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  fortune index  all fortunes 
  
 |  |  | #1761 |  | <<<<< EVACUATION ROUTE <<<<< 
 |  |  |  | #1762 |  | Even bytes get lonely for a little bit. 
 |  |  |  | #1763 |  | Ever wondered about the origins of the term "bugs" as applied to computer technology?  U.S. Navy Capt. Grace Murray Hopper has firsthand explanation.
 The 74-year-old captain, who is still on active duty, was a pioneer in
 computer technology during World War II.  At the C.W. Post Center of Long
 Island University, Hopper told a group of Long Island public school adminis-
 trators that the first computer "bug" was a real bug--a moth.  At Harvard
 one August night in 1945, Hopper and her associates were working on the
 "granddaddy" of modern computers, the Mark I.  "Things were going badly;
 there was something wrong in one of the circuits of the long glass-enclosed
 computer," she said.  "Finally, someone located the trouble spot and, using
 ordinary tweezers, removed the problem, a two-inch moth.  From then on, when
 anything went wrong with a computer, we said it had bugs in it."  Hopper
 said that when the veracity of her story was questioned recently, "I referred
 them to my 1945 log book, now in the collection of the Naval Surface Weapons
 Center, and they found the remains of that moth taped to the page in
 question."
 [actually, the term "bug" had even earlier usage in
 regard to problems with radio hardware.  Ed.]
 
 |  |  |  | #1764 |  | "Every group has a couple of experts.  And every group has at least one idiot.  Thus are balance and harmony (and discord) maintained.  It's
 sometimes hard to remember this in the bulk of the flamewars that all
 of the hassle and pain is generally caused by one or two highly-motivated,
 caustic twits."
 -- Chuq Von Rospach, about Usenet
 
 |  |  |  | #1765 |  | Every program has at least one bug and can be shortened by at least one instruction -- from which, by induction, one can deduce that every
 program can be reduced to one instruction which doesn't work.
 
 |  |  |  | #1766 |  | Every program is a part of some other program, and rarely fits. 
 |  |  |  | #1767 |  | Every Solidarity center had piles and piles of paper ... everyone was eating paper and a policeman was at the door.  Now all you have to do is
 bend a disk.
 -- A member of the outlawed Polish trade union, Solidarity,
 commenting on the benefits of using computers in support
 of their movement.
 
 |  |  |  | #1768 |  | Everybody needs a little love sometime; stop hacking and fall in love! 
 |  |  |  | #1769 |  | Everyone can be taught to sculpt: Michelangelo would have had to be taught how ___not to.  So it is with the great programmers.
 
 |  |  |  | #1770 |  | Evolution is a million line computer program falling into place by accident. 
 |  |  |  |  |  |   ...            ...   | 
 
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