Posts by Boris the Cockroach

Please touch

this switch

We had the opposite problem.....

When newbies start with us, they are given the talk "This button shuts everything off, this button starts everything.... if you have a problem hit the stop button and we'll sort it out"

So I retire to the office to do some important work (reading BoFH stories in el-reg most likely) and all is good for hour or 2.. until the noise starts..and continues....

So I'm out of the chair... down the stairs , across the unit to the offending machine and wham the stop button.... and our newbie is just standing there going "Is it suppossed to make that noise?"

Icon... for how I feel most days...

I'd have loved to

make the switch from bashing bit of metal with keyboards to just bashing keyboards

Sadly my Z80 assembler experience including designing programs to be multi-tasking via interupts(you try making sure everything gets done in 1/64th of a second before the next interupt arrives..) plus Open university qualifications in concurrent systems design(comes in handy when usings the old cells with the add on robots that need sync signals going back and forth to make sure everything works as planned and does'nt result in a big mangled mess of metal) and a fair amount of Java programming(including analysis of the RS 232 signals from the machines) didnt count for shit when I tried to swap careers aged 40.

I was'nt aged 22-24 with a still wet degree and 2 years experience in a 6 month old technology therefore I was not suitable for the position........ so the career change never happens and that £25/hr job(with no oily robots to cope with) was out of reach.

Still on the bright side.... only 6 more years of this bollocks to go :)

I wonder

how much of that profit is going in the form of a share buyback scheme to increase the share price even more (also increasing the C-level's share holding as well) rather than the proper way to put the share price up of investing in new products/technologies/staff to add value to the company's turnover thus increasing its profits for next year

Nope I'm being stupid again.... share buy back takes 30 seconds to show a return with no risk, investment takes 1 year to 5 years to show a return (maybe) so its buy back

Where do they

get their ideas? beancounter central?

I'm responsible for making (among other bits) some aircraft landing gear parts, once the computer has swallowed the CAD model, the CAM software has generates a program(helped by yours truely), I've built the fixture and tested it all out to make sure it all works, I am not allowed by the company rule book to be anywhere near the inspection department while they are checking it.

On the basis, if I've made an error , then hopefully they'll pick it up.

If something as simple as I make has to have a 2 man rule, I'd damn well hope that something as complex as a commecial jet has a 2 man rule too.

Icon .. for what happens if people involved with aircraft get it wrong...

Well

After the PFY's keyboard died mysteriously earlier today*

I'm pretty sure the BoFH is setting his whole office building up to be greenified........**

We had the lights changed to 'high efficiency, low cost ones'

I was'nt very popular when I pointed out with the power saved we could run the 2 compressors for an extra 5 mins per day...

*shes somehow managed to aquire the other chair in the office... possibly a black market deal with one of the senior programmers....I'm making sure the new carpet is nailed down and checking the lift when I use it so that its there when the doors open......

**after being purified by fire of course

Given my job

is rather more mechanical than IT based, the need for documentation is rather more critical.

The need for readable documentation is even more so

The need for the engineers to read the readable documentation even even more so.

After a recent disaster.....

"Did you follow the setup document?"

"Yes"

"What about the bit for checking clearance between the robot arm and the fixture?"

"What bit?"

"The bit written at the top of the document saying 'RUN IN SLOW MOTION AND CHECK FOR POSSIBLE COLLISIONS' "

"Errrrrr......."

I dont know why I bother sometimes

Maybe hes trying

(and failing) to beat this guy

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-63612489

$32 billion in a week lost ....

My question is.... do venture capitalists sign out their sanity when they arrive at their office in the morning?

"Hey John... this ones got no assets, no finance and has a plan to make 1 billion by the end of the day"

"Sounds good... lets invest 2 billion with him....... oh and pass the crayons I'm hungry"

"Oh just heard , learing, beardman and dump just invested 4 billion with him"

"Make it 8 billion we're putting in... and get my arms out of this jacket so I can sign the paperwork"

not a

keyboard killer today..... but very grin worthy none the less

Also it gives me ideas about getting my PFY to sit in on meeetings with the latest tool salesperson to dare pass the dread portal(the front door of the factory)

Which also reminds me to see about getting a new carpet for the meeting room............. and my office for that matter....

I wonder if I should be worried....

And after

several billion pounds have been splurged to the private sector* along with the NHS's records**

We find out several things that contribute to the NHS problems

Not enough doctors(including GPs)

Not enough nurses

Not enough rest of the clinical staff***

Not enough beds

Not enough hospitals for the population.

All of which will cost money and time to solve... and since the government cares about the time issue to the point of the next election, a quick window dressing exercise in "Look... we're making plans to solve the problem" which will be just enough to keep the voters onside at the next election****

*The company involved alledgedly may have a senior minister family member on the board

**wether you like it or not

***theres big list of support staff to put in here

****assuming any are left alive

And in about 12 yrs

time

"Be the master of your own data! New windows 25 , will store your data locally to ensure you have instant access to it when its needed regardless of your internet connection and cloud subscriptions.

Dont rely on other people to store your data for you... store it locally and work on it locally.

Followed a few years later with windows 33.1 with new local network abilities for when you need to talk to your colleagues...

etc etc etc in an ever depressing cycle

oh and I missed out the GUI changes in every version....

To be

honest... most of the 'pranks' listed above would find the pranker in the dole queue if tried where I attend* on a daily basis

Or worse yet........ the pranker has now listed him/herself as 'open for business' with regards to the rest of the staff..... so if their still at first job status , they'd get sent down the stockroom for a long weight

while more advanced creatures would find their chairs screwed to the floor... or missing one leg or have the airhorn tied to the gas cylinder, along with having some of the dialog texts changed to "XXXXX is a dong, please check part length because XXXX is a dong"

Right upto the ultimate prank...... the dreaded 'oil leak' they have to solve

* I'm supposed to do work or something.... most of the time today has been spent teaching the PFY howto fill out an expenses claim form so it generates lots of cash yet is still completely believable....

2 old stories

occur to me now I'm safely out of the pub...(hic)

Our machines have a hard drive... needless to say after 3 or 4 years they tend to fail, and this one showed signs of failure runnning checkdisk showed bad sectors etc etc enough to make me go "disc needs replacing" to our manglement, who called the machine tool builders to have them install a new one (something they do about every 12 months for us).

I have the day off they came in....... and the next day hit the power button only to notice a lack of files in our control directory.... yupp.. engineer pulled the drive, and replaced it without backing any of our stuff up. thank gawd for our monthly backup cycle....

And next the main feature this week....

"The case of the flat battery" or "who the hell hired this idiot?"

At a previous job, the machines had a small battery pack to keep the machine's c-mos memory going (rather like a BIOS battery does)

So the manual is full of warnings about what to do when the battery alarm goes off.

And under replacing battery pack it says "Do not turn off power when putting a new battery pack in...." (yeah you've guessed where this is heading)

So the idiot comes along..... isolates the machine and pulls the battery pack before I can yell "NNNNNOooOOOOOOoooooooo" in a dispairing voice...

too late

C-mos memory wiped along with the machine custom control parameters.

Basically we've got a 1&1/2 tons of scrap on the floor now until we can wheedle the parameters out of the machine supplier.

Said idiot still wanted paying 'cos "I've replaced the batteries..."

6 yrs... just 6 more (sobs) years....

Buttons

and users and cattle prods. kerrrrrzzzzzaaaappppAiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

My tale of woe comes from 2 jobs ago....... machine has a sliding safety door, operator has to press a button on the control to release the lock on the door to open it.

Get a call 2 hours after teaching him the basics............. door has jammed and he cant shut it.................

Wander over(cattle prod set to yellow alert) seems the door is off the runners and stuck plus the lock fingers are bent/broken

"I couldn't get the door open.. it was jammed... so I pulled it extra hard" (cattle prod to red alert) "I pressed the button but the door was still jammed"

"Did you?" I said , while turning the cattle prod to stun

"Yeah."

"Did you?"

"well i dunno AIIiiiiiieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee"

Took me 3 hrs to get make a new set of lock fingers and get that door back on the runners...

That operator never forgot instructions again..

Toads

Met plenty of them over the years....

And had suitable revenge on them too (hence icon)

Including one in a previous job who decided to take credit for my redesign of production equipment that resulted in 10% savings in machine time.

Boasted to the line manager that it was all his idea and I just implemented his idea.

Line manager showed him the sketches and mods I'd drawn up 3 weeks earlier for him after proposing the idea in passing...

I wonder if

the revenge is going to be worse than my PFY going

"Hold the funnel so I can pour the lubricating oil into the oil tank" then going "oopps... silly me... I'm just a girl after all" to the the guy who insulted her Monday and now has lube oil all over his work boots...

We haven't found the new operator who tried flirting with her last week... we think hes still here because he's clocking in and out.... but we cant seem to find him during the day....

I think its best not to ask sometimes....