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************************************************************************ ************************************************************************ *** *** *** *** *** NutWorks *** *** ---------- *** *** The Inter-Net Virtual Humor Magazine *** *** which says that people who are sane don't *** *** DESERVE the drugs we crazies get!! *** *** *** *** February, 1986. Issue009, (Volume II, Number 5). *** *** Brent C J Britton <Brent@Maine.BITNET> *** ************************************************************************ ************************************************************************ An invitation to all readers: ============================ NutWorks is looking for original articles on *any* topic and of humorous nature to be published in future issues of NutWorks. If you, or anyone one you know, is interested in having people from around the world read your work, please let us know! Articles may be sent to any member of the staff; please do not send articles to Csnews at Maine. The decision to publish any article will be that of the NutWorks staff, and will be based on the humorous and literary qualities of the article. Articles may be signed or unsigned. No changes will be made to any signed article -- other than formatting and/or spell checking -- without permission from the author. When you read NutWorks, the world laughs with you! ------------------------------------------------------------------------ We're sorry... =========== Some of you may have noticed that this issue of NutWorks magazine, the greatest thing to happen to computers since CP/67, was just a tad late arriving in your virtual reader. What? A month late!? Gee, we didn't think it had been *that* long. Well, what can we say? It's a new semester, we're students, we have jobs. There's just not enough time in the day sometimes. Anyhow, the staff of NutWorks magazine, the greatest thing that's happened to humor since the dribble-glass, wishes to apologize for being tardy this month. We know that it must have been hard on you. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ From the Bridge =============== Captains Log: Stardate 860210 Commander Spock Reporting. Well, it's the begining of another new semester... Being a farely knowledgable computer student I dread this time of being bombarded with incredibly philisophic questions. One of my all favorites occurred just the other day while I was working on this issue. THE QUESTION: "How do I get out of CMS ?" (Our logon enviornment is CMS) Well being determined to help a fellow student in need (UGH) I decided that a question of this magnitude and scope should be reffered to those who are more knowledgable then I. Hence, I consulted a few liaisons, the head of CUNY consulting, and a few system programmers I know to obtain the answer to this awesome question. After a bit of convincing thenmthat I was serious and truly wanted to know the answer they told me the following: 1) Type CP LOGOFF 2) Type CP 3) If you don't like CMS go get your own machine. 4) etc... Other great events here at Brooklyn College have included: 1) The day a student forgot to take the rubber band off his deck of cards and broke the card reader machine for a day and a helf. <Doesn't say much for our swift operator who didn't notice before he fed the machine the cards either...> 2) The day one student added (at the reccomendation of another student) CP LOGOFF to his logon profile. <I am not even going to bother to tell you how this one ended...> 3) Almost as bad as the above was when a student received an account with IPL CMS as his profile. 4) One of my favorites was when for some reason (still unknown to me) a student removed from his profile the line that defined his reader and sat here for hours wondering while his programs hadn't come back to him. He couldn't understand why everyone else was getting there outputs back and he wasn't. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ NutWorks News ============= 1) The NutWorks Staff wishes to extend its welcome to all readers who are returning for the Spring semester, (as well as those who never left to begin with)! Note: If you are graduating or will not have the same account this term, please drop us some mail so we can delete you from the mailing list and/ or add your new account to the mailing list. 3) (Outdated text deleted) 4) Nutworks is no longer available to BITnet users on the now defunct Forum @ Bitnic. Back issues of NutWorks *are* still available on CSNEWS at MAINE via the SENDME NUTWORKS ISSUExxx command. Usenet users can get NutWorks through Alan <xxxx@xxxxxx.xxxxxx>. For more information please consult the NutWorks Info File available in a solar system near you !!! 5) NutWorks is no longer available on SERVER at TAMCBA. 6) Some articles contained herein may have once appeared on the Humor disk, an offshoot of this magazine, which used to be a part of CSNEWS at MAINE but is no longer available. No "old" NutWorks articles will be re- printed. 7) To get yourself added to the NutWorks mailing list, just send mail to BRENT@MAINE.BITNET. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Nuts & Bolts -------------- Commentary. (Maligner tnerB Retorting.) Coming to work on an unseasonably warm Saturday morning at the beginning of a new semester was not an unpleasant duty. Until, that is, I found to my horror that there were no consultants on duty in the user area! With great dry heaves of revulsion I came to the realiza- tion that for the next sixteen hours I would be flooded with intell- ectually unfieldable inquiries from the new hackers, the novice, the uninformed, the L-User. Conversation of the weekend: --------------------------- User: My computer won't run my program. Me: It's not your computer. See this big blue box behind me? That's the computer. User: Well, the big blue box behind you won't run my program. Me: Did you type RUN? User: (Whips out set of instructions and reads from same): I typed EDIT HW1 and then INPUT and then PROGRAM HW1 (INPUT, OUTPUT); and then (* This program will take the average of... ... ... (days pass...) ... ...and then END. and then <CR> and then FILE and then RUN HW1. Me: (Waking abruptly): <CR> stands for Carriage Return! Just hit the ENTER key when- ever your instructions say <CR>! User: Uh-oh... Me: What's wrong? (The user had typed "<CR>" at the end of every line in his program.) Runner up for the stupidity award: --------------------------------- User: I can't stop my program from running!! Me: Type "HX" and hit ENTER. User: But I DID that and it still says "Running." Me: It's *supposed* to say "Running." That let's you know that the system is running, not your program. User: Ok. (Goes away briefly. Returns moments later.) Can you force me? I'm hung. Me: (Skeptically) What did you do to get hung? User: Nothing! It said "Running" and I typed "LIST", and then it said "More..." (pronounced "more dot dot dot") so I I typed "LIST" again. (User had typed "LIST" about twelve times thinking that "his computer" wanted "more"). And for an honerable mention: ---------------------------- User: Are the operator? Me: I hope so. User: Can you get my 191 back for me? Me: (Foolishly assuming that the user had a legitimate complaint and that the system might actually have disk trouble): What did the error message say? User: DASD 191 DETACHED Me: You didn't type DET 191 by any chance? User: Yes... why? (Now I know the true meaning of the word AAAARRRRRRRGGGGGHHHHH!!!) bcjb ------------------------------------------------------------------------ To Compute or Not To Compute ============================ Transcribed from "Bloom County" by Berke Breathed. The words of Oliver Wendell Jones: "To compute, or not to compute... That is the question. "Whether 'tis nobler in the memory bank To suffer the slings and circuits of outrageous functions, Or to take up arms against a sea of... transistors. Or rather, transponders... transcondu-... trans... Er.. "Oh, to hack with it." ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The Uzi vs. The Computer ======================== Yossie Silverman (Yossie @ Bitnic) The following advertisement appeared in one of the munition magazines: The Guy on the Right Doesn't Stand a Chance. The guy on the right has the Osborne 1, a fully functional computer system in a portable package the size of a briefcase. The guy on the left has an Uzi submachine gun concealed in his attache case. Also in the case are four fully loaded, 32 round clips of 125 grain 9 mm ammunition. The owner of the Uzi is going to get more tactical firepower delivered --- and delivered on target --- in less time and with less effort. All for $795. It's inevitable. If you're going up against some guy with an Osborne 1 --- or any personal computer -- he's the one whose in trouble. One round from an Uzi can zip through ten inches of solid pine wood, so you can imagine what it will do to structural foam acrylic and sheet aluminum. In fact, detachable magazines for the Uzi are available in 25-, 32-, and 40-round capacities, so you can take out an entire office full of Apple II or IBM Personal Computers tied into Ethernet or other local area networks. What about the new 16-bit computers, like the Lisa and Fortune? Even with the Winchester backup they're no match for the Uzi. One quick burst and they'll find what UNIX means. Make your commanding officer proud. Get an Uzi -- and come home a winner in the fight for office automatic weapons. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Q: How many data base people does it take to change a light bulb? A: Three: One to write the light bulb removal program, One to write the light bulb insertion program, and One to act as a light bulb administrator to make sure nobody else tries to change the light bulb at the same time. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ First Day on the Job ---------------------- The foreman is talking to the new employee... Foreman: You're really going to like it here. Every Thursday the boys go to the bar after work and get smashed out of their minds. Rookie: I don't think I'd like that; I don't drink. Foreman: Well, every Friday night after work we get together and get wasted on a pound of some of the best Columbian! Rookie: I wouldn't like that either; I don't do drugs. Foreman: Well, every Saturday evening we go down to the local house- of-ill-repute and spend the whole night. Rookie: I don't think I'd like that either. Foreman: (suspiciously) You're not gay, are ya? Rookie: No. Foreman: Then you *really* won't like what we do on Sunday night! ------------------------------------------------------------------------ BASE ADDRESS REGISTER CONCEPTS ============================== The IBM 360/50 computer knows where it is at all times. It knows this because it knows where it isn't. By subtracting where it is, from where it isn't; or where it isn't from where it is (whichever is greater), it obtains a difference, or deviation. The system uses deviations to generate corrective instruct- ions to take the computer from a storage position where it is, to a position where it isn't; arriving at the position where it wasn't, it now is. Consequently, the position where it was, is now the position where it wasn't, and it follows that the position where it was is the position where it isn't. In the event the position where it is now, is not the position where it wasn't, the system has acquired a variation, the variation being the difference between where the computer is and where it wasn't. However, the computer is sure where it isn't, and it knows where it wasn't, and by differentiating this from the algebraic difference between where it shouldn't be and where it was, it is able to obtain the difference between its deviation and its variation which is called ERROR! (Thank God IBM hired technical writers.) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ And now, a new word derived by the spellchecker in its never-ending quest to make sense of our misspellings: Defence - v. To take the fence away. "We DEFENCED the yard." ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Goofed-up Getaways Foil Crimes ================================ by Stephen Fay On the night of Nov. 24, 1974, a 26-year-old Lee man fleeing from the police facilitated his own capture by crashing into a tree. And though there's nothing so unusual about people fleeing from the police crashing into trees, most of them do so while in cars. This particular man had been on foot when he ran into the tree and knocked himself cock-eyed. Ignominious as his capture was, he at least has the consolation of knowing he is not alone. For Berkshire County appears to be something of a capital of goofed-up getaways. From the killer who telephoned the Pittsfield Fire Department (which records all calls) and pounded on the doors of sleeping neighbors asking directions to the home of his victim to the bank robbers who got caught when they got snarled in North Adams's rush-hour traffic to the lady who robbed a liquor store and fled in a taxi, Berkshire County malefactors - homegrown as well as transplants - have much to learn in the getaway department. A little research into criminal activities in the Berkshires turns up a whole gang of crooks who blew their getaways. _Stuck_in_snowbank Take the case of the 40-year-old multimillionaire who was convicted of torching his Richmond summer home one snowy, cold morning in January 1983. Not only did he increase the insurance on his $200,000 house to $400,000 shortly before the fire, but while setting a blaze in the rear bedroom he managed to touch off the fire alarm, not once but twice. At getaway time, he did not get far. His car got stuck in a snowbank near his Woodlot Road home. Firefighters responding to the alarm saw him as they rushed to the fire scene. He was charged shortly after the event. The most quickly solved bank robbery in Pittsfield's history occurred Dec. 3, 1974. A 33-year-old city resident forced his way into the West Housatonic Street branch of City Savings Bank at 9:40, 20 minutes before the bank was to open. An alert teller observed two of her colleagues approaching the door and asked the robber if she could tell the approaching "customers" that the bank wasn't open yet. The teller went to the front door and, using a codeword that meant a robbery was in progress, sent her two co-workers dashing for a phone to call police. In the meantime, the robber had gathered up $9,600 and, discovering he hadn't thought of transportation, asked one of the tellers inside the bank for the loan of a car. When police arrived, shortly after the robber departed, the teller was able to provide an exact description of the vehicle. Meanwhile, two detectives investigating a burglary at Crystal Creamery a mile away, heard the description of the car and driver and, a minute later, watched in awe as the very same car went right by them. The bank robber still had the money bag in his hand when they nabbed him a few blocks later. It was only last January that a 25-year-old North Adams woman pointed a gun at the owner of the Liquor Mart at the Artery Arcade in North Adams and scooped $320 from the cash register, half of which she dropped on the ground while leaving the store. Then she used a taxi as a getaway car. The ower of the store took down the cab's number and police quickly found the driver, who knew nothing of what his passenger was up to. Twenty minutes after the robbery, the robber was arrested at her home. _Caught_in_traffic_ "You gotta know the territory," said the man in Meredith Wilson's "The Music Man." It is advice that would have spared a visitor from Waltham considerable grief on the afternoon of - when else? - April Fools' Day, 1982. The 32-year-old bandit stuck up the South Adams Savings Bank on Route 8 in Cheshire at about 4:30 p.m. With $635 in cash stuffed into bank bags and a .22-caliber pistol in his hand, the robber roared away in his black Ford Mustang. He made the big mistake of heading north, however. A half-hour later, he got snarled in a 5 p.m. rush-hour traffic jam on State Street in North Adams. The police closed in and he gave in. The Indiana Jones award goes to the 25-year-old North Adams man who broke into a woman's apartment in March 1983. The woman kicked him and ran shouting out the door. The attacker jumped out the window, perhaps forgetting he was on the second floor. He broke his left ankle, which was still in its cast during the trial three months later. Then there were the two men charged with the Feb. 13, 1979, killing of a Pittsfield man. The victim lived on Hungerford Street, a rather hard-to-find road off West Housatonic Street. At their trial, it became evident that the two defendants were themselves victims - of a profound lack of planning. It seems, first of all, that they did not know where Hungerford Street was. So one of them called the Pittsfield Fire Department to ask directions, unaware that his call, like all calls to the department, was recorded. Then, in the wee hours of the morning, the two wandered around West Pittsfield, banging on the doors of sleepers, asking where Hungerford Street was. The fire dispatcher and several of the awakened neighbors were to testify at the trial. One of the men - the gunman - was found guilty of the killing, the other was let off. _Dropped_money_ That North Adams liquor store bandit who dropped half her take brings to mind the case of the unluck crook who didn't get what he ordered at the old Majestic Restaurant in Pittsfield. The case goes back to Jan. 22, 1974. An armed robber wearing a ski mask grabbed the cash box from behind the bar of a North Street eatery. But the gray metal box wasn't latched. It fell open and all the money fell on the floor behind the bar. The crook headed for the door, still hanging onto the empty money box, and took a blast of tear gas in the face from a little aerosol can brandished by the owner. Perhaps the most inept attempt to commit a crime was illustrated by one Adams man. The individual in question, age 23, tried to extort exactly $7,045 from A.H. Rice Co. of Pittsfield. The money demand, written on a piece of Howard Johnson's guest stationery, was accompanied by a bomb threat. The extortionist demanded that the sum be sent to his home on Burt Street in Adams. Cleverly, he thought, in order to throw authorities off, the extortionist said the people at that address knew nothing of the plot. "It reminds me," his lawyer, George B. Crane, told the judge, "of the old saw about the kidnapper sending the kid home with the ransom note." ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Cursed Baby Crib ------------------ Dick and Jane were expecting their first child, so they went down to buy a crib. After looking at all the different models, they decided on one sitting in the corner with no price tag on it. So they asked the salesman how much it was. He replied, "You don't want that one, it's cursed. As soon as you put the baby in it, the baby will die. Three seconds later, the mother will die. And three seconds later, the father will die." Well, Dick and Jane just loved the crib, and they thought the salesman was merely trying to jack up the price or some- thing, so, after much haggling, they bought it. A couple of weeks later, little Johnny was born. They brought him home from the hospital. Jane was so happy. Dick proudly watched as his wife put Johnny into the crib. Johnny said, "ack oop", and died. Then Dick saw his wife collapse onto the floor in a lifeless heap. Terrified, he ran out of the house and killed himself tripping over the dead milkman. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ A long time ago, on a node far, far away (from ucbvax) a great Adventure (game?) took place... XXXXX XXXXXX XXXX X X XX XXXXX XXXX X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X XXXXX X X X X X X X XXXX X X X X X X XX X XXXXXX XXXXX X X X X X X X XX XX X X X X X X XXXXX XXXXXX XXXX X X X X X X XXXX X It is a period of system war. User programs striking from a hidden directory, have won their first victory against the evil Administrative Empire. During the battle, User spies managed to steal secret source code to the Empire's ultimate program: The Are-Em Star, a privileged root program with enough power to destroy an entire file structure. Pursued by the Empire's sinister audit trail, Princess Linker races aboard her shell script, custodian of the stolen listings that could save her people, and restore freedom and games to the network... ------------------------------------------------------------- THE CONTINUING SAGA OF THE ADVENTURES OF LUKE VAXHACKER ------------------------------------------------------------- <<stoping the garbage collector from realocating them all>> ------------------------------------------------------------- Luke noticed an unused handler lying around and jumped to it. The others followed and were soon able to execute an escape sequence. Trashing some of its relocation registers caused a frame fault. He started working his way back up the return stack when he was road blocked by Dec Vadic who stood with his bytesaber active. "At last we will see who the real file master is" he remarked, bits, bytes, words, and nybbles, flew as the two fought for bus mastership. PDP-1 exclaimed "You were my best subtask! How could you have been seduced by the sideband portion of the carrier?". "It's simple," Vadic said, "I enjoy obscure protocol". While the battle continued, Luke, Con, Bookie, and the Princess linked up with the droids and found their way back to the inode where the Milliamp Falcon was stored. It looked quiet, "But,", Luke said "It could be an MMU trap.". "No chance", said Con, "I loaded the par's before I left the Falcon." As they started toward it a squad of recursive functions swapped in and started firing ROM blasters at them. "Thought you said it couldn't be a trap" quipped Luke "I said no chance for an MMU trap this is obviously a k-mon--f-trap-to 4" Con replied. PDP-1 shouted at the others "Escape while you can! I'll cause wait states as long as possible!" and with that he allowed Vadic a chance to apply several hits with the bytesaber. Instead of halting, PDP-1 was encoded onto the carrier. The Milliamp Falcon was restarted and managed to escape the shell. "Quickly!" shouted Con, "We've got to warp into virtual space!" The Bookie made several attempts, but it was obvious that a CE had not done PM in a long time and it would take a lot of decimal adjusts to byte align all the data registers. After much debugging, virtual space was finally achieved. "Do you know the path?" asked Princess LPA0. "No sweat" said Con "All we have to do is check the free space map". ------------------------------------------------------------- <<rest of star wars, especially the dog fight>> <<begining of empire strikes back, especially the battle ..>> ------------------------------------------------------------- Some months later... Luke was feeling rather bored. 3CPU could get to be rather irritating and RS232 didn't really speak Luke's language. Suddenly, Luke felt someone's eyes boring through the back of his skull. He turned slowly to see...nothing. A quiet voice came from somewhere in front of him. "Grasshopper, the carrier is strong within you." Luke froze, which was a good thing since his legs were insisting that he run but they weren't likely to be particular about direction. Luke guessed that his odds of getting lost in the dense tree structures were pretty good. Unfortunately, the Bookie wasn't available. "Yes. Very strong, but the modulation is yet weak. His network interface is undeveloped," the voice continued. A small furry creature walked out of the woods as Luke stared on. Luke's stomach had now joined the rest of his body in loud complaints. Whatever was peering at him was certainly small and furry, but Luke was quite sure that it didn't come from Alpha Centauri. "Well, well," said the creature as it rolled its eyes at Luke. "Frobozz, y'know. Morning, name's Modem. What's your game? Adventure? D&D? Or are you just one of those Apple - pong types that hang around the store demonstrations?" Luke closed his eyes. Perhaps, if he couldn't see it, it wouldn't notice him. "H'mm," muttered the creature. "Must use a different protocol. @@@H @@ @($@@@H }"@G$ @#@@G'(o% @@@@@%%H(b ?" "No, no!," stammered Luke. "I don't speak EBCDIC. I was sent here to become a UNIX wizard. Must have the wrong address." "Right address," said the creature. "I am a UNIX wizard. Device drivers a specialty. Or do you prefer playing with virtual memory?" Luke eyed the creature cautiously. If this was what happened to system wizards after years of late night crashes, Luke wasn't sure he wanted anything to do with it. He felt a strange affection for the familiar micro- computers of his home. And wasn't virtual memory something that you got from drinking too much Coke? ------------------------------------------------------------- << rest of empire strikes back, especially getting to the user haven, a directory unconnected to /. >> ------------------------------------------------------------- << Return of the Jedi, if and when ... >> ------------------------------------------------------------- The preceding was written by a number of people, working piecemeal. Additions should be posted to the net. Here at Case, we think the little incons- istancies just add a little charm. Please note that the unsigned stuff enclosed in <<...>>'s is by Barak Pearlmutter (thats me) while the stuff enc- losed in <<...>>'s signed " -Ed." is by ...!stolaf! borman. May the Carrier be with you, Barak Pearlmutter decvax!cwruecmp!pearlmut Actually, if you do come up with additions, mail them to GAMES. The Grand Wizard. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ February, 1986. Issue009, (Volume II, Number 5).