i guess not a real wtf, but a funny story anyway.

joshua, a friend of mine is double citizen of switzerland and germany (living in switzerland). a few years ago he had to visit the german embassy in bern to renew his passport. while he was waiting with another ~50 people until it's his turn, a clerk came and anounced that there are "severe computer problems and they wont be able to handle any requests today anymore". meaning that all those people comming from all switzerland had to go home and return another day again.

josh did not really felt like doing that, so he offered to check out the problem. the clerk agreed and took josh with him... while walking towards the machine that apparently did crash, josh immediatelly saw the problem. the monitor was black displaying several lines of text that all read:

"Non-System Disk Replace Disk or Hit any key"

a quick glance at the floppy drive revealed it: yes, there is a disk inside.

the lady operating the computer told him that she tried to switch the computer on and off several times with no help... and hitting something an the keyboard does not help either.

josh decided to make some profit out of this situation:
josh: "i think i can repair this in a minute or two... but what do i get for it?"
clerk: "uhm... what would you suggest?"
josh: "i'll be first in line and you wont charge me the fee (60 swiss francs... about 37 EUR/57 USD) for renewing my passport."
clerk: "deal."

so he switched off the system (while removing the floppy), went into the bios to change some settings (without saving) and that machine was alive again.

josh got his passport renewed for free and left, collecting thanks from about 50 people for fixing the system and saving them from having to leave and return again to the embassy another day.

 Nice. it's not every day we see a post here where everyone wins.

They just let him at it? He just got into the BIOS? OMG...

If it happened this week, they'd at least have the excuse of going mad of all my copatriots ('oranje-gekte', as we call it)...

 For me TRWTF are embassy workers which allowed some random guy to play with their computer, but maybe I'm too suspicious..

Gasp! A quality post in the Sidebar, and it hasn't been spoiled by the usual forum dwellers yet!

lonewolf:

 For me TRWTF are embassy workers which allowed some random guy to play with their computer, but maybe I'm too suspicious..

Indeed - if this were the US of A, he'd be in Gitmo without charge by now for tampering with government property, and being an Swisslamic terrorist.

Gasp! A quality post in the Sidebar, and it hasn't been spoiled by the usual forum dwellers yet!

Yes, it's quite relaxing at the moment.

5....4....3....2... 

 

 

 

vonNeumann:

an Swisslamic terrorist.

 

lolz.

(ps. "a" swisslamic, not "an". yes I'm in fresh-mode right now. so sue me. : ))) ) 

matterific:

Gasp! A quality post in the Sidebar, and it hasn't been spoiled by the usual forum dwellers yet!

Yes, it's quite relaxing at the moment.

5....4....3....2... 

0.

You fail at quoting.

# The Brillant Paula Bean
# Author::    derula
# Copyright:: Copyright (c) 2005-2008 Paula Bean
# License::   Originally distributed under a
#             proprietary license by Paula Bean.
#             Ruby port by derula published
#             under the same terms as Ruby's.

# This module provides a method to return the
# brillance of Paula Bean. This can be achieved
# by calling the module method get_paula.
module Paula_Bean

  # This constant stores the essence of Paula
  # Bean's brillance. This is a private
  # constant, so you MAY NOT use
  # Paula_Bean::PAULA to access it! Please use
  # the get_paula method instead.
  PAULA = "Brillant"

  # Returns Paula Bean's brillance.
  def self.get_paula
    return PAULA
  end
end

derula:

matterific:

5....4....3....2... 

0.

You fail at quoting.

Just as you fail at counting?

 

While I wouldn't consider this a genuine WTF, I'm sure those 50-something people that almost had to go back empty-handed wouldn't agree with that.

derula:

You fail at quoting.

 

I understand that as a satire of the recent how-to-quote flamewars. Which will hopefully come to an end very soon.

No, the quote is perfectly cromulent.

 You can read it (I suspect). I was interested to see how quickly the quote nazis would jump on board

 (wow, I godwined my own post) 

ammoQ:

derula:

You fail at quoting.

 

I understand that as a satire of the recent how-to-quote flamewars.

Yes, that's what it supposed to be.

Not to be completely off-topic, though, I wonder why they let him look at the problem for the first time. And, of course, the let a complete stranger enter their BIOS. Of course, considering the problem they had, they may not be true computing experts, but aren't there usually IT safety rules that are to follow in such critical agencies?

# The Brillant Paula Bean
# Author::    derula
# Copyright:: Copyright (c) 2005-2008 Paula Bean
# License::   Originally distributed under a
#             proprietary license by Paula Bean.
#             Ruby port by derula published
#             under the same terms as Ruby's.

# This module provides a method to return the
# brillance of Paula Bean. This can be achieved
# by calling the module method get_paula.
module Paula_Bean

  # This constant stores the essence of Paula
  # Bean's brillance. This is a private
  # constant, so you MAY NOT use
  # Paula_Bean::PAULA to access it! Please use
  # the get_paula method instead.
  PAULA = "Brillant"

  # Returns Paula Bean's brillance.
  def self.get_paula
    return PAULA
  end
end

matterific:

... I was interested to see how quickly the quote nazis would jump on board ...

You realise that posting with that intention does makes you a troll?

I and many other read WTF daily- and probably don't post much. but we've noticed thatWTF forums have dramatically gone down-hill lately (I work in a large IT company and WTF is often lunchroom chatter). It used to be friendly and quite a bit of fun, but now the forums are stalked by a few bigheads who seem to think their post count gives them the right to be abusive and rude.

For me the last straw was MSP (yeah it’s a call out) abuse at the person who asked a perfectly innocuous question. That's shit scares away people who want to take part, and is not fair to the rest of the people involved in the discussion as it turns into a big derail. If I'm right the question was hardly a case of RTFM either.

If there are guidlines to be followed, maybe a just offer the person advice as to where they might find them- then get on with the thread.

There, I said it. 

 

 

matterific:

... There, I said it. 

 Don't get me wrong, I DO agree with you.

What I meant to say is that deliberately trying to provoke a reaction isn't really going to help.

While the whole rebooting/BIOS fiddling stuff obviously made it seem more legitimate, he would definitely get a lot more kicks from just ejecting the diskette and pressing any key. And the clerk already was under obligation, so... >8=]

matterific:

There, I said it.

I think that should be said there, not here.

Zecc:

Gasp! A quality post in the Sidebar, and it hasn't been spoiled by the usual forum dwellers yet!

Ahh, I get it now!  My definition of a quality post is "one that is amusing or interesting" and yours is "one that is about as much fun as having your hand stuck in a meat grinder".  Seriously, is this really what my beloved TDWTF has become?  A "non system disk" error?  Why do people feel the need to post this garbage?  I blame Error'd as that seemd to lower the bar significantly and bring in a flood of newbies who all want to post their own typos and poorly-worded popups.  Listen fuckers, I can have this much fun on my own by watching Firefox chew up all available memory and take out X in the resulting crash.

matterific:

There, I said it.

Thank you for derailing a thread, trolling MPS and the "quoting Nazis", Godwinning the thread, FAILING TO USE THE GODDAMN EDITOR AND FORUM SOFTWARE THE WAY IT WAS INTENDED TO BE USED and using a lame Simpsons joke.

 

Do you think you are impressing people by using the forum software incorrectly?  Do you also write code in Word and then complain when it doesn't compile?  Do you hit "Reply All" on emails with multiple recipients when you are responding to the sender just for the sake of pissing off the "spam Nazis"?   Stop pretending you are awesome because you can't figure out how threaded message boards work.  You didn't even contribute shit -- like most of the fucktards who piss all over the toilet seat instead of lifting it you were just whining because someone expected you to grow the hell up and learn some basic etiquette.

morbiuswilters:

Zecc:

Gasp! A quality post in the Sidebar, and it hasn't been spoiled by the usual forum dwellers yet!

My definition of a quality post is "one that is amusing or interesting" and yours is "one that is about as much fun as having your hand stuck in a meat grinder".  Seriously, is this really what my beloved TDWTF has become?

 

So, just asking, but in your opinion, would this post have been legitimate material for the General Discussion forum, but not appropriate for the "Side Bar" WTF forum? (Personally, I would say that, but maybe that's just me.)

The description of Side Bar suggests that it is for things that "make us ask WTF". I enjoyed reading this post (and thank you for posting it, betlit), but it did not contain the forehead-slapping, jaw-dropping quality of a WTF.

morbiuswilters:

bring in a flood of newbies

 

No we wouldn't want new people would we. New people with their funny new ideas and new fangled ways of doing things. Your much better off hurling abuse "fucker" and keeping those newbies off your site.

Life must be a barrel of laughs for you. Hows the firefox memory leak going?  

matterific:

No we wouldn't want new people would we.

Not if they are morons, no.  I have a feeling you'd feel more comfortable on Slashdot.

 

matterific:

New people with their funny new ideas and new fangled ways of doing things.

Using the software wrong is not "funny" or "new fangled".  It's just plain stupid.

 

matterific:

Your much better off hurling abuse "fucker" and keeping those newbies off your site.

The first part of your sentence makes no sense.  As for the second, it's not my site only, it belongs to the community and all that contribute.  I think everyone is fine with having new people, but not with having dipshits like yourself further degrade the quality of this place. 

morbiuswilters, I have to say that, you have an attitude that does not belong on a community site. Take as an example your post in response to the OP. So what of the post isn't to your liking. Big deal it isn't a killer WTF, betlit even says it's not really a WTF, and just an amusing anecdote. Some people will find it amusing, some not. But it's not really worth a rant is it? 

Why would betlit, or anyone for that matter want to post again if they know he's going to cop abuse by you for just posting a story into the sidebar?

morbiuswilters, posts like this aren't killing WTF, people like you are.

 

 

morbiuswilters:

I blame Error'd as that seemd to lower the bar significantly and bring in a flood of newbies

dude, check out your joined date, you're a newbie

 

morbiuswilters:

Seriously, is this really what my beloved TDWTF has become?

agreed but it's more your style of newbie that lowered the bar

OP your post was alright, don't listen to this newb