Unix Fortunes

• Duct tape is like the force. It has a light side, and a dark side, and it holds the universe together ...
  -- Carl Zwanzig
• Pound for pound, the amoeba is the most vicious animal on earth.
• Mistakes are often the stepping stones to utter failure.
• At the source of every error which is blamed on the computer you will find at least two human errors, including the error of blaming it on the computer.
• "Two sure ways to tell a sexy male; the first is, he has a bad memory. I forget the second."
• Money is the root of all evil, and man needs roots
• A master was explaining the nature of Tao to one of his novices. "The Tao is embodied in all software -- regardless of how insignificant," said the master.
  
  "Is Tao in a hand-held calculator?" asked the novice.
  
  "It is," came the reply.
  
  "Is the Tao in a video game?" continued the novice.
  
  "It is even in a video game," said the master.
  
  "And is the Tao in the DOS for a personal computer?"
  
  The master coughed and shifted his position slightly. "The lesson is over for today," he said.
  
  -- "The Tao of Programming"
• The misnaming of fields of study is so common as to lead to what might be general systems laws. For example, Frank Harary once suggested the law that any field that had the word "science" in its name was guaranteed thereby not to be a science. He would cite as examples Military Science, Library Science, Political Science, Homemaking Science, Social Science, and Computer Science. Discuss the generality of this law, and possible reasons for its predictive power.
  -- Gerald Weinberg, "An Introduction to General Systems Thinking."
  
• Man is the only animal that can remain on friendly terms with the victims he intends to eat until he eats them.
  -- Samuel Butler
• As far as we know, our computer has never had an undetected error.
  -- Weisert
• One day the King decided that he would force all his subjects to tell the truth. A gallows was erected in front of the city gates. A herald announced, "Whoever would enter the city must first answer the truth to a question which will be put to him." Nasrudin was first in line. The captain of the guard asked him, "Where are you going? Tell the truth -- the alternative is death by hanging." "I am going," said Nasrudin, "to be hanged on that gallows." "I don't believe you." "Very well, if I have told a lie, then hang me!" "But that would make it the truth!" "Exactly," said Nasrudin, "your truth."
• "In order to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first create the universe."
  -- Carl Sagan, Cosmos
• Ray's Rule of Precision: Measure with a micrometer. Mark with chalk. Cut with an axe.
• Trying to be happy is like trying to build a machine for which the only specification is that it should run noiselessly.
• Get GUMMed
  --- ------ The Gurus of Unix Meeting of Minds (GUMM) takes place Wednesday, April 1, 2076 (check THAT in your perpetual calendar program), 14 feet above the ground directly in front of the Milpitas Gumps. Members will grep each other by the hand (after intro), yacc a lot, smoke filtered chroots in pipes, chown with forks, use the wc (unless uuclean), fseek nice zombie processes, strip, and sleep, but not, we hope, od. Three days will be devoted to discussion of the ramifications of whodo. Two seconds have been allotted for a complete rundown of all the user- friendly features of Unix. Seminars include "Everything You Know is Wrong", led by Tom Kempson, "Batman or Cat:man?" led by Richie Dennis "cc C? Si! Si!" led by Kerwin Bernighan, and "Document Unix, Are You Kidding?" led by Jan Yeats. No Reader Service No. is necessary because all GUGUs (Gurus of Unix Group of Users) already know everything we could tell them.
  -- Dr. Dobb's Journal, June '84
• "I went to a job interview the other day, the guy asked me if I had any questions , I said yes, just one, if you're in a car traveling at the speed of light and you turn your headlights on, does anything happen?
  He said he couldn't answer that, I told him sorry, but I couldn't work for him then.
  -- Steven Wright
• Experience is what causes a person to make new mistakes instead of old ones.
• Never put off until tomorrow what you can do today. There might be a law against it by that time.
• I do hate sums. There is no greater mistake than to call arithmetic an exact science. There are permutations and aberrations discernible to minds entirely noble like mine; subtle variations which ordinary accountants fail to discover; hidden laws of number which it requires a mind like mine to perceive. For instance, if you add a sum from the bottom up, and then again from the top down, the result is always different.
  -- Mrs. La Touche (19th cent.)
• ACHTUNG!!! Das machine is nicht fur gefingerpoken und mittengrabben. Ist easy schnappen der springenwerk, blowenfusen und corkenpoppen mit spitzensparken. Ist nicht fur gewerken by das dummkopfen. Das rubbernecken sightseeren keepen hands in das pockets. Relaxen und vatch das blinkenlights!!!

Schneider Lab
origin: 2004 March 22
updated: 2006 Sep 06