We (team) used to own a computer lab of around 100 machines. That lab was a small 300sqft room with access given only to a few select people. It had two air-conditioners (AC) set to 18 deg Celsius. It used to be really cold and chilly in there.
Whenever I went into the lab I used to turn off one of the ACs so that I would work there without freezing myself. I used to turn the AC back on when leaving the lab.
One evening me and Wally completed some work in the lab and just as we were stepping out of the lab the boss was entering it. We ignored him a usual and didn't start any conversation. Me and Wally then went to the cafeteria to have some snacks and tea. As we were having tea the boss came in to the cafeteria and he joined me and Wally on the snacks table. We were trying our best to ignore him and were talking on topics which will be of least interest to the boss like football etc. As usual the boss had an opinion and he made sure he said it aloud no matter how dumb it may sound to others. Finally the boss was done with his 2nd and 3rd and 4th servings of snacks and we moved to our work area.
As we went near our desk we saw the "big boss" (Boss's boss) standing next to the lab door. He called Wally into the lab.
Big Boss: Come in the lab
Wally: Why is it so hot in here?
Big Boss: Did u turn off the AC ?
Wally: Me and Dilbert left the lab about 30 mins back but we made sure both the ACs were on when leaving..
Big Boss: Then who turned the ACs off?!!!
Wally: Boss entered the lab after us. You should ask him!
Big boss called the Boss into the lab
Boss: (as he entered the lab) it’s so hot here.
Big Boss: Did u turn the AC off?
Boss: Heen ... see... Dilbert has this habit of turning one of the ACs off when working in the lab
Dilbert: Hey! I always turn it on when leaving
Boss: Heen... I think I forgot to turn it on!
I had a habit to turn off only one of the ACs and the boss turned off both of them!!! and then he forgot to start them when leaving the lab ! For 30 mins the lab was without AC and all the 100 machines running it became a preheated oven!!
That day out big boss put up a scotch tape on the AC control box saying.. "ACs need to be kept on all the time.. If you want to turn off the AC contact Big Boss (His name and extension number). It’s a different matter that the scotch tape lost its adhesive in about 2 days :)
Me and Wally continued to turn the AC off when were working in the lab without giving a damn to our Big Boss's orders. However even today the Boss doesn’t dare turn touch those AC switches !
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Friday, April 3, 2009
Connecting to internet
My company was generous enough to give me a reliance data card, so that I can work from home. Somehow the request for similar data card by our boss was turned down by his boss.
After a few days I got my broadband, and so there was no reason I should use the slowwww data card. So, I asked the BOSS if he wanted it? He was very happy and readily took that.
The life isn't simple, when you have an idiot as your boss. I had to install the software on his machine and make the data card working. (Yup, he cant do that)
*********************After a couple of days, he told me that the data card wasnt working at all. It was not getting conected to internet. I checked it and it indeed wasnt connecting.
So I dared call the Reliance call center and the female told me that the connection should be working fine. Then she made me run through numerous checks and none of them solved the problem. Finally she (and me too) gave up.
After a while I started the research and this is what I found ::
Any datacard while connecting to internet, dials a specific number for that ISP, which is set by default when you install the software. This guy went inside the setup at some point and changed the dialling number to his own cell number. So everytime we were trying to dial the internet the call was actually going to his centuries old cellphone with all numbers worn out and screen broken. And as his 3310 wasnt the ISP server the connection wasnt getting established.. Funny huh?
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Compilation error...
If you are a developer and your code is not working / doing wierd things, you like to know upto what point it works properly. For that the most popular way is to put print statements in between the code. Isnt that what you do often?
Well, our boss had some problem with some code, so he went to Tina, and asked her to see whats going wrong. To find, where it is going wrong Tina added a print statement like this @ line 39....
34 $response=;
35 chomp $response; #print"You entered $response\n\n";
36 unless($response eq "Yes" $response eq "Y" $response eq "y") { next; }
37 $line=~ /^(\d*),.*/; $id=$1;
38 $cmd = "c:\\PROGRA~1\\DEBUGG~1\\symstore.exe del /i ${id} /s $thedir";
39 print "Now I am at line 38";
On seeing this the boss started screaming, "wait wait what are you doing?"
"The code is going to crash, it would throw compilation error..."
She was shocked to see that the boss knows things technically and so started to see what wrong she did in the code. She didnt find any mistake. So she asked,"Whats wrong, Boss?"
He said, "ये तुमने क्या किया ? तुम लाइन ३९ पे लिखते हो 'इ ऍम अत लाइन ३८' , फ़िर कोड तो compilation error देगा ना । "
Arent we lucky to have this free entertainment ?
She never wanted to educate the boss, so she said "Ohh ya.. thanks for bringing it before we compiled" and then changed the line as:
39 print "Now I am at line 39";
And he was really happy.
Well, our boss had some problem with some code, so he went to Tina, and asked her to see whats going wrong. To find, where it is going wrong Tina added a print statement like this @ line 39....
34 $response=
35 chomp $response; #print"You entered $response\n\n";
36 unless($response eq "Yes" $response eq "Y" $response eq "y") { next; }
37 $line=~ /^(\d*),.*/; $id=$1;
38 $cmd = "c:\\PROGRA~1\\DEBUGG~1\\symstore.exe del /i ${id} /s $thedir";
39 print "Now I am at line 38";
On seeing this the boss started screaming, "wait wait what are you doing?"
"The code is going to crash, it would throw compilation error..."
She was shocked to see that the boss knows things technically and so started to see what wrong she did in the code. She didnt find any mistake. So she asked,"Whats wrong, Boss?"
He said, "ये तुमने क्या किया ? तुम लाइन ३९ पे लिखते हो 'इ ऍम अत लाइन ३८' , फ़िर कोड तो compilation error देगा ना । "
Arent we lucky to have this free entertainment ?
She never wanted to educate the boss, so she said "Ohh ya.. thanks for bringing it before we compiled" and then changed the line as:
39 print "Now I am at line 39";
And he was really happy.
Friday, June 13, 2008
Laptop screen brightness
I was in a meeting room with the Boss. During the course of the discussion, I told him that instead of giving verbal explaination it would be better if I can show a demo. He handed over me his laptop and pulled a chair besides me.
I connected to my machine via Remote desktop and started showing him a demo of our new project. After 2 mins I noticed that he is not able to grasp the idea, here is the conversation
Dilbert: Boss what happened.. is there any problem?
Boss: Yes.. actually I am not able to see the items clearly.
Dilbert: (Angled the laptop towards the boss) Is it okay now?
Boss: No actually there is a lot of glare from the window I am not able to see the screen clearly
Dilbert: Ok then lets sit facing the wall instead of the window so that there is no glare
Boss: Well actually हमारे बच्चे ने उस दिन कुछ keys दबाये | उस टाइम से ये screen एकदम काला हो गया है हें |
Dilbert: मतलब ?
Boss: ये देखो ना सब काला काला दिखता है
Dilbert: (Ohhh ! so you you don't know how to increase the screen brightness??? !!!) Ok wait a sec
Dilbert: (Fn+Home to increase brightness) Ok does it look bright now ?
Boss: Waaw !
My boss was working with a dull screen for a lot of days b'ca he didn't know how to increase the screen brightness !!!
I connected to my machine via Remote desktop and started showing him a demo of our new project. After 2 mins I noticed that he is not able to grasp the idea, here is the conversation
Dilbert: Boss what happened.. is there any problem?
Boss: Yes.. actually I am not able to see the items clearly.
Dilbert: (Angled the laptop towards the boss) Is it okay now?
Boss: No actually there is a lot of glare from the window I am not able to see the screen clearly
Dilbert: Ok then lets sit facing the wall instead of the window so that there is no glare
Boss: Well actually हमारे बच्चे ने उस दिन कुछ keys दबाये | उस टाइम से ये screen एकदम काला हो गया है हें |
Dilbert: मतलब ?
Boss: ये देखो ना सब काला काला दिखता है
Dilbert: (Ohhh ! so you you don't know how to increase the screen brightness??? !!!) Ok wait a sec
Dilbert: (Fn+Home to increase brightness) Ok does it look bright now ?
Boss: Waaw !
My boss was working with a dull screen for a lot of days b'ca he didn't know how to increase the screen brightness !!!
Thursday, June 12, 2008
Wren & Martin read this !
An informal chat between me and my boss....
Alice: So, how is your son?
Boss: Ya she has become very naughty.
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
How to RDC to a machine ?
The boss wanted to open a RDC (Remote Desktop Connection) to a computer named thisismymachine
Here is how he attempted it
Start->Run->thisismymachine
Waaw... so he was expecting windows to be smart and rdc to the machine by just typing the name in the Run dialog !!
This was the error
Well he did make some really funny gestures at this point, unfortunately I can't put it here...
Here is how he attempted it
Start->Run->thisismymachine
Waaw... so he was expecting windows to be smart and rdc to the machine by just typing the name in the Run dialog !!
This was the error
Well he did make some really funny gestures at this point, unfortunately I can't put it here...
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
IE6-Firefox-Mozilla HTML rendering issues
This is in continuation to the research project post
The boss finally got IIS up and running after 2-3 months of research. Well let me put it this way, he toiled hard to set it up for 2-3 months, then one fine he gave up and asked Asok to see why is it not working. Asok cleared the mess in a few minutes and bingo !! the website showed a IIS default page !!! The boss finally had a website running ! :)
Next day the Boss started working on a new HTML page [the default page of the website]. He added a few lines of text and a few hyper links [this took him about a week]
The Boss now wanted to see how the page looks on different browsers! Mind you this was not a page full of Java scripts and jazzy AJAX stuff; It was a simple HTML page with a few headers and hyper-links. Also, the target audience for the web page was about 100 internal users. However the Boss has loads of free time !
He checked how the stuff looks on IE 6 [its the default browser on his machine].
I always use Firefox [and he doesn't know how to install it] so he came to my desk and asked me to hit the website URL. Yukksss !!! what an ugly page !!! and an icing on the cake... at the top of the page there was this dirty heading text with green highlight.
[My mistake, I shouldn't have expected the Boss to have an aesthetic sense. ]
IE6 and Firefox done, he now wanted to test it on Mozilla. He went in our secured server room hunting for a Linux machine which had Mozilla installed. [The easier way would have been to install Mozilla either on his desktop or on an existing Linux machine; Again, he has the luxury of infinite time.]. After 2-3 hours of desparate search mission he had his hands on a Linux box with Mozilla pre-installed [It was a Debian PPC 64 machine, but don't remember it for sure]
It was 5:30 - 6 pm. I was in the server lab doing some installation on a new windows box. He came in and started working on his new found linux box. [I was observing all the activities he was doing :)]. He started the Mozilla, and typed the website URL. [Yuuks I had the sight of that web page again!! ]. For next 2 minutes he kept staring at the monitor. He went out of the lab to to his desk and came in again. He closed Mozilla, restarted it and again hit the same page. Once again he seemed very annoyed with what he was seeing. He made 2-3 trips to his desk and back into the lab.
[I knew he was confused about something, and I was more than sure I am about to hit a jackpot of "technical jokes" so I walked up to him]
Dilbert: Boss what's the matter ?
Boss: Strage heen.. I am curious to know why the web page is showing up like this in Mozilla ?
Dilbert: (Had a look at the monitor) Yes I can see every thing is looking very ugly
Boss: Yes.. but it looks good in IE6. Just now, I checked it 2-3 times from my desk
Dilbert:(I think it looks ugly in any browser) Ok.
Dilbert knew the problem but acted innocent .. so the conversation continued
Boss: See in Mozilla everything looks so big...
Dilbert: (To add more confusion) Yeh.. I can see... may be its the monitor size?
Boss: yes may be but my desk monitor is 19" and this one is 17". I wonder why the 17" monitor is showing bigger text than the 19" one.
Dilbert: Hmm... really strange !!
The boss then went to his desk and searched the web [I don't know for how many days] to see why Mozilla displays text DOUBLE the size of Firefox and IE6. For the next few days he kept broadcasting the newly discovered phenomenon "Mozilla shows bigger text than IE6 and Firefox".
So all you readers want to know why the text on Linux-Mozilla was insanely bigger than IE6 ??
Guess what ? the screen resolution on Boss's desktop machine is set to 1280 x 1024 and that on the Linux machine in the lab is set to 640 x 480. Isn't it only logical that everything will show up double the size ?
ROFL !!
The boss finally got IIS up and running after 2-3 months of research. Well let me put it this way, he toiled hard to set it up for 2-3 months, then one fine he gave up and asked Asok to see why is it not working. Asok cleared the mess in a few minutes and bingo !! the website showed a IIS default page !!! The boss finally had a website running ! :)
Next day the Boss started working on a new HTML page [the default page of the website]. He added a few lines of text and a few hyper links [this took him about a week]
The Boss now wanted to see how the page looks on different browsers! Mind you this was not a page full of Java scripts and jazzy AJAX stuff; It was a simple HTML page with a few headers and hyper-links. Also, the target audience for the web page was about 100 internal users. However the Boss has loads of free time !
He checked how the stuff looks on IE 6 [its the default browser on his machine].
I always use Firefox [and he doesn't know how to install it] so he came to my desk and asked me to hit the website URL. Yukksss !!! what an ugly page !!! and an icing on the cake... at the top of the page there was this dirty heading text with green highlight.
[My mistake, I shouldn't have expected the Boss to have an aesthetic sense. ]
IE6 and Firefox done, he now wanted to test it on Mozilla. He went in our secured server room hunting for a Linux machine which had Mozilla installed. [The easier way would have been to install Mozilla either on his desktop or on an existing Linux machine; Again, he has the luxury of infinite time.]. After 2-3 hours of desparate search mission he had his hands on a Linux box with Mozilla pre-installed [It was a Debian PPC 64 machine, but don't remember it for sure]
It was 5:30 - 6 pm. I was in the server lab doing some installation on a new windows box. He came in and started working on his new found linux box. [I was observing all the activities he was doing :)]. He started the Mozilla, and typed the website URL. [Yuuks I had the sight of that web page again!! ]. For next 2 minutes he kept staring at the monitor. He went out of the lab to to his desk and came in again. He closed Mozilla, restarted it and again hit the same page. Once again he seemed very annoyed with what he was seeing. He made 2-3 trips to his desk and back into the lab.
[I knew he was confused about something, and I was more than sure I am about to hit a jackpot of "technical jokes" so I walked up to him]
Dilbert: Boss what's the matter ?
Boss: Strage heen.. I am curious to know why the web page is showing up like this in Mozilla ?
Dilbert: (Had a look at the monitor) Yes I can see every thing is looking very ugly
Boss: Yes.. but it looks good in IE6. Just now, I checked it 2-3 times from my desk
Dilbert:(I think it looks ugly in any browser) Ok.
Dilbert knew the problem but acted innocent .. so the conversation continued
Boss: See in Mozilla everything looks so big...
Dilbert: (To add more confusion) Yeh.. I can see... may be its the monitor size?
Boss: yes may be but my desk monitor is 19" and this one is 17". I wonder why the 17" monitor is showing bigger text than the 19" one.
Dilbert: Hmm... really strange !!
The boss then went to his desk and searched the web [I don't know for how many days] to see why Mozilla displays text DOUBLE the size of Firefox and IE6. For the next few days he kept broadcasting the newly discovered phenomenon "Mozilla shows bigger text than IE6 and Firefox".
So all you readers want to know why the text on Linux-Mozilla was insanely bigger than IE6 ??
Guess what ? the screen resolution on Boss's desktop machine is set to 1280 x 1024 and that on the Linux machine in the lab is set to 640 x 480. Isn't it only logical that everything will show up double the size ?
ROFL !!
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