There's something very special about today. I have all but lost count of 
the number of stupid questions I've been asked so far. Yesterday almost 
nobody spoke to me. Since thing the day before. But today, everybody 
seems to want to ask silly questions.

My mum called me to ask whether to leave the birthday card I haven't 
signed yet at home so that I can sign it. (Duh.)

My grandad phoned to ask where my mum is, but I was driving, and by the 
time I'd stopped driving and had a chance to call him back, he'd found 
her anyway.

One of our project managers asked me what the difference between 
"tab-deliminted text file" and "pipe-delimited text file" is.

But so far, at just after 2PM, the current winner is this:

   "How can I convert milivolts to microsiemens?"

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> But so far, at just after 2PM, the current winner is this:
> 
>   "How can I convert milivolts to microsiemens?"

It could be worst: "How can I convert Volts to Sieverts ?"
Now, hide & run... farer!

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Invisible wrote:
> But so far, at just after 2PM, the current winner is this:

I dunno. None of those sound like silly or stupid questions to me.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
    Eiffel - The language that lets you specify exactly
    that the code does what you think it does, even if
    it doesn't do what you wanted.

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"How can I convert Volts to Sieverts ?"

X-ray tube.

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Darren New wrote:

> I dunno. None of those sound like silly or stupid questions to me.

What's the difference between tab-delimited and pipe-delimited? Well, 
let me see now... one of them is a file who's fields are delimited by 
tab characters, and the other uses pipe characters instead. What, you 
couldn't figure that out all by yourself?

Should you leave the card for me to sign? Actually no; just hand it over 
blank. It'll be fine, right?

The final question is less stupid. Although trying to convert milivolts 
to microseimens would be like trying to convert miles per hour into 
pounds per square inch. (But in SI units at least...)

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And lo On Fri, 18 Jun 2010 14:20:28 +0100, Invisible <voi### [at] devnull> did  
spake thusly:

> There's something very special about today. I have all but lost count of  
> the number of stupid questions I've been asked so far.

Have to agree with Darren, I've heard stupider.

> Yesterday almost nobody spoke to me.

> Since thing the day before.

Have I missed something?

> But today, everybody seems to want to ask silly questions.
>
> My mum called me to ask whether to leave the birthday card I haven't  
> signed yet at home so that I can sign it. (Duh.)

Or should she fake your signature so as to get it in the post, or shall  
she bring it down to you, or should she give it to X to pass on to you.  
Context is king.

> My grandad phoned to ask where my mum is, but I was driving, and by the  
> time I'd stopped driving and had a chance to call him back, he'd found  
> her anyway.

Hardly stupid unless you were out of the country to which the answer would  
be "How the hell should I know?"

> One of our project managers asked me what the difference between  
> "tab-deliminted text file" and "pipe-delimited text file" is.

Again if you know what delimited means you can guess, but if you don't  
"what's a pipe?"

> But so far, at just after 2PM, the current winner is this:
>
>    "How can I convert milivolts to microsiemens?"

Well, we all have off days.

-- 
Phil Cook

--
I once tried to be apathetic, but I just couldn't be bothered
http://flipc.blogspot.com

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> Have to agree with Darren, I've heard stupider.

Oh, sure, I've heard _worse_.

These aren't stupid on the scale of Verizon Math Fail, but stupid on the 
scale of "for goodness sake, go away and stop pestering me!"

>> Yesterday almost nobody spoke to me.
> 
>> Since thing the day before.
> 
> Have I missed something?

No, but I apparently missed a couple of keys on my keyboard.

(That should of course be "same thing the day before".)

>> But today, everybody seems to want to ask silly questions.
>>
>> My mum called me to ask whether to leave the birthday card I haven't 
>> signed yet at home so that I can sign it. (Duh.)
> 
> Or should she fake your signature so as to get it in the post, or shall 
> she bring it down to you, or should she give it to X to pass on to you. 
> Context is king.

Well, since I'll be home in an hour or so and I'm coming to where the 
card needs to be taken... it's fairly self-evident that leaving the card 
there is the thing to do. (The alternative I suppose is to take the card 
over there blank and I'll sign it when I get there - but this seems less 
optimal.)

>> My grandad phoned to ask where my mum is, but I was driving, and by 
>> the time I'd stopped driving and had a chance to call him back, he'd 
>> found her anyway.
> 
> Hardly stupid unless you were out of the country to which the answer 
> would be "How the hell should I know?"

Well, you know, I almost *never* know where the hell my mother is. Why 
ask me? Phone her! (In retrospect, maybe they did. She never ****ing 
answers anyway...)

>> One of our project managers asked me what the difference between 
>> "tab-deliminted text file" and "pipe-delimited text file" is.
> 
> Again if you know what delimited means you can guess, but if you don't 
> "what's a pipe?"

I'm still trying to figure out why the hell she wanted to know, but 
anyway...

>> But so far, at just after 2PM, the current winner is this:
>>
>>    "How can I convert milivolts to microsiemens?"
> 
> Well, we all have off days.

This was the least-stupid question of them all, IMHO.

(It turns out we have a machine that takes measurements in microseimens, 
but some software we use needs a value in milivolts. And while they are 
completely different dimensions, if you knew the properties of the 
machine, it's conceivable that a constant conversion factor actually 
exists...)

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On 21/06/2010 11:41 AM, Invisible wrote:
>
> (It turns out we have a machine that takes measurements in microseimens,
> but some software we use needs a value in milivolts. And while they are
> completely different dimensions, if you knew the properties of the
> machine, it's conceivable that a constant conversion factor actually
> exists...)

You have a machine that displays measurements in microseimens. 
Internally it will probably measure them in millivolts or milliamps. For 
conversion you need to make sure that the conversion should be linear, 
it might not be.

-- 

Best Regards,
	Stephen

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>> (It turns out we have a machine that takes measurements in microseimens,
>> but some software we use needs a value in milivolts. And while they are
>> completely different dimensions, if you knew the properties of the
>> machine, it's conceivable that a constant conversion factor actually
>> exists...)
> 
> For 
> conversion you need to make sure that the conversion should be linear, 
> it might not be.

Given what the machine does, it seems plausible that the conversion is 
perfectly linear.

A more important question is whether the conversion factor is *constant* 
or not...

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On 21/06/2010 1:27 PM, Invisible wrote:
>>> (It turns out we have a machine that takes measurements in microseimens,
>>> but some software we use needs a value in milivolts. And while they are
>>> completely different dimensions, if you knew the properties of the
>>> machine, it's conceivable that a constant conversion factor actually
>>> exists...)
>>
>> For conversion you need to make sure that the conversion should be
>> linear, it might not be.
>
> Given what the machine does, it seems plausible that the conversion is
> perfectly linear.
>
> A more important question is whether the conversion factor is *constant*
> or not...

If it is linear then the conversion factor must be constant. Not taking 
hysteresis into account.
You need the input specs for the software.


-- 

Best Regards,
	Stephen

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