PsL Monthly 1993 December/PSL Monthly Shareware CD-ROM (December 1993).iso/prgmming/dos/basic/pbtool.exe/REALPROG.TXT

Text File | 1991-06-10 | 7.3 KB | 121 lines

       ┌───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
       │ Filename: Realprog.txt        Subject: Real Programmers!  │
       │ Portions of this file were taken from a Univac mainframe  │
       │ text file circa 1983-86 (from my memory & other sources). │
       │             supplied by : Andy Kellett   June 1991        │
       └───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

     In this day and age of applications generators, windowed operating
     systems, and REALLY SCAREY licensing agreements, your typical
     programmer is seen by management as just another employee.  There
     was a time, not too many years ago, when programming required a
     special breed far, far removed from the walk (and paycheck) of
     any other employee in the organization.  The entire profitability
     picture could hinge on his/her deft software caresses at 4:30am
     during a crucial month-end!  Let us turn once again to the
     golden rules which made up the:
                        R E A L    P R O G R A M M E R
                     ( also known by the trade name: R.P. )

     1.  Real programmers never ate quiche.  In fact, they rarely ate
         normal human food at all, mainly surviving on (brace yourself)
         VENDING MACHINE FOOD.
     2.  Real programmers never drank spring/mineral water.  In fact
         they used water for only two purposes:  1) Washing cruddy
         things out of their eyes after an all-night system software
         debugging session, and  2) As a minor ingredient in making coffee
         (the major ingredient being coffee grounds).
     3.  Real programmers never followed normal working hours.  Sometimes
         this meant they came in whenever they felt like it and left
         whenever they wanted to, especially after saving the company
         and/or D.P. managers hide.  Usually this flexible work schedule
         meant coming in at 5 am or leaving at 9 pm because some poor
         user or technician needed them to do some crucial software magic.
         Of course, this ignores all the midnight to 6 am calls which
         might/might not require a visit back to work.
     4.  Real programmers never drink anything without a high concentration
         of caffeine.  Jolt and REAL Coke are the preferred drinks when
         a temperature reduction is required.  Vending machine coffee,
         (also known by the scientific name of BROWN37) is taken straight
         (sometimes with large doses of sugar for imminent deadlines).
         If the vending machine was broken (and the Real Programmer couldn't
         fix it him/herself), he/she actually made their own coffee!
         We have sworn testimony by actual eye witnesses (on two occasions)
         who saw R.P.s making actual coffee, or at least a drinkable dark
         brown sludge.
     5.  Real programmers never used help screens.  Mainly because they
         weren't available and if they were guess who wrote them!
         They never used the help section of any manual and in general
         never used a manual either.  After all, if you're the highest
         guru of known and unknown programming secrets, why look like a
         schmuck digging for help in a manual.
     6.  Real programmers never dressed for success.  In fact, they wore
         whatever was handy.  Ties were usually stuffed into a desk drawer
         and were tied with odd looking knots when they were worn (increasing
         the chances that management would not make ties mandatory for
         R.P.s).  Sometimes lug-soled hiking boots were worn due to the
         fact that you could never tell when a mountain would suddenly spring
         up in the computer room, requiring a hike from the tape drives to
         the console.


                            Real Programmers            page 02 or 00000010


     7.  Real programmers rarely had degrees in Computer Science or
         Information Systems.  Although some had no degrees, most never
         mentioned ever having a degree.  After all, if their skills
         were learned in college, how indespensible could they be?
         Most shied away from any conventional training other than
         "throw me on the system/language/compiler for a few 30 hour
         days and I'll be up to speed".
     8.  Real programmers never programmed in high-level languages.
         COBOL, Pascal, BASIC, (etc) were for wimpy programmers who
         didn't know that, unlike assembler, these languages actually
         SHIELDED you from those last few ounces of the computers
         capabilities.  Although some R.P.s actually migrated to
         the C language, this can be directly traced to using mineral
         water for brewing their coffee (ie induced genetic alteration).
     9.  Real programmers rarely used the computer as a debugging aid.
         R.P.s knew that the computer was nothing more than the Silicon
         Beast.  Like lion tamers, those who cracked the whips would
         not allow themselves to ever be at the other end.
    10.  Real programmers rarely commented their code.  If you couldn't
         understand what the program did from the source listing or a
         hexadecimal dump, you just couldn't understand it, period.
         There is a logical sub-rule to this one:  If it was hard to
         write, it should be hard to read too!  Those who adapted this
         sub-rule were also some of the first to try systems-level
         work in C.
    11.  Real programmers, like world class brain surgeons, don't
         get long vacations.  If they can do without a R.P. for
         three weeks, they don't need one anyway.  Even three-days-
         plus-the-weekend should leave the management squirming.
    12.  Real programmers don't get their hair DONE -- it gets cut.
         Female R.P.s (yes, there were plenty) don't get their nails
         done, either.  Also you could never tell when a female R.P.
         was suffering from PMS : the generally superior, crabby attitude
         of male/female R.P.s made detecting such minor nuances too
         hard for mere mortals.
    13.  Real programmers never had normal ways to occupy their spare
         time (which was infrequent).  R.P.s considered sports only as
         something to watch on TV, if they considered sports at all.
         Testing batteries and watching concrete set were near-standard
         hobbies for many.
    14.  Real programmers rarely used the base ten numbering system.
         Since R.P.s acquired the ability to convert between binary,
         hexadecimal, and octal in their head (from numbing months of
         practice forced by outdated compilers/assemblers/operating
         systems) this was another chasm dividing R.P.s from the
         human race (now you know where the initial idea for the
         Vulcan race came from...).

    Epiloge:  I once worked with one of the few remaining R.P.s in the
         world.  As a fellow programmer said of him, "he could alter
         the bits on the disk platter itself with his teeth if needed,
         and at 3600 rpm to boot".  Although J.T. is now retired, I'm
         sure he occasionally gets up in the middle of the night just
         to think about what problems they are having in the computer
         room.