Warp wrote:
> Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
>> With great responsibility comes great power
> 
>   Wasn't it the other way around?-)

... or words to that effect.  :-)

-- 
   Darren New / San Diego, CA, USA (PST)
     "That's pretty. Where's that?"
          "It's the Age of Channelwood."
     "We should go there on vacation some time."

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Warp wrote:

>> Well as you both know, it *should* be that the two come together - you 
>> are held responsible for that which you actually have power over. But - 
>> as I'm sure you're also both aware - this is sadly not always the case...
> 
>   You mean sometimes you are held responsible for things which are not
> under your control at all?

Yes.

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

Post a reply to this message

>> as I'm sure you're also both aware - this is sadly not always the case...
> 
> You could make it the case, tho. You *do* know the password that changes 
> passwords.

And *they* know the Enterprise Administrator password that trumps all 
other passwords in the Active Directory forest. Not to mention that, as 
my direct superiors, they have the power to order me to do things. [Such 
as, say, HAND OVER THE PASSWORDS.]

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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Doctor John wrote:

> John (with chianti and fava beans)

...and again I'm opening the dictionary...

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> Doctor John wrote:
> 
>> John (with chianti and fava beans)
> 
> ....and again I'm opening the dictionary...
> 
It's a reference to a meal Dr Hannibal Lecter ate

John

-- 
I will be brief but not nearly so brief as Salvador Dali, who gave the
world's shortest speech. He said, "I will be so brief I am already
finished," then he sat down.

Post a reply to this message

>>> John (with chianti and fava beans)
>> ....and again I'm opening the dictionary...
>>
> It's a reference to a meal Dr Hannibal Lecter ate

Oh yes, I realise that. I just don't know what fava beans or chianti 
actually *is*.

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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On Fri, 25 Apr 2008 05:35:52 -0400, Warp wrote:

> Invisible <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
>> AAAAAAAARGH!!!
> 
>   Here you go again. I thought you said you have lessened these types
> of attentiont-seeking posts... ;)

He did it because he knew he'd get some attention from you, Warp. ;-)

Jim

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On Fri, 25 Apr 2008 09:07:48 -0500, Mike Raiford wrote:

> Gilles Tran wrote:
> 
> 
>> Keep 'em coming, I need material for your web comic :P
>> 
>> G.
>> 
>> 
> This I've got to see ...

Ditto. ;-)

I've been waiting for the next installment - someone *did* save those 
off, didn't they?

Giles?  Got an archive you can post somewhere?

Jim

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Orchid XP v8 wrote:
>>>> John (with chianti and fava beans)
>>> ....and again I'm opening the dictionary...
>>>
>> It's a reference to a meal Dr Hannibal Lecter ate
> 
> Oh yes, I realise that. I just don't know what fava beans or chianti
> actually *is*.
> 
http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/glossary/f.shtml?fava_beans

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chianti

John

-- 
I will be brief but not nearly so brief as Salvador Dali, who gave the
world's shortest speech. He said, "I will be so brief I am already
finished," then he sat down.

Post a reply to this message

On Fri, 25 Apr 2008 20:32:24 +0100, Doctor John <doc### [at] gmailcom>
wrote:

>Orchid XP v8 wrote:
>> 
>> Actually, wasn't there some advert for something that featured an entire
>> office of people using beanie bags instead of real chairs? Something
>> like "you could give everybody beanie bags to create an informal and
>> inspiring atmosphere, but if you REALLY want to boost productivity, buy
>> product X"...
>> 
>Hmm. Rings a faint bell in the dim and distant past. Maybe Stephen
>remembers it ;-)
>

Maybe he does?
-- 

Regards
     Stephen

Post a reply to this message

On Fri, 25 Apr 2008 20:34:15 +0100, Doctor John <doc### [at] gmailcom>
wrote:

> ...and don't forget the silence of the lambs

The first one that came to mind was a pregnant silence ;)

>John (with chianti and fava beans)

Slurp! Yum!
-- 

Regards
     Stephen

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On Fri, 25 Apr 2008 14:02:53 +0100, Invisible wrote:

> I really hope I manage to sort out this giant mess sometime soon -
> because I do *not* enjoy being this worked up.

You know, I just ran across something yesterday that's helping me with a 
vaguely similar situation; look for a book entitled "Perfect Phrases for 
Dealing with Difficult People: Hundreds of Ready-to-Use Phrases for 
Handling Conflict, Confrontations, and Challenging Personalities" by 
Susan F. Benjamin.

I'm not a huge fan of this type of book - "phrasebook" puts me off, 
because there's no ready-made list of things you can say that will make 
things all better, because situations vary widely, so just a list of 
"comebacks" tends to not be useful.

This book includes some of that, but in the context of understanding the 
underlying motivations that people have - and the strategies you can use 
to get what you need out of the working relationship.  So rather than 
being a "cookbook" of "in this situation, say this and everything will be 
fine", it instead discusses the underlying motivations behind someone 
who, say, has a negative attitude, and then focuses on how you can direct 
them in a way to get what you want/need.

So, for example, from Part 3 - "Perfect Phrases for Communicating with 
Difficult Bosses", an example given has to do with distant, weak, or 
hands-off bosses.  The suggested strategy is to be more proactive in 
communicating with the boss - so rather than just saying "my boss doesn't 
listen to me", continue to provide them with feedback, ideas, and your 
opinions.  They need to be presented in a way that is positive (ie, focus 
on positive results, not the problems you're trying to avoid".

In your situation, you've got someone who's taken total control away from 
you, and you feel this will leave you holding the bag when the auditors 
come in.  Take a minute to talk with the head guy from HQ and say "you 
know, I'm really concerned about the changes here, not because they're 
not going to be better for the organization, but instead because when the 
auditors come, I'm the one they're going to talk to - and I don't 
understand why you're making the changes you're making.  Since our 
company is answerable to regulatory authorities, can you help me 
understand these changes so I can explain them to the auditors and avoid 
the company potentially being fined over something that I just didn't 
understand?"

What this does is it acknowledges the expertise they bring (whether 
there's any real expertise or not there isn't particularly relevant - 
they're the ones calling the shots, and you'll get a better response from 
them if you acknowledge their position in a positive manner).  "You guys 
clearly have a plan here - but I feel I need to understand this 
because ..." and give them the reasons.

Then follow the conversation up with a quick e-mail - it never hurts to 
have a paper trail.  Be objective in the e-mail rather than subjective, 
and more specific rather than less.  "Per our discussion, you'll provide 
me with full documentation for these changes for the next audit by June 
21, 2008.  Does that date sound good to you?" - that gives you a 
trackable goal they need to achieve, and if they don't meet it, you can 
refer back to that agreement when the auditors are scheduling their time 
to come in (if they do that, I don't know if they do or not).  By ending 
with the question, you give them the opportunity to say "yes".  That 
works well in person as well.

A friend of mine has tried an experiment along these lines recently - her 
boss is a micromanager.  New boss, unfamiliar with the business, wants to 
change everything right now to what he thinks the business should be 
doing.  Recently, there was a discussion about a decision point where the 
boss was very adamant about a change being put in place that my friend 
was dead-set against.  Instead of digging in, she acknowledged the 
experience the new boss has, but presented a different perspective and 
followed that up with an e-mail outlining a possible compromise that 
could allow the boss to implement what he wanted, it wasn't without any 
controls at all (which was the perception of the initial request).  By 
suggesting there might be room to make the suggested change but while 
incorporating some reasonable controls, my friend was able to say to the 
boss "I can see this is a good idea, but I'd rather not compromise 'x', 
'y', and 'z' because we've worked hard to address those issues, and I 
feel that this could undermine the issues we've worked so hard to resolve 
the past 2 years.  But if we did 'a', 'b', and 'c', we could accomplish 
this goal without compromising on the things we've fixed."

The response was quite positive from the boss - and I suspect (as I don't 
know the boss in question) that the boss was more receptive to these 
suggestions because there was an acknowledgment that the idea wasn't a 
bad one and with some minor tweaks, it would be workable and could 
actually resolve more issues.

Anyways, have a look for the book - I've been impressed with it so far, 
from the standpoint of the insights.  Since I've had to deal with some 
difficult people recently myself (including one individual who actually 
filed legal action to get their way), I thought it might be worth a look, 
and I've learned quite a bit as a result.

Jim

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Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> And *they* know the Enterprise Administrator password that trumps all 
> other passwords in the Active Directory forest.

Sure. Can you change that also?

Or, at least you'll know when someone changes stuff out from under you. 
  "Boss, I can't do my job, because the people at HQ keep changing the 
administrator passwords."

>  Not to mention that, as 
> my direct superiors, they have the power to order me to do things. [Such 
> as, say, HAND OVER THE PASSWORDS.]

Of course. But then you say "What do you need them for, for my auditing 
records?"

The point is not to prevent them from doing their work, but preventing 
them from doing work you don't know about.

-- 
   Darren New / San Diego, CA, USA (PST)
     "That's pretty. Where's that?"
          "It's the Age of Channelwood."
     "We should go there on vacation some time."

Post a reply to this message

>> And *they* know the Enterprise Administrator password that trumps all 
>> other passwords in the Active Directory forest.
> 
> Sure. Can you change that also?

Hehehe. As if I would ever be privy to such sensitive information...

>>  Not to mention that, as my direct superiors, they have the power to 
>> order me to do things. [Such as, say, HAND OVER THE PASSWORDS.]
> 
> Of course. But then you say "What do you need them for, for my auditing 
> records?"

The answer will be that then they can remotely fix things when I'm not 
around, or if I don't know the fix. The guys in HQ are very big on the 
idea that they can solve anybody's problem, anywhere in the company. 
They tend to forget that by the time they know there's a problem, the UK 
has been off-air for about 5 hours. (Can you spell "time zones"?)

> The point is not to prevent them from doing their work, but preventing 
> them from doing work you don't know about.

If there's one thing I've figured out, it's this: The Director of IT may 
or may not be any good at IT, but he is *guaranteed* to be better at 
politics than you. He had to get there somehow...

In fairness, they're not geniunely *trying* to make my job harder. 
They're just not terribly organised, and they don't really think through 
the consequences of their actions. And they're hopeless at communicating...

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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On Fri, 25 Apr 2008 22:12:35 +0100, Orchid XP v8 wrote:

> The Director of IT may
> or may not be any good at IT, but he is *guaranteed* to be better at
> politics than you. He had to get there somehow...

In my experience, that's actually generally not the case.  Many times, 
it's not that they're better at politics, but rather that they ended up 
with responsibilities they hadn't planned on when they were first hired.

Hell, that's how I ended up in my current role.  If you'd asked me 5 
years ago if I'd be a program manager, I'd have told you there was no way 
I'd leave the technical field.

Yet here I am, slowly losing some of my technical acumen because I don't 
use it every day the way I used to.  Doesn't mean I'm IT-stupid by any 
stretch - and in fact it's helped me in working with my IT organisation, 
because I can say "I've BTDTGTTS, so I understand where you're coming 
from".

But several of the bosses I've worked for over the years - in IT and out 
of it - got promoted not because of their political skills, but because 
they had some quality that the person doing the promotion was looking for 
- a vision, an idea, even in a couple of cases they were friends/long-
time colleagues with the person doing the promotion.

> In fairness, they're not geniunely *trying* to make my job harder.
> They're just not terribly organised, and they don't really think through
> the consequences of their actions. And they're hopeless at
> communicating...

Whereas you aren't.  I'm serious about that, when you put your mind to 
it, you do a good job communicating - so use those skills in talking with 
them.  It sounds like you're on the right track with following them 
around and writing stuff down - don't be afraid to say to them "hey, slow 
down - I know you've got a lot of work to do, but I need to record this 
for the audit and I'm falling behind here."

Jim

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Warp wrote:
> Orchid XP v8 <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
>> Warp wrote:
>>> Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
>>>> With great responsibility comes great power
>>>   Wasn't it the other way around?-)
> 
>> Well as you both know, it *should* be that the two come together - you 
>> are held responsible for that which you actually have power over. But - 
>> as I'm sure you're also both aware - this is sadly not always the case...
> 
>   You mean sometimes you are held responsible for things which are not
> under your control at all?
> 
Essentially that has been his main complaint here over the years in his 
blog posts. I.e. the ones in which he did not complain about the lack of 
female company other than his mother.
He is responsible for much of the network and the functioning of the 
company software. So his company made sure there was always a key 
component in the US that could be changed there overnight.
This thread was initiated because he is responsible for the, legally 
required, documentation of the changes made to the systems. So someone 
higher up decided to let a bunch of guys without any knowledge of the 
legal implications take much of his computers apart and install new 
programs. He was there to record what was going on (hopefully enough to 
fake a standard procedure retrospectively) but they would just as well 
have done it when he was on holiday.
If they had given him the power that goes with this responsibility, he 
should have given these guys the documents that explain the legal 
requirements and told them to go home and come back the next day after 
reading it. As it is his power to do appears to be just below that of 
the cleaning lady.

Post a reply to this message

Orchid XP v8 wrote:

> 
> ...and actually, just before I posted this, I got called downstairs for 
> the food thing. I just ate an entire cake! I feel much happier now! :-D
> 
> 
> 
> PS. The cake is a lie.
> 

You ate a lie??

Post a reply to this message

andrel wrote:
> Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> 
>>
>> ...and actually, just before I posted this, I got called downstairs 
>> for the food thing. I just ate an entire cake! I feel much happier 
>> now! :-D
>>
>>
>>
>> PS. The cake is a lie.
>>
> 
> You ate a lie??

No - I lied about eating the entire cake. Actually I ate half of it. ;-)

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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Invisible wrote:
> AAAAAAAARGH!!!
> 
You work for idiots.  Naturally you have stress.

Regards,
John

Post a reply to this message

John VanSickle <evi### [at] hotmailcom> wrote:
> Invisible wrote:
> > AAAAAAAARGH!!!
> >
> You work for idiots.  Naturally you have stress.

I suppose, although somehow being the idiot sounds more stressful.  Assuming of
course that you realize it, which probably isn't usually the case.

 - Ricky

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Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> The answer will be that then they can remotely fix things when I'm not 
> around, or if I don't know the fix.

If you're around, they can ask you for the password, and then you'll 
change it when they're done. If you're not around, the boss can get the 
password out of the sealed envelope in the safe as well as make sure 
they've filed the appropriate paperwork.

If nothing else, *you* should have an account and *they* should have an 
account, and the auditing should show who is logged in when and doing 
what. They should not have any excuse to turn off auditing of privileged 
operations.

> If there's one thing I've figured out, it's this: The Director of IT may 
> or may not be any good at IT, but he is *guaranteed* to be better at 
> politics than you. He had to get there somehow...

Of course.

> In fairness, they're not geniunely *trying* to make my job harder. 
> They're just not terribly organised, and they don't really think through 
> the consequences of their actions. And they're hopeless at communicating...

Changing the passwords regularly ensures that they communicate, is all. 
Hopefully you've written up formally your AAARRRRGGHH experience and 
passed it to your boss and your legal department.

-- 
   Darren New / San Diego, CA, USA (PST)
     "That's pretty. Where's that?"
          "It's the Age of Channelwood."
     "We should go there on vacation some time."

Post a reply to this message

John VanSickle wrote:

> You work for idiots.  Naturally you have stress.

To put it succinctly... yes.

Assuming I survive this migration, my next priority is to gently 
*remind* the various agencies that I'm still looking for work...

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> Assuming I survive this migration,

Hopefully it's a transition and not a migration.

-- 
   Darren New / San Diego, CA, USA (PST)
     "That's pretty. Where's that?"
          "It's the Age of Channelwood."
     "We should go there on vacation some time."

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You think that's bad?

http://qdb.us/81636

Post a reply to this message

Nicolas Alvarez wrote:
> You think that's bad?
> 
> http://qdb.us/81636

Oh God, that has surely GOT to be fake! >_<

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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And lo on Sat, 26 Apr 2008 09:29:25 +0100, andrel  
<a_l### [at] hotmailcom> did spake, saying:

<snip>
> If they had given him the power that goes with this responsibility, he  
> should have given these guys the documents that explain the legal  
> requirements and told them to go home and come back the next day after  
> reading it. As it is his power to do appears to be just below that of  
> the cleaning lady.

Yeah the conversation should have run:

"Have you read all the documentation regarding our legal requirements to  
document all changes?"
"What legal requirements?"
"Please go and see our QA manager and she'll walk you through it all"

End of responsibilty. If they go through the legal stuff and don't do it,  
then it's their fault. If they don't go through the legal stuff after  
you've told them about it and subsequently balls it up, then it's their  
fault.

-- 
Phil Cook

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

Post a reply to this message

>> Don't worry, I know exactly how you feel, I am at the end of a 3-day 
>> "supplier evaluation workshop" from our largest customer - and I have a 
>> ton of action items that need to be completed by lunchtime Monday...
>
> Well, I suppose to some extent my plight isn't quite as bad as the project 
> manager for the new building. We were supposed to take ownership on 17 
> March. However, somebody wheeled some heavy item into the recention area 
> and cracked several floor tiles. This caused them to have to retile the 
> reception area.

How about this one:

Me: "Hey, electrical engineer dude, what is the maximum current our product 
will draw from the power supply?"
<some hours of calculation later>
"2.8 amps"
"OK, well our target is 1.2A, are you sure you can't improve that?"
<some more hours later>
"OK we reduced the maximum to 1.8A"
(WTF!)
"OK I will inform the customer and see what they say"
<some days later>
Customer: "1.2A is the absolute maximum available, if you want more than 
that your product won't work.  end of story."
"Hey engineer dude, we really need to meet this 1.2A target"
<some 20 minutes later>
"OK I think we can meet it, tell them it's ok"

Now, I *really* cannot wait until we make the first samples of this product 
and see how much power it actually uses :-)

Post a reply to this message

On Wed, 30 Apr 2008 11:11:32 +0200, "scott" <sco### [at] scottcom> wrote:

>How about this one:
>
>Me: "Hey, electrical engineer dude, what is the maximum current our product 
>will draw from the power supply?"
><some hours of calculation later>
>"2.8 amps"
>"OK, well our target is 1.2A, are you sure you can't improve that?"
><some more hours later>

[Snipe]

LOL
It depends how you define Amps and "1.2" 
-- 

Regards
     Stephen

Post a reply to this message

> LOL
> It depends how you define Amps and "1.2"

I'd imagine it's going to be defined exactly how the person who designed the 
power supply defined it :-)

Post a reply to this message

Orchid XP v8 <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
> Mike Raiford wrote:
>
> > Why does that all of the sudden make me feel as if I'm one of the
> > mole-people.
> >
> > "Thriving community down here, in the deep recesses of the underground."
> >
> > :)
>
> I always liked to thing of POV-Ray, and especially off-topic, as an
> elite underground sect of engineers, mathematicians, physicists and
> programmers...
>
> --
> http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
> http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

"...an elite underground sect of engineers, mathematicians, physicists and
programmers..." Yes, I like that...

But some of us out here are so asocial that we're even more invisible than
Invisible (me for instance)... Yeah, I admit it, I'm a lurker. I've spent SO
much time reading the posts on these forums, for years now, but I hardly ever
post anything myself. Of course my World of Warcraft addiction has occupied
most of my free time for a couple of years. I'm trying to come out of my shell a
bit though, so we'll see...

Anyway, the fact that Gilles has been able to create his web comic around your
(mostly) silly posts is quite hilarious to me... Awesome work!

Post a reply to this message

On Wed, 07 May 2008 15:35:51 -0400, Robert McGregor wrote:

> Anyway, the fact that Gilles has been able to create his web comic
> around your (mostly) silly posts is quite hilarious to me... Awesome
> work!

Agreed - and I'm *so* glad there's an RSS feed for it, now I don't miss 
it ever, just part of my morning comics routine. :-)

Jim

Post a reply to this message

Jim Henderson wrote:
> On Wed, 07 May 2008 15:35:51 -0400, Robert McGregor wrote:
> 
>> Anyway, the fact that Gilles has been able to create his web comic
>> around your (mostly) silly posts is quite hilarious to me... Awesome
>> work!
> 
> Agreed - and I'm *so* glad there's an RSS feed for it, now I don't miss 
> it ever, just part of my morning comics routine. :-)
> 

Yup. Me, too ..


Its amazing to me that a comic with no actual drawn character could work 
so well. It really brings to light that it's the writing and not the 
drawing that really creates a good comic. You could even draw stick 
figures (see XKCD) and make a good comic, it truly is all in the writing.

Post a reply to this message

And lo on Fri, 25 Apr 2008 18:43:09 +0100, Orchid XP v8 <voi### [at] devnull>  
did spake, saying:

> Mike Raiford wrote:
>
>> Why does that all of the sudden make me feel as if I'm one of the  
>> mole-people.
>>  "Thriving community down here, in the deep recesses of the  
>> underground."
>>  :)
>
> I always liked to thing of POV-Ray, and especially off-topic, as an  
> elite underground sect of engineers, mathematicians, physicists and  
> programmers...

If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them,  
maybe you can hire the POV-Team; dum dum dum, dum dum da.

-- 
Phil Cook

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

Post a reply to this message

Mike Raiford wrote:

> Its amazing to me that a comic with no actual drawn character could work 
> so well. It really brings to light that it's the writing and not the 
> drawing that really creates a good comic. You could even draw stick 
> figures (see XKCD) and make a good comic, it truly is all in the writing.

...or, converstly, even if I could draw I'd still make a suckworthy 
comic. :-/

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

Post a reply to this message

Phil Cook wrote:

> If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find 
> them, maybe you can hire the POV-Team; dum dum dum, dum dum da.

Not... The P Team! o_O

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

Post a reply to this message

Invisible wrote:

> 
> ...or, converstly, even if I could draw I'd still make a suckworthy 
> comic. :-/
> 

Not a good writer, eh? Neither am I. I don't have what it takes to make 
a comic that people would continually return to and enjoy. Not only 
that, but when something is just a hobby or side project often life gets 
in the way and I wind up not being able to see it through. Funny how I 
can complete huge projects at work, but stuff I do in my free time gets 
sidelined so much... :/

Post a reply to this message

Mike Raiford wrote:

> Not a good writer, eh? Neither am I. I don't have what it takes to make 
> a comic that people would continually return to and enjoy.

Tell me about it!

It seems most of the humour in my writings is because people are 
laughing *at* me for being so stupid... :-/

> Not only 
> that, but when something is just a hobby or side project often life gets 
> in the way and I wind up not being able to see it through. Funny how I 
> can complete huge projects at work, but stuff I do in my free time gets 
> sidelined so much... :/

Heh. You have *no idea* how many half-finished programs I have sitting 
on my harddrive. ;-)

There's 2 fractal generators, a ray tracer, several sorting algorithm 
benchmarks, a lambda calculus evaluator (in both CLI and CGI versions), 
a Mathematica clone, my reinvented Prolog thing, the half-done chunky 
list implementation I was looking at, a stream fusion library, half of a 
virtual machine emulator... you get the idea, yes?

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

Post a reply to this message

"Mike Raiford" <mra### [at] hotmailcom> a écrit dans le message de news: 
4822e86d@news.povray.org...
> Jim Henderson wrote:
>> On Wed, 07 May 2008 15:35:51 -0400, Robert McGregor wrote:
>>
>>> Anyway, the fact that Gilles has been able to create his web comic
>>> around your (mostly) silly posts is quite hilarious to me... Awesome
>>> work!
>>
>> Agreed - and I'm *so* glad there's an RSS feed for it, now I don't miss 
>> it ever, just part of my morning comics routine. :-)
>>
>
> Yup. Me, too ..
>
>
> Its amazing to me that a comic with no actual drawn character could work 
> so well. It really brings to light that it's the writing and not the 
> drawing that really creates a good comic. You could even draw stick 
> figures (see XKCD) and make a good comic, it truly is all in the writing.

Thanks to all who like the comic! I'm not sure how long I'll be able to do 
it (not much I guess) but it's quite fun to create, in a perverted way (the 
topic is really not that funny after all).
The challenge is interesting because there's so few degrees of freedom here. 
There's little room for text in a 4-panel strip. Note that while it's not 
"drawing" it's still a real exercise in graphics that uses the few visual 
resources that Powerpoint offers: : font, size font, colors, position of the 
speech bubbles, some premade vector art... Some future panels will break 
that mold though.
I don't think it's so much different from many panel strips out there where 
actual drawing consists in copying the same premade characters again and 
again. A lot of the comic strip tradition is really stand-up comedy on 
paper.
Strangely, I'm not very fond of "chatty" comics, as I prefer mute, 
expressive images (there are some wonderful Calvin & Hobbes episodes like 
this that look like Japanese engravings) but then it's much, much, much more 
difficult to do and requires actual drawing skills.

G.

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On Thu, 08 May 2008 13:02:23 +0100, Invisible <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:

>
>...or, converstly, even if I could draw I'd still make a suckworthy 
>comic. :-/

Now that is a skill that could be useful :)
-- 

Regards
     Stephen

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On Thu, 08 May 2008 12:51:54 +0100, "Phil Cook"
<phi### [at] nospamrocainfreeservecouk> wrote:

>
>If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them,  
>maybe you can hire the POV-Team; dum dum dum, dum dum da.

To be done after Pov ver 4.0 and Free Moray ;)
-- 

Regards
     Stephen

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Stephen wrote:

> To be done after Pov ver 4.0 and Free Moray ;)

Is Free Moray something like Free Willy?

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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On Thu, 08 May 2008 15:10:33 +0100, Invisible <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:

>Stephen wrote:
>
>> To be done after Pov ver 4.0 and Free Moray ;)
>
>Is Free Moray something like Free Willy?

No it is like a free bus pass! You have to wait until you are too old
for it to be of any use :)
-- 

Regards
     Stephen

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Invisible wrote:
> Stephen wrote:
> 
>> To be done after Pov ver 4.0 and Free Moray ;)
> 
> Is Free Moray something like Free Willy?
> 

Free hagfish! Come an' getcher free hagfish!

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On Thu, 08 May 2008 06:41:24 -0500, Mike Raiford wrote:

> Its amazing to me that a comic with no actual drawn character could work
> so well. It really brings to light that it's the writing and not the
> drawing that really creates a good comic. You could even draw stick
> figures (see XKCD) and make a good comic, it truly is all in the
> writing.

Absolutely - and I think even if you didn't know Andy, the episodes cover 
things that are fairly common IRL, so it's got a good general appeal.

Jim

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On Thu, 08 May 2008 15:09:19 +0200, Gilles Tran wrote:

> there are some wonderful Calvin & Hobbes episodes like this that look
> like Japanese engravings

Agreed - I have a couple that are in my daily list that are fairly chatty 
- and they're there just so I can skip them.  Which I know is weird, but 
growing up I'd read comics in the newspaper, and I'd skip them there as 
well.  If I didn't include them, it wouldn't feel right for some reason 
(I tried that once).

Jim

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Invisible wrote:
> It seems most of the humour in my writings is because people are 
> laughing *at* me for being so stupid... :-/

Is anyone else finding this thread bizarrely self-referential?

-- 
   Darren New / San Diego, CA, USA (PST)
     "That's pretty. Where's that?"
          "It's the Age of Channelwood."
     "We should go there on vacation some time."

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Gilles Tran wrote:

> I prefer mute, expressive images - but then it's much more 
> difficult to do and requires actual drawing skills.

...says Gilles Tran, the noted POV-Ray artist... ;-)

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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And lo on Thu, 08 May 2008 14:55:22 +0100, Stephen <mcavoysAT@aolDOTcom>  
did spake, saying:

> On Thu, 08 May 2008 12:51:54 +0100, "Phil Cook"
> <phi### [at] nospamrocainfreeservecouk> wrote:
>
>>
>> If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find  
>> them,
>> maybe you can hire the POV-Team; dum dum dum, dum dum da.
>
> To be done after Pov ver 4.0 and Free Moray ;)

'Oh no we've been locked in this shed with only a fully operational  
supercomputer, the user manuals, and the complete works of Knuth. What are  
we going to do?"
'I love it when an algorithm comes together'

-- 
Phil Cook

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

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On Thu, 08 May 2008 17:06:48 +0100, "Phil Cook"
<phi### [at] nospamrocainfreeservecouk> wrote:

>
>'Oh no we've been locked in this shed with only a fully operational  
>supercomputer, the user manuals, and the complete works of Knuth. What are  
>we going to do?"
>'I love it when an algorithm comes together'

Has the sun gone to your head? :)
-- 

Regards
     Stephen

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"Invisible" <voi### [at] devnull> a écrit dans le message de news: 
48231f5f$1@news.povray.org...
> Gilles Tran wrote:
>
>> I prefer mute, expressive images - but then it's much more difficult to 
>> do and requires actual drawing skills.
>
> ...says Gilles Tran, the noted POV-Ray artist... ;-)

Well, one of the reasons I ended up doing 3D was that my drawing skills were 
just not good enough to make the kind of hand-drawn art I wanted to do, 
lacking both the natural talent and the formal training.

The good thing about digital art is that one can always say "Poor me can't 
do better because I can't afford X [sofware/hardware]" while with hand-drawn 
art the only person to blame for the lack of results is oneself ;-)

(and even if you're good at it: I was once at a book signing of the French 
comic book artist JC Mezieres. He was friends in art school with comic book 
legend Jean Giraud/Moebius (who could draw blindfolded with both hands tied 
in his back) and when asked about the experience he answered "Picture 
yourself being in music school with Mozart." Sometimes one cannot win.)

G.

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