[off topic] - programming lanquages

[john_blakeley@mon.bbc.co.uk]

Hiyah!

I just got this and thought you might like it... My boss wanted to know what 
I was laughing at.

Salut/.

J/.
__
John Blakeley
www.ligotage.demon.co.uk



How to Determine Which Programming Language You're Using.

The proliferation of modern programming languages which seem to have stolen 
countless features from each other somtimes makes it difficult to remember 
which language you're using. This guide is offered as a public service to 
programmers in such dilemmas. If you have anything to add, please email me.



C: 

You shoot yourself in the foot. 

Assembly: 

You crash the OS and overwrite the root disk. The system adminstrator comes 
over and shoots you in the foot. After a moment of contemplation, the admin 
shoots himself in the foot and then hops around rapidly shooting everyone 
else in sight. 

APL: 

You hear a gunshot and there's a hole in your foot, but you can't remember 
enough linear algebra to understand what the hell happened. 

C++: 

You accidentally create a dozen instances of yourself and shoot them all in 
the foot. Providing emergency medical is nearly impossible since you can't 
tell which are bitwise copies and which are just pointing at others saying, 
"that's me over there." 

Ada: 

If you are dumb enough to actually use this language, the United States 
Department of Defense will kidnap you, stand you in front of a firing squad 
and tell the soldiers, "Shoot at his feet." 

Modula/2: 

After realizing that you can't actually accomplish anything in the language, 
you should yourself in the head. 

sh, csh, etc: 

You can't remember the syntax for anything, so you spend five hours reading 
man pages before you give up, shoot the computer and switc to C. 

Smalltalk: 

You spend so much time playing with the graphics and windowing system that 
your boss shoots you in the foot, takes away your workstation and makes you 
develop in COBOL on a character terminal. 

Fortran: 

You shoot yourself in each toe, iteratively, until you run out of toes, then 
you read in the next foot and repeat. If you run out of bullets, you 
continue anway because you have no exception-processing ability. 

Algol: 

You shoot yourself in the foot with a musket. The musket is aesthetically 
fascinating, and the wound baffles the adolescent medic in the emergency 
room. 

COBOL: 

USEing a COLT45 HANDGUN, AIM gun at LEG.FOOT, THEN place ARM.HAND.FINGER on 
HANDGUN.TRIGGER, and SQUEEZE. Then return HANDGUN to HOLSTER. Check whether 
shoelace needs to be retied. 

BASIC: 

Shoot self in foot with water pistol. On big systems, continue untill entire 
lower body is waterlogged. 

PL/I: 

You consume all available system resources, including all offline bullets, 
The Data Processing & Payroll Department double its size, triples it's 
budget, aquires 4 new mainframes, and drops the original one on your foot. 

SNOBOL: 

You grab your foot with your hand, then rewrite your hand to be a bullet. 
The act of shooting the original foot then changes your hand/bullet into yet 
another foot (left). 

lisp: 

You shoot yourself in the appendage which holds the gun with which you shoot 
yourself in the appendage which holds the gun with which you shoot yourself 
in the appendage which holds the gun with which you shoot yourself in the 
appendage which holds. . . 

scheme: 

You shoot yourself in the appendage which holds the gun with which you shoot 
yourself in the appendage which holds the gun with which you shoot yourself 
in the appendage which holds the gun with which you shoot yourself in the 
appendage which holds. . .but none of the other appendages are aware of this 
happening. 

FORTH: 

begin gun foot shot bullets not or blood until 

HTML< 

You load the gun and take a picture of it. Then you ask someone to download 
the picture and a picture of a bloody foot. 

JavaScript 

You load the gun and take a picture of it. Then you ask someone to download 
it and shoot you in the foot with it. The best the can do is to download a 
picture of a bloody foot and put it on your foot. 

Java 

You get the gun and take aim. After pulling the trigger you are told you 
don't have permission to shoot yourself in the foot. 

ActiveX 

You ask someone to download the loaded gun and shoot you in the foot with 
it. They end up blowing your torso off.