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GNU Project Humor Page

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the gnus-and-gniggles-and-guffaws dept.

First submitted by piman, "The GNU Project opened an interesting programming humor page today (11/20/99). To quote: 'designed to provide some laughs to the working hackers'. Hey, I laughed." Some were "cute" :)

65 of 86 comments (clear)

  1. Wow. by WWWWolf · · Score: 1
    It had some things I had not even read about yet. A bit better than I could guess from the amount of flamage here. Yes, a lot of old jokes, but it has its sides.

    Classics too - I have sent the virus warning to everyone who tells me about Good Times or related things. =)

  2. Re:And the winner is... by damyan · · Score: 1

    I downloaded that. It took a while on a share 64k line.

    I played the first ten seconds and couldn't listen to the rest.

  3. Re:This is humour?! by CzechSome · · Score: 1

    Yeah, not like HAH an iMac-style vibrator....wow, now that is funny. Cough.

  4. Re:C variable names by Chemical+Serenity · · Score: 1
    Or long rambling_manifesto

    Personally I like struct dumb by[sizeof member]. Muhahahahaha...

    --
    rickf@transpect.SPAM-B-GONE.net (remove the SPAM-B-GONE bit)

    --
    "People will pay big bucks for the luxury of ignorance."
  5. Re:They Shouldn't have insulted religions. by frantzdb · · Score: 1
    It may insult all mentioned religions, but it mentions almost all religions so it's not really biased. I'd say it's more poking fun at rather than insulting. If you are insulted that your religion can be summed up so easily, perhaps you should try a different religion :-)


    As an Episcopalian, I find "Shit happens, let's hold a procession" quite funny. It's funny not because it's making fun of Episcopalians, but because to an extent, it's true.


    Get a grip.

  6. // comments in C by Bradley · · Score: 2

    Perhaps you might be so kind as to please remind me which revision of the standard added those silly C++ comments to C.

    C9X added them. See here for the summary of changes, or here for the full standard (section 6.4.9).

    I don't think there's anything wrong with // as comments. OTOH, people using // for multi-line comments probably shouldn't be.

    1. Re:// comments in C by Bradley · · Score: 1

      I'm not talking about 2 line comments, but the long paragraph type things, when adding an extra sentence means wrapping the text around and then having to fix all the // comments.

      To get slightly back on topic, I'm sure GNU Emacs can do this automatically, if I could work out how. :)

      Re the nesting, the C9X rationale, which I found while looking for this, says something along the lines of the C89 group considered allowing nested comments, but decided that it was easier on the compiler writers if we all just used #if 0 instead. They also suggest using if (0) {...}, mentioning that most compilers optimise that away to nothing.

    2. Re:// comments in C by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1
      I'm not talking about 2 line comments, but the long paragraph type things

      :x,ys/^/\/\//g

      where x and y are the first and last lines to comment out. And to remove:

      :x,ys/^\/\///g

      Good ol' vi. Let's see EMACS do this with as few key strokes.

    3. Re:// comments in C by Per+Abrahamsen · · Score: 2

      eVIl> x,ys/^/\/\//g

      Emacs> C-c C-c

      eVIl> x,ys/^\/\///g

      Emacs> C-u C-c C-c

      Loser> Good ol' vi. Let's see EMACS do this with as few key strokes.

      Heh! Line numbers is a brain damage inflicted by harmful technology like VI and BASIC. With Emacs, you simply select the text you want commented in or out.

    4. Re:// comments in C by hobbit · · Score: 2

      Traditional C comments (of the /* ... */ style) are annoying -- specifically in their multi-line usage -- because of problems with nesting them.

      Try using #if 0...#endif to comment out blocks of code. Is there any other reason why you might want to nest comments?

      Hamish

      --
      "Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools, because they have to say something" - Plato
  7. ROFLMAO by Robert+S+Gormley · · Score: 2
    I sprayed coffee over my monitor when I read this! Thank God for Antistatic screens!

    I'd been thinking something along those lines too.

    I especially love the qualifier :)

    --

    Open Source. Closed Minds. We are Slashdot.

  8. Charities must stay out of politics by dmitriy · · Score: 1

    Like it or not, but this little verse is politically charged.

    Tax-exempt charities can't do politics while staying tax-exempt.

    This page does not belong to a server directly funded by FSF. How about moving it somewhere else?

    1. Re:Charities must stay out of politics by dublin · · Score: 2

      This definitely does NOT belong on an FSF page, and can only hurt their cause.

      (That bad, bad, Gingrich is against "rights for gays!" To paraphrase Linda Bowles, one of my favorite columnists, "Could someone please explain to me why being confused about which end of a penis one belongs on should confer any special rights on the confused party?" Gingrich's position is eminently reasonable here, as in most (not all) other cases...)

      --
      "The future's good and the present is nothing to sneeze at." - Roblimo's last ./ post
  9. Re:This is humour?! by bcombee · · Score: 1

    Actually, it took me a moment, but as soon as I realized that those were valid ISO C (1990) variable declarations, I giggled a little.

  10. The image of GNU. by gwyndaf · · Score: 2
    I have to know ...... why is GNU represented by a turd with no dress sense.

    Er.. I mean on Slashdot, of course....

    1. Re:The image of GNU. by finkployd · · Score: 1

      Everytime I see that I have to think:
      "Mr. Hankey, the Emacs poo"

      Now that I look at it, he seems pissed too.

      Finkployd

  11. Let's pretend batmud is a geek thing by thefallen · · Score: 1

    .

    --
    - Kaatunut
  12. Racist jokes. by schmaltz · · Score: 1

    http://www.gnu.org/fun/jokes/gnu.jive.html

    I'm a little perplexed: It's the end of the 20th century, the fight against racism has been waged publicly for going on fifty years.

    What is GNU doing distributing a "joke" which mocks the stereotyped speech of Black people?

    The little disclaimer on the first line -about a lex script called 'jive'- in no way excuses the bad taste and lapse in judgement which caused the posting of such a page to GNU's webserver. And by posting it on a webserver, they ARE, in fact, "circulating" it, contrary to the assertion.

    If you argue that it's protected free speech? I answer that you must place higher value in your desire to hurt and humiliate others than you are truly interested in exercising freedom of speech.

    This is shameful.

    If you value the civil rights of all people, please, send email asking GNU to take down this _racist_ page: webmasters@gnu.org.

    -schmaltz

    --
    Big Daddy, Johnny, Burp, Aunt Zelda, Scott, Slurp, Big Momma ... where's Siggy?
    1. Re:Racist jokes. by pedro · · Score: 1

      I know my comment to the parent post might inflame a bit of controversy, but here goes...
      The reason the 'jive' translations, or, for that matter, the 'redneck' translations resonate is because they cater to a stereotype. The stereotype itself, and its derivation is the big problem in these discussions.
      I posit that stereotypes exist because, at some level, they are *true*.
      They are not true for an aggregate population of any ethno/religious/political category in toto but they *are* true, often, for the loudest, and most visible members of those populations.
      This issue has been explored in depth by numerous serious sociology type persons (no, I don't have citations easily at hand), and the plain truth is that Stereotypes fairly accurately predict the overall experience a non member of a group might have with that group.
      Go to new york. They're testy.
      Go to France. They're rude.
      Go to Harlem (this might have changed). Get your car stripped.
      Different groups have different rules. They understand, internally, where and where not to go within their world. Outsiders see the dynamics more clearly afterwards , because they're 'martians' in that realm. They only see the surface, though.
      Hence stereotypes.
      Stereotypes aren't necessarily bad. They can provide a group with some much needed feedback on how they are performing.
      Stereotyped peoples (I'm white, and stereotyped as well) should either pay much more attention to why they are seen in a particular way, or cease complaining about those assessments that piss them off.
      One more thing, and this is to schmaltz, personally.
      If you are so fscking afraid of freedom that you cannot tolerate dissenting voices, I heartily encourage you to seek ye a totalitarian paradise. Try Iran. Or PRC. Afghanistan.
      I am in no way obliged to be 'sensitive' to anyone's neurotic or psychotic delusions. They must handle them for themselves. I've been there. I know how it has to work.

      --
      Brak: What's THAT?
      Thundercleese: A light switch.. of TOTAL DEVASTATION!
    2. Re:Racist jokes. by Red+Storm · · Score: 3

      Is it so shameful?? What of the redneck jokes of a comptuer??
      You know u're a redneck if your computer has a gun rack... etc...
      Why not look at it as a joke about the differences of our many unique cultures, not of Race... Nowhere else in the world have I seen so many people get so pissy about race...
      I'm sorry if this sounds like a flame, but I can't stand it when people say that we must take down this and that because it is "offensive" or is "derogitory to a race" or "racist." No it's CENSORSHIP!
      Hey I'm a white boy, but I don't mind jokes being made about the fact that I can't dance, can't play sports, and don't attract the ladies as well as people of other cultures.... So what, I'll laugh with you!

      Hmmm maybe I have discovered a way to cook ala slashdot... :-)

      Slashdot Steak:
      One juicy steak.
      BBQ or prefered maranade sauce...
      place steak on monitor..
      post a flame on slashdot
      apply maranade to steak
      post a rebuttal flame to the earlier responces to the flame you had ealier.
      apply more maranade
      keep tending to the flames... making sure the steak is evenly cooked to the desired level..

      remove from monitor, and serve.. :-)

      --
      ---- Fight to protect your right to keep and arm bears! ummmm... ya I think that's right....
    3. Re:Racist jokes. by pb · · Score: 2

      Sigh. It's been said already, but this is humor.

      Would you also be protesting the defamation involved in the valley girl, elmer fudd, redneck, or B1FF text filters? They aren't very different. If you would, then you have no sense of humor. If you wouldn't, then you are a racist.

      Or, rather, just to make sure you understand:

      WouLD u @l5O b PRO+E5tING tHe DEF@M@zhun INVOLved 1n tHE v@LeY +oDAl BABE, ElMur fudD, RednecK, Or B1Ff +eXt fILtur5?!?1?!?
      +hEY AReN+ tOt@LLy difFuRent, 1F u wOuLD, +heN u GO+ no 5En5E uv HuMOR!
      iF u wouLDn+, tHeN u r A r@CI5+,

      What you should be protesting is the dehumanizing force that is the computer, able to translate plain English into mechanically incomprehensible gibberish that some people still manage to find funny, for no apparent reason. (Slap mah fro!)
      ---
      pb Reply or e-mail rather than vaguely moderate.

      --
      pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
    4. Re:Racist jokes. by HP+LoveJet · · Score: 1
      If you argue that it's protected free speech? I answer that you must place higher value in your desire to hurt and humiliate others than you are truly interested in exercising freedom of speech.

      This is linking the permissibility of speech to its content, which is exactly the sort of argument that cuts no ice with knee-jerk ACLUers like me.

      I may not like jive, but I will defend to the death the FSF's right to promulgate text files based on it.

      spawn_of_yog_sothoth

      --
      spawn_of_yog_sothoth
    5. Re:Racist jokes. by Frodo · · Score: 1

      That's silly. If you get offended with such things, seek professional help (I mean doctor, not lawyer). Next time you will require to change "black" to "zero-value-color", because it could offend some people with black skin.

      --
      -- Si hoc legere scis nimium eruditionis habes.
    6. Re:Racist jokes. by Tarnar · · Score: 1

      Tell it like it is =)

      For anyone who wants to see a satire of political correctness gone too far, see this.

  13. Call this humour ? by maroberts · · Score: 1

    Most of the jokes have circled the globe several times. They'd have done better by just putting a few links to good sites such as UserFriendly or SegFault.

    --

    Donte Alistair Anderson Roberts - hi son!
    Karma: Chameleon

  14. Re:Shell humour ... by Tom+Christiansen · · Score: 2

    Er, um, technically speaking, unzip isn't very Unixy, more DOSlike. Even the Unix ports act very non-Unix-like in their noisiness. But of course, it wouldn't be as funny without it.

  15. Re:Ya want humor? Just look at GNU indent style. by Tom+Christiansen · · Score: 2
    //K&R style indents
    The truly funny thing is that that isn't even C code. :-)
  16. Re:Doh. by pedro · · Score: 1

    Good point.

    --
    Brak: What's THAT?
    Thundercleese: A light switch.. of TOTAL DEVASTATION!
  17. The VAXorcist by majere · · Score: 1

    "You, you DOS LOVER! Your mother manages RSX systems in hell!"

    heh, I like it

    --
    "Hope is the denial of reality, it is the carrot dangled before the draft horse in a vain attempt to reach it" - Raistl
  18. Re:DNA filled with comments? by TummyX · · Score: 1

    True (i do remember some highschool biology :))
    But that's not unlike what computer circuits do with compiled binaries.
    The thing is compiled binaries don't normally still contain comments.

  19. it's funny. Laugh by Money__ · · Score: 3
    From The gingrinch that stole christmas.

    The Gingrinch and Clintons now shared the same plight

    Whatever they'd do, they could not do it right.

    "Folks hate you," said Bill, "once you land in D.C.

    But I've got a plan: Let us bond, you and me.

    We'll work as a team, yes! That's my advice!

    We'll listen and nod and make NICE NICE NICE!"

    The Prez put his hand out, they hugged on the ledge...

    And then that old Gingrinch pushed Bill off the edge LOL!

  20. Re:Old stuff. by ViGe · · Score: 1

    It seems to be a collection of very old stuff, that has been floating the net for many years

    Exactly.. It obviously tries to collect all that kind of humorous stuff in to one place. Definitely a page to bookmark and read when you're bored.. :-)
    --

    --
    It has to work - rfc1925
  21. Re:Old stuff. by Jonas+�berg · · Score: 3

    Perhaps we should put dates on them? As you say, most of these are very old. We collected them mostly from various GNU disks. Some of it dates more than 10 years back. I wouldn't be surprised if some of this dates back to when prep.ai.mit.edu was a VAX 11/750. For those of you interested in a little history; prep was (in the early 1980's) a VAX 11/750 designed to to run a large plotter for VLSI plots. It only needed to do this a few days ever year, so rms "adopted" the spare cycles for GNU work. People generally thought that RMS was doing GNU Emacs work on it, which was true of course and accounted for the disk space used, but the machine also had all other GNU material and users on it.

  22. What's the license ? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2

    What's the license obligations if i want to tell someone else these jokes? What if i want to make a small modification ?

  23. Old stuff. by Abigail-II · · Score: 1
    It seems to be a collection of very old stuff, that has been floating the net for many years. The only part that's making me smile are the bang style email paths, bringing up memories from times when getting 2 emails a day was a lot of email.

    I wonder what the connection is between this old stuff and GNU. None of what I've seen seems to use a GPL.

    -- Abigail

    1. Re:Old stuff. by mwr · · Score: 1
      Perhaps we should put dates on them?

      No doubt about that. The average Slashdot reader probably didn't even get most of the PC jokes in the computer terminology dictionary. Like the one about "convertible" replacing "junior" -- the IBM PC Convertible and the PCJr were pretty nasty machines, even worse than first-generation PS/1 boxes.

    2. Re:Old stuff. by Industrial+Disease · · Score: 1

      That might be a good idea, even for those of us who don't find a lot of this stuff particularly funny, to help give it a bit of historical context.

      --
      Weblogging Considered Harmful:
  24. Re:Oh no, flamebait, what will we do? by cheese63 · · Score: 1

    2) Most of the laughter of a geek seems extremely forced (look how cool we are for finding this funny)

    No, the funniest thing I've ever heard isn't a computer joke, it's this dialog at the last supper (sorry if the dialog's a little incorrect, haven't seen it in awhile):

    What else do we got?
    Bababanush!
    I wanna dip my balls in it!

  25. It's funny. Laugh. by Double+A · · Score: 3

    "Historically, the Church has a reputation as an aggressive competitor, leading crusades to pressure people to upgrade to Catholicism, and entering into exclusive licensing arrangements in various kingdoms whereby all subjects were instilled with Catholicism, whether or not they planned to use it..."

    priceless.

  26. Re:Pathetic by ladygeekia · · Score: 1

    Have some respect for the subjectivity of humor. Just because you don't like it doesn't mean you have to insult it and possibly ruin the enjoyment someone else could get from it.

    -ladygeekia
    "Work a little bit harder on improving your low self-esteem... you stupid freak."
    - "Weird Al" Yankovic

  27. C variable names by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2

    What, no "unsigned short suicide_note" ?

  28. The human source code would never compile ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    or God has an extremely good compiler! (Spot the typo yourself.)

  29. DNA filled with comments? by TummyX · · Score: 4

    I guess either

    1) God doesn't have a very good DNA compiler
    or
    2) God decided to make DNA an interpreted language!

    1. Re:DNA filled with comments? by Pyro+P · · Score: 2

      2) God decided to make DNA an interpreted language!
      It actually kind of is. A sequence of DNA will get transcripted to a sequence of RNA by a RNA polymerase, and the RNA will get "interpreted" by a ribosome. (That's not the only thing DNA does: the ribosomes only create amino acids.) I'm oversimplifying like hell here buy you get the idea

      --
      If 90% of everything isn't crap, your standards are too high.
  30. This is humour?! by h2so4 · · Score: 4

    Maybe I'm having an off day, but is this funny?
    -
    auto accident;
    register voters;
    static electricity;
    struct by_lightning;
    -
    hahah, my sides...help
    Sure I've seen most of this before....and it was just as stale then... I mean come on, a page of smileys?!

    The GPL'd human code - muhaha, sedate me.
    Anagrams...jesus, I need to sit down...

    This is funny. So is this. In fact, most of attrition's gallery is.

    But the GNU humour page?! Come on... I laughed harder when I rm -rf'd /usr/lib.

    1. Re:This is humour?! by Tralfamadorian · · Score: 1

      Well, I can see where the confusion might come from... How often do you use the "auto" keyword?

  31. float by Jimhotep · · Score: 2

    float ing_in_a_tin_can
    char broiled
    int o

  32. *g* nice way to spend the morning by Chris+Johnson · · Score: 2

    ...reading geeky humor :)
    My personal favorite is the obscure MPW compiler messages: note the secret The WHO reference! http://www.mackido.com/EasterEggs/PR- MPW.html
    "a typedef name was a complete surprise to me at this point in your program"
    "This array has no size, and that's bad"
    "Call me paranoid but finding `/*' inside this comment makes me suspicious"
    "Huh ?"
    (and many more)

  33. They Shouldn't have insulted religions. by free+space · · Score: 1

    The "shit happens" page simply insults all mentioned religions.
    I don't think this is funny.

    --Mohamed

  34. RMS singing by Jerky+McNaughty · · Score: 2

    As much as I respect RMS for what he's done for the free software community, every time I hear that free software song, I do laugh. But it's a mean kind of laugh---I'm laughing _at_ him. That song is really ridiculous.

    At the end, people clap for him, so I assume this was a live "performance". Where was this song originally sang?

  35. Re:Shell humour ... by pb · · Score: 1
    Well, you could put gunzip there if your sensibilities are offended. After all, it should handle .zip files provided they only contain one item. Does that make unzip seem a tad bit more UNIX-like? Or do we have to use compress and end up like the guy in American Pie...

    Speaking of this, I think my favorite (horrible!) variable declaration had to be:

    struct dumb by [sizeof member];

    I mean, that's just elegant in its cleverness and wrongness...
    ---
    pb Reply or e-mail rather than vaguely moderate.

    --
    pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
  36. Bah. by Mr.+Piccolo · · Score: 1

    It's better in Cockney anyway.

    --
    Glückwünsche, haben Sie Slashdot ermordet, indem Sie zum korporativen Druck beugten und Subskriptionen einlei
  37. Whazzup with Slashdot's GNU icon? by cnflctd · · Score: 1

    Is it just me? I try and try, but for the life of me, Slashdot's GNU icon looks to me like a drawning of:

    A shaft of fecal matter with glasses and red shoes. It holds a blue blanket to its ear and sucks its thumb (ala that other Linus). It seems to be wearing a locomotive engineer's hat on it's stinky little head.

    Isn't a gnu some sort of yak? Where are it's horns?

    --
    I'm cool like a fool in a swimming p-p-pfft-pool
  38. Re:Oh no, flamebait, what will we do? by Dwonis · · Score: 1

    I found listening to RMS sing his free software song to be quite funny. No forced laughing here! And I'm a free software advocate!
    --------
    "I already have all the latest software."

  39. And the winner is... by unitron · · Score: 1
    The biggest joke is the suggestion that RMS can sing.
    There's another Microsoft and the Catholic church merger story floating around somewhere that isn't the one here because it's got a line about the churches centuries of experience with icons.

    --

    I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.

  40. Shell humour ... by dr.+greenthumb · · Score: 3

    Sex the Unix way: # unzip ; strip ; touch ; finger ; mount ; fsck ; more ; yes ; umount ; sleep

  41. The Sci.Electronics.Repair FAQ by ech3 · · Score: 1
    I always enjoyed the man ed page, well anyways, check out

    http://192.132.34.17/pub/electronics/repairfaq/REP AIR/F_humor.html

    for the Sci.electronics.Repair FAQ humor section for a bunch of Engineer and lawyer jokes. I found it the other day and almost died laughing, even though it is cruel I liked Chapter 40 a lot:)

    --
    "Doctor's mistakes you bury, Engineer's mistakes you live with forever."
  42. My signature... by Gurlia · · Score: 1

    My email signature: Don't modify spaghetti code unless you can eat the consequences!. :->

    --
    mikre he sophia he tou Mikrosophou.
  43. Re:Ya want humor? Just look at GNU indent style. by Tom+Christiansen · · Score: 2
    First of all, gcc is hardly the definition of "standard".

    Secondly, perhaps you might be so kind as to please remind me which revision of the standard added those silly C++ comments to C. I must have missed it.

  44. Stamp out, eliminate, and expunge redundancy by jbuhler · · Score: 1

    So, now that all GNU humor files have been collected on its web site, can we possibly remove them from the Emacs distribution tarball and save everyone a few kilobytes? For that matter, how about removing the political screeds, cookie recipes, and the interview with RMS from 1986?

  45. Re:Funny by manHolo · · Score: 1

    "Solaris forever": that is a good joke.

  46. Packet Storm humor by SpinyNorman · · Score: 3

    IMO, some *much* better computer humor:

    http://packetstorm.securify.com/unix-hu mor/

  47. Er, char boriled? by VAXman · · Score: 1

    What is funny about "char broiled", and the other variable names? Maybe to somebody who is reall, REALLY new to C, it would be funny, but after that it seems pretty standard.

    The Vaxorcist was pretty funny though. I've never seen that one before.

  48. Some Gems by finkployd · · Score: 1

    Not all was funny, but the science facts page was by far the funniest thing I've read in a while. I'm going to get alot of .sigs out of that one (GPLed .sigs of course)

    Finkployd

  49. Uh oh... by jdube · · Score: 2

    bash-2.02$ %blow
    bash: fg: %blow: no such job
    bash-2.02$


    If you think you know what the hell is really going on you're probably full of shit.

    --
    If you think you know what the hell is really going on you're probably full of shit.
    jdube is who I am.