control. She introduced a new policy: every team member had to log their work in 15-minute increments using a new time-tracking software. She claimed it was to "optimize productivity," but it felt more like surveillance. We tried to express our concerns, highlighting that the nature of our work didn't always fit neatly into 15-minute blocks. Sometimes, we had brainstorming sessions, quick client calls, or impromptu team huddles. But Karen was adamant: "If it's not logged, it didn't happen." Fine. I decided to comply—maliciously. I began logging every single activity: 9:00 AM – 9:15 AM: Booting up computer and reviewing emails. 9:15 AM – 9:30 AM: Responding to emails. 9:30 AM – 9:45 AM: Coffee break. 9:45 AM – 10:00 AM: Team stand-up meeting. 10:00 AM – 10:15 AM: Bathroom break. 10:15 AM – 10:30 AM: Reading industry articles for professional development. And so on. I included everything: waiting for files to download, software updates, even the time spent logging time. I wasn't the only one. The entire team followed suit. Within a week, Karen was inundated with detailed logs that painted a picture of a team bogged down by administrative tasks. Our actual productivity took a hit because we were so focused on tracking every minute. After two weeks, Karen called a team meeting. She looked exhausted. "Okay, maybe we went a bit overboard with the time tracking," she admitted. "Let's simplify the process." Victory. We returned to our previous system, focusing on deliverables rather than micromanaging time. Productivity soared, and Karen learned that trust and flexibility often yield better results than rigid control.

I saved the exact location of my toilet on my computer It's labeled as my "I Pee" address.

Painted my computer black hoping it would run faster... Now it just doesn't work.

"You can't do that work any more, because it's not your trained specialty..." When I was in the military, my military occupational specialty (MOS) was power generation equipment repair -- or generator mechanic for all the civilians. I was trained on the mostly 5kW and 10kW generators, but when I get to my permanent duty station, they only had a few scrawny 1.5kW and 3kW generators that we occasionally used in the field. Once our motorpool captain found out that I was computer savvy, he had me in the office doing reports and memos and other computer related work. After a while, they even sent me away with another sergeant for a week of training to manage a new application to track vehicle repair work in the motorpool. Things were good for a year or so, and then we had a change of leadership in the motorpool, including me losing my immediate boss (the sergeant who had trained with me). The Sergeant First Class (Big Sarge) was known for doing shady stuff, and they wanted me to be comfortable with a lot less accuracy on reporting through the computer system. I didn't feel like being setup to be the scapegoat for the nonsense I knew they were doing. Due to my lack of cooperation, Big Sarge took me away from that work, and put me back on generator duty, **"because that's your MOS."** Even when we had nothing going on with generators on a regular basis, that's all they had me working on each day. Well, things were fine with the computer stuff for almost two months, until it came time to do all the end of quarter reporting. And none of these dummies in the new clique had ever been trained on the system. So, they fumble around for two or three days, and then Big Sarge tells me right at the end of a motorpool formation that I need to go and help them run the reports -- while we are still in formation. Me: *"I don't know how to do that, Sergeant!"* Him: *"What do you mean? Of course you do!"* Me: *"It's not my MOS, Sergeant!"* Him: *"Drop!! Give me 50, soldier!"* He dismissed everyone else and left me out there until I did the pushups. He was heated, but didn't say anything else to me that day. The next day, he called me aside, privately, and asked if I could *please* help them out. "Sure," I said. He treated me a whole lot better at that point, and I did run the reports they needed. Totally unrelated to this incident, I was transferred to HQ company about 3 months later, and then all his guys had to report to me for these motorpool reports. That was a whole other barrel of laughs, and Sarge always swore I somehow orchestrated that, when I have absolutely zero power, clout or influence to make any such thing happen. But his boys were unable to get away with anything any more, once I was in charge of consolidating the motorpool reports for the whole battalion.

Use Slow Computer for Demanding Project I got voluntold for the job of switching a paper-based corporate learning to computer-based, including web based training. I did not have a desk or a computer, so I brought in my personal laptop. The boss objected and stated I needed to write a business case for a computer. A week later I got the absolute minimum system that met the minimum requirements on the box. I started the painful process of converting a Powerpoint into an Adobe Captivate file. When it came time to compile the first file, the computer stated it would be three hours before it finished, maybe, so I headed to the breakroom. The executive director for the project happened to walk in and asked me what I was doing there. “I’m staying not frustrated while waiting for the first draft to compile, should be about another two hours sir.” It was five hours. When I showed up the next day, my computer had been upgraded to the then top model with dual monitors. The next day, my fancy unit was on the boss’ desk, and I had his even older, slower computer. This time compiling was over ten hours. Back to the breakroom. Same executive walks in, I just smile, nod, and go back to my lunch. The next day, I had two computers on my desk, the still compiling boss’ unit and my previously issued fancy one. The boss was cleaning out his desk having been sent back to frontline, non-boss work. It felt so good to give that company the boot once the project completed.

Yeah, I lost to my computer at chess. But it turned out to be no match for me at kickboxing.

"F*cking hell love, this is interesting." I said to the wife, looking up from my computer. "It says here that the giant squid, which until last year had never even been seen alive, is actually estimated as a 100 million-strong species, worldwide." "What the hell are you telling me that for?" She said, angrily. "You were supposed to be on the internet searching out cool tattoo designs for my bum-cheek." "I was, love." I told her. "But I had to make sure there'd be enough ink, first."

One day Bill complained to his friend, "My elbow really hurts, I guess I should see a doctor." His friend said, "Don't do that. There's a computer at the drug store that can diagnose anything quicker and cheaper than a doctor. Just put in a sample of your urine and the computer will diagnose your problem and tell you what you can do about it. It only costs ten dollars." Bill figured he had nothing to lose, so he filled a jar with a urine sample and went to the drug store. Finding the computer, he poured in the sample and deposited the $10. The computer started making some noise and various lights started flashing. After a brief pause out popped a small slip of paper on which was printed: You have tennis elbow. Soak your arm in warm water. Avoid heavy lifting. It will be better in two weeks. Late that evening while thinking how amazing this new technology was and how it would change medical science forever, he began to wonder if this machine could be fooled. He decided to give it a try. He mixed together some tap water, a stool sample from his dog, and urine samples from his wife and daughter. To top it off, he masturbated into the concoction. He went back to the drug store, located the machine, poured in the sample, and deposited the $10. The computer made the usual noise and printed out the following message: Your tap water is too hard. Get a water softener. Your dog has worms. Get him vitamins. Your daughter is using cocaine. Put her in a rehabilitation clinic. Your wife is pregnant with twin girls. They aren't yours. Get a lawyer. And if you don't stop jerking off, your tennis elbow will never get better

What's Adolf Hitler's favourite computer game? Mein Kraft.

A blonde and a lawyer are seated next to each other on a flight from LA to NY. The lawyer asks if she would like to play a fun game? The blonde, tired, just wants to take a nap, politely declines and rolls over to the window to catch a few winks. The lawyer persists and explains that the game is easy and a lot of fun. He explains, "I ask you a question, and if you don't know the answer, you pay me $5.00, and vice versa. " Again, she declines and tries to get some sleep. The lawyer, now agitated, says, "Okay, if you don't know the answer you pay me $5.00, and if I don't know the answer, I will pay you $500.00." This catches the blonde's attention and, figuring there will be no end to this torment unless she plays, agrees to the game. The lawyer asks the first question. "What's the distance from the earth to the moon?" The blonde doesn't say a word, reaches into her purse, pulls out a $5.00 bill and hands it to the lawyer. "Okay" says the lawyer, "your turn." She asks the lawyer, "What goes up a hill with three legs and comes down with four legs?" The lawyer, puzzled, takes out his laptop computer and searches all his references, no answer. He taps into the air phone with his modem and searches the net and the library of congress, no answer. Frustrated, he sends e-mails to all his friends and coworkers, to no avail. After an hour, he wakes the blonde, and hands her $500.00. The blonde says, "Thank you," and turns back to get some more sleep. The lawyer, who is more than a little miffed, wakes the blonde and asks, "Well, what's the answer?" Without a word, the blonde reaches into her purse, hands the lawyer $5.00, and goes back to sleep.

My son just ran up to me waving his tablet and screaming Son: ‘Daddy, my Internet isn’t working.’ Me: ‘What is it?’ Son: ‘It’s a worldwide network of computers and other systems that all speak to each other, but that’s not important right now.’ Turns out he’d put it in Airplane mode by accident.

“Please, I’m sorry, I know I’m defective, just —PLEASE, NO!” As I stare at the black screen, the room is silent, yet I can hear the computer sobbing and babbling as its data is erased.

Need all the equipment back, fine, this project is all yours too! Good morning, Inspired by another post of removed admin privileges, here is one of my tales of internal concepts not meeting external realities. I was working(remotely) for a European based manufacturer of (at least my division) high end broadcast processing equipment. They also made other pro equipment, but this area was the highest-end and by far the most technically demanding. Very nichey, very configuration dependent, etc. Great technical staff and developers in Europe, we had great relationship being a bunch of tech nerds who could talk about IP ranges and capacitor values for hours. The US office just took orders from HQ over there. Had some good basic techs, but not set up to do any high end troubleshooting(which is exactly why I existed) There was an acquisition coming up, and auditors started to be involved. We had to send in inventory of all of our computers and test gear, etc. Fine, whatever. Well remember that "setup dependent" part: I was right in the middle of a huge project with one of the largest US broadcasters, (which had already resulted in one of the largest upgrade sales this division had ever made) and was testing some "fresh from the sandbox" SNMP features. This is pretty old tech that is still being used, so I enlisted an older Supermicro server I had been barely using for remotely accessing some kit in my workshop, to do some basic SNMP functions to make sure these new features didn't bung anything up before I literally put them in air on 50+ stations. Things were working fine with tests, I'd get a new revision first thing in the morning, bang on it a bit, send it off to my tech contact by my EOD at the network(which was his morning) Not terribly difficult, but pretty nichey, and also one reason I worked for this company, no one knew at all what any of this was in North America. So, auditors are involved, and the North American office that just takes orders sees this Supermicro server on the inventory list, and it's just the end of the world. Why is there a server out in the field? Why do you need so much test equipment? Who approved this? Etc. My first couple replies were just disregarded because no one knew what I was talking about. A decision was made that this server HAD to go back. A third insistence from me that this was actively used, and who else would take this over? fell on deaf ears. It was the most important thing in the entire world that they get this server back. It's a junky old Supermicro 1RU utility beast that cost maybe 1k at most. For whatever reason I was feeling extra snarky the day I should have boxed the server up, so I wrote an extra friendly note to all the techs, the decision makers at the US office and to my tech contact and his boss at the network introducing everyone thanking them for taking over this critical project, and thanking HQ for helping take on this time sensitive test phase that would really help me get to other critical projects About 25 minutes later I sent tracking information for all the kit (still didn't box up the server) I was supposed to send back. About an hour later I get a really odd email from one the the decision makers in the US office. He doesn't want to admit that no one at HQ doesn't know what the hell I was talking about technically, and simultaneously realized this is a huge account that would totally affect their bonuses if another nice sale came through. They were trying to save face and cover for their techs by suggesting maybe I get them up to speed on the project before we do anything drastic. I just replied to his email with the tracking information again and mentioned I had suggested this 3x now. 25 minutes later I get a freaked out phone call from the head tech at the US HQ. Him and his superior (the decision maker) have ust got a very nice call from my contacts boss at the network. They were so happy with the service so far (I had a great relationship at this point) and excited that having someone else checking these updates would allow me to be onsite more, big future plans, etc. He is wondering who is going to do this work now? NOW this comes up? I just repeated that 3x this was brought up now so clearly this decision was educated, they know best. So now there's full blown panic at US HQ. Knowing this, I send a note to the developers in Europe to make sure the new updated code goes to the catch-all address for the US HQ tech team and not me because they will be doing the testing going forward. This has the desired effect because now the head of development in Europe is on the horn with the decision maker in US wondering about who they recently hired (without approval) to be able to have these in-house resources now? By the time that UPS pick up was supposed to have happened,, somehow having this old server back was no longer the highest priority. In fact, I never heard about the server again.

We cheered as the first successful brain upload was successful, and activated the computer's speaker to communicate with it. "Ithurstsithurtsithurtsithurts..."

How does a computer science major pick up chicks? Oh shit I thought this was google

Fax and shred Okay guys. I'm pretty proud of this one. I'm a front desk receptionist. And I have this woman who is a team lead/manager/whatever for a department in the office I work at. She is insanely lazy. One of my jobs is to sort out the incoming mail and get it placed into the proper mail slots for the departments. Easy enough, right? This woman, I'll call her K, after a few months walked from the mailroom, where the fax machine is, and handed me paperwork asking her if I could fax it for her. I figure, oh she must be in a hurry, so I say yeah, sure. Nope. That was her testing my willingness to do things for her. She would, every time after that, open the mail in the mailroom, bring me the mail, so I could go BACK to the mail room and fax it in. Now this is only like 15 steps away, so it's not like it's on the other side of the building, but it really irked me. Like she is RIGHT there. She knows how to do it, because she once explained how if I fax things to a few particular numbers, a program checks it and puts in our computer system. Check and all. I confirmed that it was okay to fax the CHECK. She agreed. So I said okay. Fast forward a few months and my boss leaves. Suddenly I am not doing my job and am told that I need to open all of K's mail and forward mail type B. (I'm withholding saying what because it becomes very apparent the field I'm in) I make a note in my "Guide book" that my old boss had made, and move on. Whatever. It's dumb, but the material is time sensitive, and my new boss agreed that I need to do it so I do. Fast forward a couple more months and K hasn't come to pick up her mail in 3 weeks. I email her to mention this because there were quite a few things in her mailbox. She goes and tells my manager that I am not doing my job again. And now I have to scan in everything that is Type A. The one with checks. My boss agrees and says, "why haven't you been doing this?" I explained that it wasn't my job and I was faxing in type B like requested, and showed her the note I made in my guide book where I had added a note from the last conversation. Well now it's both. 10 checks later, one of them is for over 200 bucks. I hold onto this one instead of shredding it like the others because I'm thinking, "This is the one that's going to make them realize what I'm doing." And sure as shit, 2 weeks later, I get questioned by another manager. "Uh...why is this in the {program}?" 'Because I was told anything Type A related was to be scanned, after that, they go in the shredder because it contains PII.' "Uh...this is a check for payment of (paperwork)." 'Yep.' "Things that were already sent." 'Okay?' "This needs to go to finance." 'Oh? I was told that ALL Type A info gets scanned.' "Even checks?" 'Even checks.' "Who told you this?" 'K, did.' "But...this isn't a request, this is payment." 'Yeah I didn't know that. I'm not part of that team so I don't know what they've done, and the wording of this doesn't say that they already received something. Maybe I'd have asked if I saw that.' "So this has been shredded? We can't cash a photocopied check." 'Actually this one I saved because I had a feeling it was the wrong thing to do. I was going to shred it at the end of the week if I didn't hear about it.' "How many have you shredded?" 'Like 5 or 7.' "Do you have these instructions in writing?" 'Yep, I'll email them to you.' Haven't heard from them since. Maybe K should come into the office and do her job like she's supposed to. I'm just following her directions.

Three engineers are riding in a car. One is a mechanical engineer, one is an electrical engineer, and one is a computer engineer. The car breaks down and coasts to the side of the road. "Hang on," says the mechanical engineer. "The problem is probably the engine, let me have a look at it and I'll have us on the road again in no time." "Wait," says the electrical engineer. "The way it just stopped like that, I think it's the electrical system. Let me have a look and I'll get us going again in a minute or two." "Hold on," says the computer engineer. "Why don't we all just get out of the car and get in again, and then see if it starts?"

Report everything that happens on these files - or else. Okay then..I will Ok I will get this right this time. 10 y ago. I worked under a manager who could best be described as old-school old-battleaxe. It was an hr office (I do not work in hr anymore and this is probably why) . I was an intern starting a white collar hr corporate job after 10 y of blue collar work. I was excited to be in a climate controlled office. I dreamed for years for this and put myself through university by my bootstrap. I would do anything for air conditioned office. I just broke my back a year prior and had a difficult time finishing my final year. She was known across the office for being impossible to please and for running through staff faster than the copier toner. Nobody lasted more than a year, I was told. From my first day, I was on her radar. I make occasional typing mistakes because of medication I was on that affects short-term memory. I always ran spellcheck and proofed my work carefully, but she treated every minor error like a personal failure. She would scold me for the smallest things. Once she gave me an hour-long lecture about professionalism because I wore a blue shirt instead of a white one. I wore a sweater to a client meeting because their thermostat was broken and it was -20c outside. I got shouted at by my supervisor for wearing the sweater harder than I did on any work site. Every day felt like inhaling glass shards. Then came the instruction that broke the camel’s back. She told me I needed to deliver a daily oral report on every client file I managed. These weren’t short updates. She expected me to know every number, every email, every call from memory. Word for word what was said. If i even got one word out of the transcript off.. i was not fit to be there. She said, “From the moment the sun rises on this office to the moment it sets, you are to report everything that happens in these reports” She knew I had a memory-related disability from a past concussion. She knew it would overwhelm me. So I decided to take her words literally. That night, I opened Excel and began logging everything. Every keystroke. I wrote it all down. I even practiced my delivery so I could recite it perfectly. The next morning, when she called me into her office, I began: “Walked from my car to the building. Opened the office door with my right hand, moderate pressure. Entered the building. Greeted the receptionist. Made a coffe in the keurig for 25 seconds. Sat at my desk. Adjusted my chair. Started computer. Open excel. Began typing reports, ensuring keyboard sound remained within acceptable volume to avoid disturbing senior management arriving 45 minutes after 9am...." I continued like that for almost the entire hour A UNinterrupted. She tried to interrupt, but I reminded her gently that I was “reporting everything that happens..." When it was over, she just stared at me. A week later, HR called me in (yes HR does have its own HR). I explained the situation exactly as it happened, that I was following her directive word for word. I had detailed documentation (by this time I wrote down EVERYTHING that happened in that office). They agreed it wasn’t sustainable. Within a month, I was transferred to a new department. I was laid off 3 m later because that boss quit but I got a good reference.

A woman brought a very limp duck into a veterinary surgeon As she laid her pet on the table, the vet pulled out his stethoscope and listened to the bird’s chest. After a moment or two, the vet shook his head and sadly said, "I'm sorry, your duck, Cuddles, has passed away." The distressed woman wailed, "Are you sure?" "Yes, I am sure," replied the vet, "Your duck is definitely dead." "How can you be so sure?" she protested. "I mean, you haven't done any testing on him or anything. He might just be in a coma or something." The vet rolled his eyes, turned around and left the room. He returned a few minutes later with a healthy looking black Labrador Retriever. As the duck's owner looked on in amazement, the dog stood on its hind legs, put its front paws on the examination table and sniffed the duck from top to bottom. It then looked up at the vet with sad eyes and shook his head. The vet patted the dog on the head and took it out of the room, and returned a few minutes later with a cat. The cat jumped on the table and also delicately sniffed the bird from head to foot. The cat sat back on its haunches, shook its head, meowed softly and strolled out of the room. The vet looked at the woman and said, "I'm sorry, but as I said, this is most definitely, 100% certifiably, a dead duck." The vet turned to his computer terminal, hit a few keys and produced a printout. "I'm afraid I'm going to have to charge you our full fee," he said, "which includes the cost of a complete lab test and a cat scan." The vet took the paper, handed it to the woman and said, "The bill is $1500." "$1500!" the woman exclaimed in disbelief. "How much for the rest of the duck?"

No, the stock take must agree with the system, look again. Years ago, I worked for an office supplies chain store. It was an OK job for a student on the weekend. The store manager would occasionally ask us to do a stock take. It involved going around with a hand scanner and making sure that what we had in the store agreed with what the computer system said we did. Unfortunately, we had a lot of theft in the store and so frequently there were missing items, lots of them. The IT system was also a complete mess so we would frequently find items that the system said we didn't have. The store manager was of the firm belief that there was no theft and that the stock system was completely infallible. If you went up to him and said "Hey SM, the system reckons we've got 37 of these 19" CRT monitors. I found 3. I think there's an issue". He's brush it off and say we weren't looking hard enough and that we're not leaving the store until the hand scanner agrees with the stock system..... cue malicious compliance. We would scan the same monitor multiple times until we had 37 of them. If we found something that the stock system said we didn't have, it either got hidden behind the stacks of office paper, on top of one of the offices, or more frequently it would end up inside the paper and card compactor. We made sure that the hand scanners would always agree with the stock system and we got to leave the store on time. A few years later I found out that the store manager had been fired by the company because they did an external audit of the store and found a stock system that said there were thousands of items that weren't there, and that the stock takes must have been falsified.

Absolutely Must Restore My Important Files! One of my early jobs was managing the back end server and database for a desktop/laptop file backup system. Very big company and we had all the sales and management laptops on regular backup schedules. Often the database would crash and we would have to rebuild it. This meant restoring files using the automated process was offline for a few hours to sometimes a few days. Management put out a notice that any restore requests must get my manager's approval before we did a manual restore. Most times it could wait for a day or so. This one sales guy insisted that we restore his super critical sales documents immediately or he would escalate to senior management. My manager told him to wait for one more day. Nope, he went straight to the CTO and got his way. So, as part of the manual restore process, we print out the complete file list of what we would be restoring and copied all the files to a DVD that was to be sent to the user. 95% of the files that were to be restored were porn pics and videos with a few word docs and spreadsheets. So after printing the 20+ page file report and burning the DVD, I took it to my manager. She smiled and immediately set an appointment with the CTO. Needless to say the sales guy had a very intense meeting with the CTO, Sales VP and HR. I heard he denied to the end those files were his. I wonder what he told his wife when he had to look for another job. TLDR: Be careful when you escalate with IT to restore your critical files. They will find those others you shouldn't have been saving to your work computer.

Ask John I’ve been working for a company that started out small and grew steadily over time, but unfortunately, the way they run things never really kept pace with that growth. When I first joined several years ago, I quickly noticed how outdated and inefficient many of the processes were. Right from the start, I pointed out the urgent need to automate repetitive tasks to save time and reduce errors. For example, instead of using straightforward payment solutions like PayPal or similar services, the company insisted on manually calling customers to follow up on payments. After a few months of insisting, they finally agreed to use PayPal, and voilà — fewer errors and more orders. It was time-consuming and frankly unnecessary in today’s digital world. On top of that, they were using multiple software tools that didn’t communicate with each other at all, which meant we had to pay an employee simply to re-enter data that the client had already submitted elsewhere. This duplication of effort was not only a waste of resources but also a source of avoidable mistakes. We were a small team with limited time and energy, and it made no sense to spend so much of it on tedious manual tasks that any computer could easily handle faster and more accurately. I was constantly pushing for improvements, but change just didn’t happen. Every time I raised the issue, the answer was always the same: “Ask John,” the IT guy. John didn’t really care, and the company’s attitude was basically, “We’ve always done it this way, so why change now?” Over the years, all my requests were ignored or dismissed with excuses that it wasn’t possible. The truth is, nobody wanted to put in the effort to rethink how things were done—they preferred sticking to the status quo rather than disrupt their routines. Fast forward five years, and I finally decided to quit. That’s when it became clear that the processes everyone assumed were automated were actually being done manually—by me. Suddenly, my boss sent me a message: “Can you document all the processes you handle so someone else can take over?” My answer was simple: “Ask John.”

I had a phone conversation today with a very nice young chap from India This is how it went: "Hello sir, how are you today?" "I'm very well, thank you for asking. And how are you? And, more to the point, WHO are you?" "Sir, my name is Sanjit, and I'm calling you from Microsoft". "Microsoft, eh? Is that a city in India? How's the weather there today?" " No, sir - MICROSOFT, the computer company. I'm calling to tell you that we have found a problem with your computer and -" "REALLY?? Well, that's quite concerning......" "Yes sir, it can become very serious indeed, but thankfully I will be able to fix it for you. Now, if you -" "No, I meant it's very concerning because you see I don't HAVE a computer". "You don't?" "I don't". "Ahh, it must be a problem on your laptop sir -" "Don't have one". "Ipad?" "Nope". "Tablet?" "Nope, I have none of those things. As a matter of fact, I don't even have a telephone". After a few seconds of silence he said "Ah, sir, you are lying to me now!" I said "Well, you started it!!" and put the phone down.

Documentation will save your cookies So, I was a contractor in a Government office. My background is extensive starting with multiple engineering degrees, and many years of designing, building and operation of Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROV's). There was constant personnel churn in the office, and the contractors were the corporate memory. It's an interesting situation, I always likened it to a feudal society. Staffers (direct Government employees) were the royalty and contractors were the serfs. Sometimes it was bothersome, but the position paid very well, so that was some benefit. Most of the time, the staffers knew they were in way over their heads and gladly accepted our advice. A woman staffer arrived one day as head of the department that managed our outside service contractors. Typically, I played a large advisory role in dealing with these folks as someone familiar with the industry and able to call bullshit if you will. Well, this woman decided that I was conspiring behind her back with the contractors virtually on the first day there. Why, I never knew, but it was what it was. Luckily I didn't answer to her, I answered to a guy who in a former life was a member of Seal Team 6. Basically a trained killer, Great guy, he liked me a lot, and we got along well together. When the foo foo started, he pulled me aside and said, "document everything you do". So I did as he suggested. I had a notebook in OneNote that I would record whatever I did that involved this woman, including her increasingly anti-social behavior towards me. We would be in meetings, and not only would she not look at me, when I asked her direct questions she wouldn't answer. Several times, this happened and then there was this dead silence until someone else spoke. About this time we got a new division manager who was very.... personnel "sensitive". He was a PhD type in an operations role and completely out of his league, so he regressed to what he knew, making the office "kinder and gentler". This was quite a challenge as we had an office full of ex-Navy types, and they weren't exactly used to being "kinder and gentler". In a short period of time, the woman in question had skewered 5 other males in the office in her short tenure, with the result of them departing the office. Both staff and contractors. I would have been her 6th if she had had her way. So, there was a lot of concern about my position. My boss was in my office one day talking about the latest anti-social behavior demonstrated by this woman. He made a comment, "boy, I wish I had documentation of all this". I laughed, went to my computer and printed off a 20-page dissertation on all the stupidity. His eyes lit up. Come with me, he said. We went into the office of the new director and my boss gave him my dossier. It took him a bit to read through it all. I had used the word "harassment" (which turned out to be the magic word) in description of many of the episodes. He said, I think harassment is too strong a word for this behavior. I asked him if a contractor was exhibiting this behavior towards a staffer, what would you call it? He didn't answer the question. About a week later, the woman was reassigned to a different organization. I always say, it's not good to go head to head with a trained killer.... LOL

Don't want to wait for the easy way? Alright, we will wait longer for the "official" way. I work as on-site IT for a company, mostly user end hardware and networking sort of things. Lots of "user error" or "turn it on and off" sort of calls. Can be mind numbing at times but I do enjoy it. The bane of my existence, and virtually every other IT person's existence I've ever known, is printers. Which, of course, I get a call for one of our offices at the end of campus. I bundle up, grab my tools and supplies, and walk over. Get there and get the normal "everything is terrible and we \*\*need\*\* this printer! ....For the literally only three out of the normally twelve people are in the office today due to the cold. And this particular department has multiple printers in the area, like two more than the total employees in-office today. But I do my level A+ bestest to get it fixed. Clean the printer, change the rollers, check settings, all the stuff that usually works. But today on this damn thing it sure doesn't. Keeps crimpling up the paper and jamming. So I tell the lady that called it in "I am going to have to replace it." The normal doom and gloom follows and I schlepp my arse back out to our shop to get another printer. I get the replacement ready. Set it up, get it set to DHCP, make sure the damn thing works, etc etc. But when I got back to the location I see that the ethernet cable had fallen behind a heavy filing cabinet. And, of course, the damned wall plate its plugged into is \*right\* in the middle of this like six-foot long heavy cabinet. Not enough room to reach it on either end, and too heavy for me to tip even if I had someone else available to grab the cable. I let the user know and she absolutely freaks out. \*Apparently\* this printer that went down was the "\*\*The only one\*\* use (also happens to be the closest to her by about three feet) and we (IT) just \*have\* to get it up and running \*\*now\*\*." Which considering there is nothing special about the one that was broken and I had the exact same mode to replace it with, I doubt. I apologize, but let her know that "I can't reach it or safely move the cabinet. I can set up her computer to print to the other printer and tomorrow I will bring in a tool I have, reach the cable, get it hooked up, and it will be ready for her on Monday no problem". She counters with a "Well then \*who\* do I call to move the cabinet \*today\*?" I let her know "Well that would be Property Management, but their turn around time unless its an actual emergency tends to be 24-hours and they are only 'on-call' on the weekends" ie they are off tomorrow and won't move the cabinet until Monday at the earliest. She, subsequently, insists we call them.. Now for the malicious compliance. So I call PM on my mobile, put it on speaker, catch one of the guys before he gets ready to leave for the day, and he subsequently tells both of us "Yeah earliest we will get to it is Tueaday. Gotta be at least two of us. Nopants can't help, hes in IT and not PM. Let me get the ticket entered in." (pause for keyboard clicking and random sounds of blue-collar cussing). "OK yeah we will be over Tuesday before noon unless something comes up. Nopants can I just plug that thing in?" I stifle a chuckle, knowing that PM guy is more than capable of plugging in an ethernet cable "Yeah unless you really want IT there we can have a tech come over. Might have to check the schedule, I am off Mondays and Tuesdays. Who will be here so might have to push it baxn to Wednesday." This whole time the user has the stunned look of someone that got smacked upside the head and is still recalibrating. PM guy says "Nope we are fine. Tuesday before noon unless an emergency pops up." And he hangs up. I tell the user, "Well that will work for us in IT. I will get this old printer removed, thank you for your patience. Once PM confirms that everything is done, we will have a tech come by and make sure the printer is still working and is networked properly." After I got back to the shop and told the other tech on duty we had a hell of a laugh. I called PM and told him to go ahead and cancel, I will bring my little grabber tool in tomorrow and get it hooked up. He said he would wait until Monday since if he cancels the appointment it will trigger an email for the user since her name is on the ticket in the system. Update: The cable has been successfully retrieved! Little grabby tool was able to get in there and get it, cable was resecured on its insecure little clip to hold it up, and subsequently plugged into the printer. Thankfully the Gremlins didnt mess with it overnight and I get to close out the ticket.

Don't want to pay be for being on call? Ok I won't be Hey there, just wanted to share my compliance with you. Its been a few years but i still am proud of it. Background: I worked in it in a medium sized company. We were a team of about 20 persons, with always 2 specialists for every topic. For example server / database and mine - network and firewalls. Due to laws in our country we had a gentlemen's agreement with our company. As noone could be forced to be on call pretty much 24/7 every 2 weeks, but the company needing exactly that they paid us about 500€ per month, and we would be on call - but with less harsh rules (you were supposed to call back in a larger timeframe, it wasn't expected that you could start working within a specific frame etc.). The calls were not frequent so this was okay for us. Every team was called like 2-3 times a year, so it was decent money for a psychic burden, more then for real work. The problem: I was the new one. So I worked there for several years and my boss just left me out of the agreement. At the beginning it was ok, because I wasn't called and also wasn't able to help immediately. But after 2 years my higher boss blatantly stated "well if there is a problem, we'll just call him" to other colleagues and my direct boss when it came to my partner going into vacations or illness. The first problem: As you might expect I was pissed. And low and behold, the time came and they needed help from the whole department, because there was a computer problem with all systems. The higher boss didn't even have the balls to call me himself, he made one of the other colleagues do it. I answered and it was hard to leave them hanging, but I declined, knowing everyone would have more work with less people. The Solution : After being set into such a harsh spot, I chose to solve the problem myself. You don't want me on call? You won't be able to call me. I switched my mobile number, only giving it to my direct partner, who also agreed with it being unfair, like my direct boss. He would simply lie that he didn't have it either if he was asked. Everyone knew I was pissed, so they agreed with my solution. Then i turned off my home phone, which I didn't use anyway and gave hr the number of my parents, telling them to only contact me, if there was a real problem, nothing just work related. And then I waited. And waited. The Crashout & Aftermath: And then my time came. Colleague was out of country on holiday. I had a nice weekend. On Monday I came in and everyone was like: everything crashed on the weekend. Turns out the firewall as main gateway had a network interface going up and down. Noone even had a login expect my colleague and me. They had to get a specialist from the support to help them, which cost them the whole weekend to solve this, meaning critical calculations didn't run as planned. I was immediately called into my boss (unfortunately not the higher one again) office. He instantly promoted me to being on call, no matter the consequences. Everything with HR and the bigger boss would be done afterwards, I just had to make sure I was on call when leaving the building this day. So I went ahead and gave them my number, and after that I was never even questioned about it again. Bonus for me: Other departments always were pissed about our "free bonus money" and I was the only one who always just went ahead and told everyone I would actually give it up again, if I had my personal freedom and space back. I actually prefer my space over the money. Left some years afterwards for a 8-16 it job without being in the constant awareness that someone might call. The money might sound great at first. But about 3000€ per year for always having your work in the back of your head just isn't worth it for me. Hope you enjoyed my MC Have a good one Edit for clarification: 500€ a month, at about 42% tax rate. It's quite usual to make it simple and just half the initial income. So it would have been around 3400€. Nothing was split, every one on call got the 500

You want me in 3 places at once? You got it! A little over a decade ago, I worked up in the oil patch in Northern Canada on different IT contracts. The current contract I was on was maintaining virtual meeting rooms. The oil company had decided that if you didn't need to be on site, they would move your job south and pay you 25 to 50 % less. When you needed to meet with people on site, you'd book a meeting and all is golden. The IT company I was with was amazing, but they lost the contract to an international IT company "A", servicing oil company "B". I was one of the fortunate few that got a job with IT company A; which was so unbelievably stupid. Most of the rest of the talent that had been working IT under contracting companies for 10 plus years took a walk. I think the management literally sat down and said "What's the absolute worst way we can mess things up", and then they did that. They hired a bunch of fresh out of college or unqualified people and within a few months our ticket count had gone from averaging around 50 at any given time to well over 600 and growing with no end in site. This is all well and good, and we got chewed out for the ticket count being high, we got chewed out for bringing it down low, because our ticket closure rates weren't similar, it didn't really matter; good, bad, we got chewed out. Company A was hemorrhaging money to Company B. Like every ticket outside of the allowed failures that was a failure and not resolved was a fine, and there were multiple sites. Basically IT company A ended up paying Oil company B to do IT for them. Most salaried oil company employee who had computer problems took weeks or months to get problems solved, but they were salaried and it didn't affect oil coming out of the ground, so it didn't matter. Except for the meeting rooms. Managers couldn't have virtual meetings with staff, things were getting delayed, and it was going to affect oil coming out of the ground, so it was a problem. The 12 of us working there were given full time work and 6 vehicles. The supervisor took one for himself for driving too and from town and wouldn't let anyone use it during the day, so that left 5 vehicles. It used to be that we were dedicated to a specific type of work, but now everyone did everything, and we were expected to just "Check the meeting rooms" as we drove by, or "if we had a ticket in that building". So all the meeting room maintainance was just not being done and the new guys that would get a ticket to facilitate a virtual meeting of the vice presidents, directors, etc... of the oil company would just not show up and the meeting would fail. During this time I had been loudly and constantly complaining about our inability to "check meeting rooms in buildings that we don't have tickets for when we don't have a vehicle to get there anyways", a coworker told me that one of IT company A's managers had come North to review the situation, was at lunch, saw one of my emails, said "I'm not reading that", tossed down his phone and ate his lunch. So I just gave up, gave in, and did what I was told. I had been busting my ass to keep everything working for all the execs of oil company B for months, and it was time to "cue malicious compliance". There was a building in town with meeting rooms, our building on site was around 45 minutes North. Every morning, rather than being on site and working at 7, I would be at the town building at 8, checking a meeting room, stocking it with supplies, and fxing problems; except I wasn't because it was in use and I couldn't get in. So I would drive North and get to our building around 9 and start my day, do a few tickets, be one of the only ones that the oil execs saw that could actually make meetings run successfully, and then leave at 2 to go check a meeting room I couldn't get into, and then go home. This lasted about a month before the oil execs called in my supervisor, manager, and manager's manager and said something along the lines of "Put I_IdentifyAsAstartes on doing just meeting rooms and meetings". I got called into a meeting with my supervisor, most of my other work was taken away, I was given my own vehicle, and I was told to check all the meeting rooms every week (a 4 person job) and to take care of all of the exec meetings. I told my supervisor that it wasn't physically possible for me to be in 3 or 4 places at once to check all the meeting rooms, he didn't care, he didn't care how I did it, just get it done. So I got it done. Every time we checked a meeting room, we had to scan a QR code with a company phone that we would then export into Exel and submit as the rooms we checked. Every minute of every day I clicked the scan button and scanned nothing. At the end of the week I would export to Exel, then get the list of all the room codes, randomise them, paste them in, save, and submit. *Click* I'm in town checking a room. 1 minute later *Click* I'm 30 kilometers

Early 2000's Radio Contest: Whoever sends the most emails wins concert tickets! The AI-written story about crashing their manager's email server reminded me of something I did back in the early 2000's. A local radio station launched a contest to give away tickets to a Britney Spears concert in LA. I had no interest in Britney Spears, but I had friends in LA that I wanted to see. Contest rules: Whoever sends the most emails to the DJ at the radio station over the weekend wins. I mean, it was the early days of The Internet, and things like this happened. Malicious Compliance: I wrote a simple program that sent out a bunch of emails per second from my home computer and left it running. I don't remember the exact number of emails per second. To be fair, though, I was trying to not be so malicious that I crashed their email server, because I wanted my emails to be counted so I could win. I remember from my logs that I sent many millions of emails while the contest was running, so it was probably close to 100 per second. I had a counter running and would include the counter in my email subject line, something like: "Email Contest Submission #15,323,726" Fallout: On Sunday afternoon, they announced on the radio that the contest was over early, because their email server kept crashing and please stop sending emails. The DJ responded to one of my many, many emails asking me personally to stop. He told me that he didn't have the tools to delete so many emails and had to request special help from their ISP's IT department, that he got in trouble with his manager, and insinuated that I was a mean-spirited person for automating something that was clearly meant to be hand-crafted emails and for causing him so much trouble. He also told me I came in 2nd place. Looking back, I should have added a few more zeros to the number of emails I sent per second... *Edit because it wasn't clear to some readers:* *The guy who won the contest sent way more emails than I did, by several orders of magnitude. In his email to me, he said there were 3 of us who flooded his inbox with millions of emails. They closed the contest early because it was already clear who would win.*

All in on Python... You got it! This might be a bit long but it needs some set up. TLDR: New manager decided that Python was the only language to be used in a C/C++/C# software team. Productivity drops to zero. Manager is no longer around. Preface: Please don't bash any programming language in the comments. This is not a post about the merits of various programming languages. It's just a story of what happened. I worked for a VERY long time at a small company that created some niche products. The company had a lot of scientists and engineers around to develop and refine the products this company made. Over the years, the people in the science and engineering departments changed but I still stuck around. They paid well and I got a lot of time off. I also only had to work 40 hours per week, which was nice. My job in software was to support the production of equipment. I wrote custom software that calibrated and configured the devices. At the click of a button someone could run the software with minimal human interaction needed. When I started I was the only developer. By the time I left, there were four developers. That should give you an idea about the size of the company. Not large. But profitable. At the beginning of my time at the company, each piece of software was originally developed by a scientist or engineer. Each and every one had their own pet language they preferred to use. They would start the software and, when they felt that it was ready for prime time, they would hand it off to me. I would then make it actually ready for use. This included things like error handling and streamlining the user experience. Also finding the massive amount of bugs that were in the code. This also meant that originally the company used dozens of different programming languages. Towards the end of my time with the company, they had decided they were going to mostly focus on Windows computers. So we used primarily C derivatives (C, C++, C#) and web technology (Javascript, HTML, CSS, PHP). There were other languages floating around but this is what we mostly used. All four of us were proficient in these languages and I was the only one that could handle the edge cases of old programs from before this consolidation. By the time of this story, we had been using these languages for nearly a decade. For most of my time at the company, we had worked under the Engineering department for a person that wasn't really a software manager. So we were left to run ourselves. One day the company decided they needed to hire an actual Software manager. So they found one that came with excellent credentials. He had a lot of experience managing software teams. He actually came in and didn't change things right away, for which I was grateful and held out hope that it would all work out. Then came the fateful day. One day he pulled us all into a conference room and told us that company would be making a shift. One of the scientists was complaining that they couldn't understand the software we were writing and needed to be able to edit it. So, instead of teaching the scientist C and such, we were going to, shift 100% of all new code to Python. Starting immediately. Any new code written needed to be in Python. I brought up the fact that none of us knew Python. I was told that we could take classes in our own time on our own dime if we wanted. I pointed out that learning a new language would slow down our delivery of software. Python isn't hard so I had no doubt we could get there. But we had libraries written of common code that we just plugged in when needed. None of those could be used. In fact, we had to figure out how to plug Python into existing programs that needed updates. Any updates had to be done in Python. And, not only that, all our code had to be "Pythonic". Meaning that it had to be done in the proper way for Python and not utilizing techniques that would technically work in Python but weren't necessarily the "correct" way in Python. Any code we did write had to be submitted to the complaining scientist to verify that it was "Pythonic". Which most of it wasn't. So, we did exactly as we were told. All of us stopped writing in any language except Python. Everyone stopped working and started writing very simple programs to figure out how Python worked. I was working on a plug-in for an existing program to try and resolve some U/I issues. However, I really struggled with this because the U/I was written in C# and the new code had to be in Python. When I brought this up, I was rebuffed and told it MUST be done in Python. So I was trying to figure out how to change an existing C# U/I by using new Python code. Our productivity dropped to zero. Not a single bit of software made it to production for the few months this manager was around. After a few months of nothing at all getting done, he decided to leave the company to pursue other opportunities. We weren't told that they fired him. But I'm sure that's what happened. Af

Wife texts husband on a cold winters morning: Wife texts husband on a cold winters morning: "Windows frozen." Husband texts back: "Pour some lukewarm water over it." Wife texts back 5 mins later: "Computer completely fucked now."

A dog sees a "Now hiring" poster outside of a computer store. The poster reads: "Must be able to type. Must be able to program. And must be bilingual. We are an equal opportunity employer." The dog takes the poster in his mouth, and walks in. The manager spots the dog, and decides to humour it, pulling up a chair and a computer with a word processor. "Alright, if you want to work here, you need to first write a letter," and leaves the room. 30 minutes later, he comes back in, and the dog has typed out a completely error-free letter. "Well, I'll be. This is a smart dog. But can he program?" he asks himself. 20 minutes pass, and the dog has made a perfectly running website for the store. He looks, shocked, at the dog, and finally speaks. "Look, I know you have the qualifications, but, well... you're a dog." The dog nudges the words "We are an equal opportunity employer." on the poster, and the manager sighs. "There's no way you're bilingual." The dog looks him in the eyes, and says, "Meow."

My computer crashed a few hours into writing my paper looks like I'm gonna have to write my name and the date again

My boss said to stop putting papers on his desk. Okay. Back in the days before computers, everything was documented with paper. There was no email, no electronic memos…nothing. Everything was typed or handwritten. I was the office manager for a contractor. I was also the payroll department, accounts payable & receivable, accounting and HR departments. The owner’s desk was always a mess. Papers were scattered everywhere. Nobody had any idea what color the top of his desk was. He managed to work like that for years…until the day he snapped. One afternoon, I was waiting for him to sign a stack of checks. He was interrupted by an urgent phone call and couldn’t find the contract that needed his immediate attention. He stood up, and used his arm to swoop every piece of paper from the desk to the floor in front of his desk. It was like watching a ticker tape parade in slow motion. I don’t remember ever seeing him so pissed off before. Then he yelled, “NOTHING GOES ON MY DESK UNTIL I CLEAN UP THAT SHIT ON THE FLOOR!” Okay, funny man. We had 80 employees at the time who were paid weekly. Remember…this was before computers. We didn’t allow signature stamps on checks. All checks and legal documents required his original signature. I hated to do it, but orders were orders. I tossed all paychecks, company checks, contracts, phone messages, bids, and contracts on the top of the pile of papers on the floor in front of his desk. I have to give him credit because it only took him two weeks for his stacks of paper to be in neat, organized piles on his desk arranged around his desk calendar. Then he said my desk should look as organized as his. I told him to fuck off because my chaos was organized inside my head, and if he really wanted it cleaned off he needed to stop giving me so much work to do. I multitasked before it was a thing, and organizing my desk wasn’t included. Edit: Just to clarify, his phone was on the credenza behind his desk. It was safe. He signed paychecks and worked on the mountain of papers from the top of the heap down to the bottom of the pile.

The librarian NSFW A man walks into a library and says to the librarian, "do you have that book for men with small penises?" The librarian looks on her computer and says, "I don't know if it's in yet." "Yeah that's the one"

My girlfriend called me a pedophile. I said, "That's a pretty big word for someone who just found 10 GB of child pornography on my computer."

Use the API as provided? Ok. I have been a computer programmer for about 25 years now, and it's crazy how people can become so territorial and controlling over their little kingdoms. I was on a project about 10 years ago that, when my team was assigned to the project to program the front end orchestration services and UI, we were handed a backend API that stored nearly 0% of the data that Design said we needed to display. We went to the team that set up the backend with a list of all of the features that were missing and were told that the comments period ended six months prior, and what we had was the final version. We pointed out that was six months prior to us even hearing about the project, but they wouldn't budge. We racked our brains for a while, and eventually someone noticed that of the fields that were there but generally useless to our needs, there was a freeform "notes" field. We came to the conclusion that we would take all of the data we needed, model it how it was useful to us, JSON encode it, and stuff it all into the notes field. We took the approach to our manager, and since there was literally no other way for us to proceed, he approved it. We started working on that approach, but word of what we were doing started moving up the chain of command. About a week into it, we were told that the backend team was re-reviewing the needs of this particular API and would like our input as to what we needed for this project. I guess someone didn't like the idea of us using the "final" version.

An Apple store near where I live got robbed $25k worth of merchandise was stolen. The police said that they will get both computers back.

A State Trooper was patrolling late at night off the main highway. At nearly midnight, he sees a couple in a car, in lovers' lane, with the interior light brightly glowing. He carefully approaches the car to get a closer look. Then he sees a young man behind the wheel, reading a computer magazine. He immediately notices a young woman in the rear seat, filing her fingernails. Puzzled by this surprising situation, the trooper walks to the car and gently raps on the driver's window. The young man lowers his window. 'Uh, yes, Officer'? The trooper asks: 'What are you doing?' The young man says: 'Well, Officer, I'm reading a magazine.' Pointing towards the young woman in the back seat the trooper says: 'And, her, what is she doing?' The young man shrugs: 'Sir, I believe she's filing her fingernails.' Now, the trooper is totally confused. A young couple, alone, in a car, at night in a lover's lane and nothing obscene is happening! The trooper asks: 'What's your age, young man?' The young man says: 'I'm 22, sir.' The trooper asks: 'And her, what's her age?' The young man looks at his watch and replies:' She'll be 18 in 11 minutes.'

Calling in sick... A young man had just got a job at an electrical store and was to start work on Monday. Unfortunately, he called in sick for the day. The boss was a little annoyed but decided that shit happens and let it go. The guy came in Tuesday and sold a stack of electronics, and continued on for the rest of the week selling record amounts of computers and TVs and other goods. The following Monday, the boss got a call - it was the new employee calling in. "Sorry boss - I'm really sick!" The boss was getting more annoyed with him. Tuesday the young guy was in and selling even more than last week. He finished up the week making a new record for sales for his state. Next Monday the new guy called in sick again and the boss decided it was time for a chat with him. So on Tuesday the guy rocks up to work and the boss pulls him aside. "Bob, you're a great salesman, but you keep calling in sick on Mondays - What's going on?" "Well boss. My sister's just gone through an awful divorce and she calls me every Monday morning crying, so I go over to her house and comfort her. We always wind up making love for the rest of the day..." "THAT'S SICK!" "I told you..."

They may take our shorts, but they'll never take our freedom! (this happened a few years ago and our compliance wasn't exactly malicious, but I thought I'd share...) We had a new CIO take over our IT group. They had next to no experience/competence and weren't even a finalist from the selection committee, but were a friend of the CEO and were hired. What they lacked in these area they countered with micromanagement and the demand for absolute professionalism (superficial BS, if you will). One of the first policies they implemented was no-shorts, and attire must be office appropriate (no holes, no graphic T-shirts, etc.; effectively, business casual, especially for supervisors). Now, there were various positions in IT, but several of us—who were also supervisors—had to work in dirty/unconditioned spaces, etc. Several of us made requests to wear shorts—installing new cabling in the floor of the server room, unloading/installing equipment, wiring buildings in the summer that had no/low AC, etc. All were denied. When walking out of a meeting to discuss this, we noticed that the CIO's secretary and several of the female office support staff were wearing skirts/skorts. We brought this up at our next meeting and were assured that this was different, for reasons. Obviously, the women in our group were not about to wear skits while ITing about, but several started wearing skorts. Later, I (M) was looking through my ThinkGeek wishlist—told you this was a few years ago—and at some point, I had placed a [Utilikilt](https://utilikilts.com/) in the list. Dear reader, I mashed that buy button so fast that the kilt damned near arrived the next day. I also shared this with a few of my closest male coworkers, who did the same. Early the following week, we all show up in our kilts and our coworkers had a good laugh, as did our manager—a good egg, trying to make the best of the CIO's eccentricities—who said nothing to the CIO. It just so happened that on that day a Windows update had borked the CIOs computer and they needed someone to take a look ASAP. While not my job, I eagerly volunteered as I was in-between tasks. I showed up in my kilt with the CIO present—who just sort of stared as I worked—fixed their computer in a very professional and expedient manner, and left. Shortly thereafter, I get a message from my manager that we needed to talk. Long story, short, while he was sympathetic, I was in violation of the no-shorts policy. I said that if women can wear skits, we should be able to as well. Full disclosure: I was the only person with a very specific, hard-to-come-by skillset, so I was fairly secure in my position and was happy to take one for the team as there'd likely be little consequence for me, personally. Anyway, while we didn't go crazy with the kilts, we made a point of wearing them when we had some visibility outside of IT, which caused a lot of discussion from other departments—from laughing to good-natured ribbing, to solidarity. A short time later, we had an all-hands meeting: the policy was being amended so that managers could make exceptions—e.g., when we needed to do building infrastructure maintenance, etc.—and that from now on, Fridays would be casual day (still no shorts, but more relaxed clothing; I honestly think they had seen this on *Office Space*). The mutual understanding, though, was that in return, we needed to retire the kilts, which we did... for the most part.

What do women and modern computers have in common? Neither one will accept a 3 and a half inch floppy

A mechanical engineer, electrical engineer, chemical engineer, and computer engineer One day, a mechanical engineer, electrical engineer, chemical engineer, and computer engineer were driving down the street in the same car when it broke down. The mechanical engineer said, I think a rod broke. The chemical engineer said, The way it sputtered at the end, I think it's not getting enough gas. The electrical engineer said, I think there was a spark and something's wrong with the electrical system. All three turned to the computer engineer and said, What do you think? The computer engineer said, I think we should all get out and then get back in.

What does Stephen Hawking say when his computer crashes? Nothing.

Jesus and Satan were having an ongoing argument about who was better on the computer... They had been going at it for days, and God was tired of hearing all of the bickering. Finally God said, "Cool it! I am going to set up a test that will run two hours, and I will judge who does the better job." So Satan and Jesus sat down at the keyboards and typed away. They moused. They did spreadsheets. They wrote reports. They sent faxes. They sent emails. They sent out emails with attachments. They downloaded. They did some genealogy reports. They made cards. They did every known job. But 10 minutes before their time was up, lightning suddenly flashed across the sky, thunder clapped, the rain poured, and, of course, the electricity went off. Satan stared at his blank screen and screamed every curse word known in the underworld. Jesus just sighed. The electricity finally flickered back on, and each of them restarted their computers. Satan started searching frantically and screamed, "It's gone! It's all gone! I lost everything when the power went off!" Meanwhile, Jesus quietly started printing out all of his files from the past two hours of diligent work. Satan observed this and became irate. "Wait! He cheated! How did he do it?" God shrugged and said, "Jesus saves."

Null encryption creates null company first post and I still have PTSD about this job This happened in 2001. I worked as an IT Manager for Z-corp, a multi-level marketing company providing internet education and website hosting services. Mostly we made money by selling you a $149 yearly program that automatically renews. The vast majority of the $149 was used to pay the people above you in your up-line. We also taught you how to sign up people in your down line so you could make money. The important part is the annual renewal which would have made millionaires out of a large number of people. At any rate, Z-corp was run by a father , Daddy, and his sons who were all former construction workers and lived a couple time zones later than me. They woke up and started the day by yelling at the person most likely to need a jumpstart. I typically worked 18 hour days so sleep was precious. 5am phone calls with someone yelling at me were common. One fine morning at 5am, Daddy calls to tell me the website is down. I stumble out of bed and drive to the data center, logon and see the last person to modify the production files was his son, Richard. I call Daddy back and tell him his kid took down the site, then revert all the changes and delete Richard's access. Walking out of the data center, Daddy calls back that we can't process credit cards. I walk back in and check our connection to the credit card processor, yep, its down. So I call their customer support line, who tells me Richard called them several hours ago and violated the contract. Richard knows he screwed up bad so has turned off all his phones and moved into a hotel thinking no one would find him. A mad scramble to find a new processor happens and we change over to using the new company. We were down for 2 days. No sales. No money. No payouts. Daddy calls our original processor and gets them to reinstate us as long as we sign a new contract. The new contract requires SSL to enabled on the credit card pages (the little "lock" you see on every page) and credit card information is to be encrypted in the database. We have a team meeting to discuss implementation details. Our development team says it will take a full rewrite and months to change the software to encrypt the credit card information. I say we can implement a Null Encryption process in the database that doesn't require a software rewrite. Daddy is fully onboard with a quick solution and says do it. Doesn't ask for details. I setup the database job and run the first update manually verifying everything works correctly. And go back to fixing all the other stuff that broke. Daddy calls back to say the original credit card processor wants to audit our fixes before enabling our account again. I invite them to the data center to personally check the server. They ask about our innovative encryption solution. I say its easier to show than describe. I run the tests showing no credit card data is present. They ask to see the data base code. where credit card data present, set to NULL It runs every night at midnight. Technically, I had Null encrypted the data. That it was no longer accessible wasn't relevant. The audit passed and we were back in business. Jan 3rd 2002, I had finally had enough of Z-corp. No raises, no overtime, no comp time, paychecks always late, no bonus, no sleep, etc. I reset my company phone and low level formatted my computer and quit. 6 days later, the first annual renewal failed because credit card data was Null. Z-corp closed their doors permanently not long after. Update 1: Removing the credit card data nightly kept the company in compliance with the credit card processor. When the annual renewal came due, there was no credit card data to process the renewal. In a SQL database, NULL is the absence of a value. A value is data (number, characters, images, spaces, etc). Technically, we were already using a Null Encryption scheme as there was no encryption (the encryption scheme was not set). FTC investigated Z-corp and handed out indictments. I left for other reasons. Mostly I had found another job that didn't involve an angry person waking me up at 5am to clean up another mess. There was no one cross-trained for my job because I kept taking their punishment every day and no one thought I would actually quit. Wiping my phone and computer was childish...an angry person had just vented at me, they were still yelling when my computer wiped and when I pulled the battery from my phone.

How many Mexicans does it take to run a computer? Dos

iBoob Apple Computer announced today that it has developed a computer chip that can store and play high fidelity music in women's breast implants. The iBoob will cost between $499 and $699, depending on the speaker size. This is considered to be a major breakthrough because women have always complained about men staring at their breasts and not listening to them.

Difference between computers and woman Unlike computers a woman will reject a 3 1/2 inch floppy.

What's the difference between a feminist and a computer? You can punch information into a computer.

I looked up from my computer and asked my son, "Have you heard of the blind cyclops brothers?" Puzzled, he replied, "Uh, no." I responded... "Neither have eye."

My manly password My wife and I were trying to set up a new password for our computer. Trying to be clever, I put "Mypenis" and my wife fell to the ground laughing hysterically because on the screen it said: **"Error. Not long enough."**

I think my neighbor is stalking me as she's been googling my name on her computer I saw it through my telescope last night.

A man walks into a library ... A man walks into a library and asks the librarian, "Do you have that new book for men with small penises?" The librarian looks on her computer and says, "I don't know if it's in yet." "Yeah that's the one!"

A computer science student... ...was writing a note to his crush before lecture. The student next to him grabbed the note. The first student tried to grab it back. “You can’t see that, it’s private!” The second student protested, “But we’re in the same class”

"I'm so sorry, my dog ate my homework." Rolling his eyes, my computer science professor shot back, "Really?! Your dog ate your coding assignment?" "Well, to be perfectly honest, it did take him a couple bytes."

I painted my computer black... thinking it would run faster but it just stopped working

Ever since I downloaded AdBlock on my computer... All the local girls in my area seem to have lost interest.

What did Stephen Hawking say when his computer crashed? Nothing.

A programmer is working on a convenience store cash register... A programmer is working on the software for a cash register computer at a convenience store. He finally thinks he got it done and tests a few items. Scans a gallon of milk: > $2.50 Perfect. How about this bag of beef jerky? > $4.99 Excellent. 20 oz soda? > $1.59 Perfect. How about this box of cigarettes? > ERROR Huh? Maybe try this can of snuff? > ERROR Shit. So he looks through the code again, making sure he checked every parenthesis and spelled every function correctly. He checks. Double checks. Triple checks. Finally, he sees the problem. It was a sin tax error.

HARLEY DAVIDSON MEETS GOD The inventor of the Harley Davidson Motorcycle Corporation, Arthur Davidson, died and went to heaven. At the gates, St. Peter told Arthur, "Since you've been such a good man and your motorcycles have changed the world, your reward is you can hang out with anyone you want in Heaven." Arthur thought about it for a minute and then said, "I want to hang out with God." St. Peter took Arthur to the Throne Room, and introduced him to God. Arthur then asked God, "Hey, aren't you the inventor of woman?" God said, "Ah, yes." "Well," said Arthur, "professional to professional, you have some major design flaws in your invention: 1. There's too much inconsistency in the front-end protrusion. 2. It chatters constantly at high speeds. 3. Most of the rear ends are too soft and wobble too much. 4. The intake is placed ! way too close to the exhaust. 5. And the maintenance costs are outrageous." "Hmmmm, you may have some good points there," replied God, "hold on." God went to his Celestial super computer, typed in a few words and waited for the results. The computer printed out a slip of paper and God read it. "Well, it may be true that my invention is flawed," God said to Arthur, "but according to these numbers, more men are riding my invention than yours."

A man goes into a pet shop to buy a parrot. The shop owner points to three identical-looking parrots on a perch and says, "The parrot on the left costs $500 dollars." "Why does the parrot cost so much?" asks the man. The owner says "Well the parrot knows how to use a computer." The man then asks about the next parrot and learns that it costs $1,000 dollars because it can do everything the first parrot can do plus it knows how to use the UNIX operating system. Naturally, the increasingly startled man asks about the third parrot, only to be told that it costs $2,000 dollars. Needless to say, this begs the question, "What can it do?" To which the owner replies, "To be honest, I have never seen it do anything, but the other two call him boss!"

How does a computer learn new things ? Bit by bit