Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/5/84; site sunybcs.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!sunybcs!forys From: forys@sunybcs.UUCP (Jeff Forys) Newsgroups: net.jokes Subject: Murphy's laws on technology Message-ID: <594@sunybcs.UUCP> Date: Sat, 29-Sep-84 21:21:48 EDT Article-I.D.: sunybcs.594 Posted: Sat Sep 29 21:21:48 1984 Date-Received: Sun, 30-Sep-84 04:27:11 EDT Distribution: net Organization: State University of New York @ Buffalo,NY Lines: 155 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ MURPHY'S LAWS ON TECHNOLOGY =========================== - You can never tell which way the train went by looking at the tracks. - Logic is a systematic method of coming to the wrong conclusion with confidence. - Whenever a system becomes completely defined, some damn fool discovers something which either abolishes the system or expands it beyond recognition. - Technology is dominated by those who manage what they do not understand. - If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker to come along would destroy civilization. - The opulence of the front office door varies inversely with the fundamental solvency of the firm. - The attention span of a computer is only as long as its electrical cord. - An expert is one who knows more and more about less and less until he knows absolutely nothing about everything. - Tell a man there are 300 billion stars in the universe and he'll believe you. Tell him a bench has wet paint on it and he'll have to touch to be sure. - All great discoveries are made by mistake. - Always draw your curves, then plot your reading. - Nothing ever gets built on schedule or within budget. - All's well that ends. - A meeting is an event at which the minutes are kept and the hours are lost. - The first myth of management is that it exists. - A failure will not appear until a unit has passed final inspection. - New systems generate new problems. - To err is human, but to really foul things up requires a computer. - We don't know one millionth of one percent about anything. - Any given program, when running, is obsolete. - Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. - A computer makes as many mistakes in 2 seconds as 20 men working 20 years make. - Nothing motivates a man more than to see his boss put in an honest day's work. - Some people manage by the book, even though they don't know who wrote the book or even what book. - The primary function of the design engineer is to make things difficult for the fabricator and impossible for the serviceman. - Any sufficiently advanced bug becomes a feature. - To spot the expert, pick the one who predicts the job will take the longest and cost the most. - After all is said and done, a hell of a lot more is said than done. - Any circuit design must contain at least one part which is obsolete, two parts which are unobtainable, and three parts which are still under development. - A complex system that works is invariably found to have evolved from a simple system that works. - If mathematically you end up with the wrong answer, try multipying by the page number. - Computers are unreliable, but humans are even more unreliable. Any system which depends on human reliability is unreliable. - Give all orders verbally. Never write anything down that might go into a "Pearl Harbor File". - Under the most rigorously controlled conditions of pressure, temperature, volume, humidity, and other variables, the organism will do as it damn well pleases. - If you can't understand it, it is intuitively obvious. - The more cordial the buyers secretary, the greater the odds that the competition already has the order. - In designing any type of construction, no overall dimension can be totaled correctly after 4:30 P.M. on Friday. The correct total will become self-evident at 8:15 A.M Monday. - Fill what's empty, empty what's full, and scratch where it itches. - All things are possible except skiing through a revolving door. - The only perfect science is hind-sight. - Work smarder and not harder and be careful of yor speling. - If it's not in the computer, it doesn't exist. - If an experiment works, something has gone wrong. - When all else fails, read the instructions. - If there is a possibility of several things going wrong, the one that would cause the most damage will be the one to go wrong. - Everything that goes up must come down. - Any instrument when dropped will roll into the least accessible corner. - Any simple theory will be worded in the most complicated way. - Build a system that even a fool can use and only a fool will want to use it. - The degree of technical confidence is inversely proportional to the level of management. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ One for the road... 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