How to get an upgrade, BOFH-style
By Simon Travaglia
Published Saturday 17th January 2004 07:59 GMT
Episode 1
BOFH 2004: Episode 1
It's upgrade time again - like it always is when there's money laying about the place not being used - so I scan down the long list of complaint frequencies and pick the HR database server performance problem from near the top of the pile. I love upgrades!
In a word, crap! A ZX-81 with tape drive could almost give better performance than the server concerned, and it's easy to see why - all the money was spent on the chassis, not the internals, to give "room for expansion" which never occurred. With a single processor, 128 megs of memory and a single hard drive, it's all rather depressing. Something should be done.
"But it doesn't NEED an upgrade!" the Boss burbles, trying to hide the executive edition of the mobile phone and accessory brochure he's been looking through. "Anyway, we don't have the money!"
"Well as luck would have it, the beancounters misaddressed the finance reporting output, and it appears that our cost centre is over twenty thousand quid underspent this quarter - due to under-spending in the last quarter."
"Really?" the Boss asks. "How did that occur?"
"We put it down to the fact as that your predecessor was on life support for so long that he didn't have time to fritter money away on 'tat' like cellphones, handsfree kits, etc", I respond.
"Ah. And how much do you expect this upgrade to cost?"
"The HR Database server - uuuh, I dunno, not a lot. Maybe five k in processors, a couple in memory and another couple for disk and RAID card. Under ten?"
"Which would leave the remaining ten thousand for..."
"Projects which you consider strategically important," I respond, playing his game for him.
"Well... I suppose it might be in our best interests to address this," he grudgingly admits, "so long as your budget figures are accurate and you obtain written quotes."
"No sooner said than done," I say.
A statement which turns out to be bollocks.
"And the serial number of the machine is?" the vendor's sales droid asks.
"373847201B."
"B's not a number," he comments.
"It's on the panel at the back, beside the 'S', stroke and 'N'," I reply.
"Well it must be an eight!" he snaps back, oozing condescension.
"Not unless your eights have flat sides."
"Ah, so it's flat both sides?" he asks, thinking digitally.
"No, just the left. ONE flat side, you know, like the letter 'B'."
"The configurator isn't going to like it - it only expects numbers," he warns.
"Tell you what, why don't you punch it in anyway to save me popping down there and punching something myself?" I ask, testily.
"I... uh... >clickety< Well look at that! It did work. So, it's a quad box, four processors and a gig of RAM."
"It's a quad capable box, one processor, 128 meg of memory."
"That's not what it says here."
"But it is what I'm looking at here - I have the box with the lid off in front of me."
"I think you'll find it's got four processors. The configurator is never wrong! Big things with heatsinks on them, and fans."
"Yes, there's one of those. And in the other three slots are some proprietary looking cards with some active components on them instead."
"With heatsinks on them?" he asks, not wanting to give up too soon. "Told you the configurator is never wrong!"
"No. Just small cards."
"Screw-in cards?" he asks.
"No, not PCI cards, just cards," I sigh, putting the cattleprod battery pack into the charger.
"Well let's just skip that. What would you like?"
"A quote for three more processors the same as the original, two gig of memory in 512s, a high performance Ultra SCSI 3 Raid card, and four 15k RPM 36 gig Ultra SCSI 3 disks."
>clickety< "OK, you can't get processors for it, because it's full."
"It's got one processor."
"Yes, but the configurator says it's full."
"Tell it it's not."
"We can't. But we could do a field uninstall, but then it would automatically charge you three hours' engineer time for the uninstall."
"Tell it that the client will do it."
"But you'll void your warranty."
"It's not ON warranty. Besides, I've got the cover off and I'm not certified, so I think we've already crossed that bridge."
"Oh. Well >clickety< it'll only remove ALL four processors, unless we trade the processors in."
"Do that then."
"But you haven't got processors!" he blurts.
"Yes, we have, the configurator says so!"
"But you told me you didn't."
"Yes, when you mentioned the trade-in option, I just realised that they were."
"They can't be, they don't have heatsinks on them!"
"They will by the time your engineer gets here..."
"He'll never accept them - he'll know they're processor bypass cards!"
"Would this be the same engineer we normally get whose specialist technical field is lifting?"
"I..."
"So, we'll trade the four PROCESSORS in on four faster ones. And we'll trade the gig of RAM in on two gig."
"You said you had 128."
"No, no, it was a gig, I'm sure of it now!" I cry.
"He'll count it."
"I'm sure he will, and will not find me lacking. In fact, he can take as many SIMMs as he likes from the big bag under my desk."
"I think you mean DIMMs," he responds.
"Like your engineer is going to know."
>sob<</p>
"Is that all then?"
"No, I'd like to buy a Raid card and four disks."
>clickety< "We can only give you three - that's all that will fit into the machine."
"With ten slots in the front? Oh, how many disks have we currently got?"
"One."
"I think you're lying. And while you can lie to me, I don't think you want to lie to the configurator..."
"I.... seven disks," he sniffs.
"Lets trade them in on four new ones. And a Raid card. Now, what's all that going to cost me?"
"Well, with... trade-in allowance... one thousand three hundred and forty quid."
"Really. It seems a little steep. Can I trade in anything else from my box?"
"That's all you have!"
"So of the eight PCI slots, there's nothing I can cash in on?"
"No."
"I think you're lying. Tell you what, configure me up the cheapest ten meg PCI NIC card."
"OK." >click<</p>
"What's the total?"
>clickety< "1380."
"Givvus another."
>tap tap< "1420."
"And another..."
>clickety< "1460."
"And another..."
>click< >click-click< "You can't, the configurator won't let you."
"Why?"
"Because the bus is full," he sighs, knowing he's trapped.
"What's in the box?" I ask.
"Five high-spec graphic cards with 256 meg."
"AGP Cards?" I ask.
"AGP 8s, yes."
"And how many AGP slots does the machine come with?"
"One."
"And so the configurator tells you that I have another four in there somewhere, taking up PCI slots?"
"Yes," he gabbles. "It's because the AGP Connector's right near the first PCI slot, so if you have a AGP card, you lose a PCI slot."
"Ah, and because I have five cards, I lose five slots."
"Yes," he sighs.
"OK, so I'll trade in the five cards and use the on-board video, drop the NIC cards, now what's the total."
"Minus 53 quid."
"Better. Have the cheque sent to me personally would you?"
"You'll never get away with it," he sneers. "They'll find out."
"Course they won't. It's all in the Configurator. And the Configurator's never wrong! Gosh, wouldn't it be awful if the we asked specifically for YOU to do the install and you returned to work with a box of old parts - and they started to suspect that you'd rigged the whole thing?"
"Make the cheque out to cash then?"
"That'll do nicely. And put an expedited delivery on those parts will you - I'd like to get this sorted out quickly so we don't have to upgrade another of your servers to cope with the load. We've got an eight-way in the computer room!"
>click<</p>
Now to forge a second quote and get the company cheque made out to Computing Access Support and Hardware (or its acronym) too...
Did I mention how much I love upgrades? ®
BOFH: Protecting bodily waste in the public domain
By Simon Travaglia
Published Tuesday 9th March 2004 13:34 GMT
Episode 8
BOFH 2004: Episode 8
"You?re looking pretty cheerful," the PFY observes, as the Boss rolls into mission control.
?Mmmf!? he responds, between mouthfuls of a large apple.
?Mmm??
?It?s this fruit, it?s delicious!? he burbles.
?What, the cafeteria?s run out of fried lavatory paper?? I ask. ?Someone?s going to have to update the menu on their webpage!?
?Funny you should say lavatory,? the Boss continues, ?as that?s just where this item came from.?
?You nicked an apple from the bog?!? the PFY responds. ?That?s hardly hygienic!?
?No, this apple is a direct product of our toilet system!? he snorts.
?You nicked an apple from out of the toilet?? the PFY gasps, wrinkling his nose.
?NO! No, the company signed up to a sustainability and reduced ecological impact initiative a couple of years back, and this is one of the outcomes!?
?How??
?Simple. For the past two years we?ve been sending our effluent to one of those biodome things as a raw product for their planting system.?
?We?ve been giving them crap?? the PFY asks.
?For want of better wording, yes.?
?So does that mean we?re giving our clients a break?? I ask, rhetorically.
?AND THE OUTCOME OF THIS,? the Boss continues, ignoring me, ?is fruit and veg, free for the taking, in the cafeteria!?
?So let me get this straight,? I ask ?You?ve been giving my excrement away to people.?
?It?s crap!? the boss responds.
?It?s MY crap, and I work long and hard choosing the products to eat to make it high yield fertiliser.?
?It would?ve got sent to the bloody sewer system anyway,? the Boss replies.
?If I so choose to release my products to the public domain, so be it. However, if you take something which is mine, which I created, and give it to another ? well that?s theft!?
?Yeah, sure,? the Boss snaps wearily.
?I thought about it, and created it, it?s my intellectual property!?
?I doubt it!?
. . . three days later . . .
?What the hell is this?? the Head of IT snaps, crashing into mission control, waving a piece of paper.
?A ... piece of paper?? the PFY suggests.
?Well?? he asks, ignoring the PFY and addressing me directly.
?I can?t see from here.?
?It?s a letter from your solicitors, saying they?re going to take legal action against the company ? and all the staff in the company who took any of the free fruit and veg earlier in the week!?
?Oh that!? I said. ?Yes, about the company stealing my IP.?
?They stole your excrement!? he snaps.
?So you agree they stole it?? I ask.
?No, I didn?t mean that, I meant it was just ... $hit.?
?It may be $hit, but it was incorporated into a better product without my permission.?
?And so if we don?t?. purchase a licence to your excrement? you?re going to sue us.?
?Yes.?
?But we don?t want your excrement ? it?s smelly and worthless.?
?That may be the case, but parts of my excrement made up the fruit and veg you took, without my permission. And as I don?t license components of my excrement, just the excrement, you?d need a license for my excrement to own the fruit and veg.?
?It?s $HIT!? he snaps.
?There would be few people in the world who would disagree with you. However, my thought went into its construction, and it?s my intellectual property.?
?It?s $HIT!?
?I?m not arguing with you.?
?OK, how much is the licence??
?50 quid.?
?FIFTY BLOODY QUID!?
?Yes, now. Course if you wait till after the court case, the price might go up.?
?That?s extortion!?
?I?m not going to argue with you about that either.?
?But what good is an excrement license to me??
?Well, should you want to use my excrement for something ? in the future ? you have a license for it. And you can keep eating the free fruit and veg!?
?So what PART of your excrement contributed to this carrot??
?I?m afraid I?m not at liberty to disclose that.?
?We?ll I?ll tell the biodome to stop using your crap.?
?It would mean a complete cleanup, start from scratch, to remove all the vestages of my IP from the ground substrate? Very costly. And it wouldn?t help all you people who still have the fruit and veg.?
?So let me get this straight ? I buy a poo license from you for 50 quid.?
?At today?s prices, yes.?
?And you allow me to keep eating free fruit and veg.?
?Yes.?
?And if it transpires that you used a toilet that didn?t empty into the storage container, but into the sewer instead would you refund me??
?Well no, because you bought a licence to use my poo. Contained in that license is the option to use things made from my poo. But you can still use my poo.?
?So if there was none of your poo in the biodome, I?d have paid you 50 quid.?
?At today's prices.?
?Yes, at today?s prices, for nothing.?
?No, for the license to use my poo.?
?Right, well I?m not paying.?
?Well, I guess I?ll see you in court.?
. . .
?Are you really going to take them to court??
?Depends on how much money I get outside of court. If I get a lot, I?ve lined up a private investor who?ll buy all the rights and then charge an annual support fee.?
?If not??
?Dunno, I might settle for a couple of pints and a pickled egg at the pub. So, was that a pear you were eating yesterday??
?You bastard.?
?I don?t think Bastard goes anywhere near to describing the unmitigated scum sucking, bottom feeding toerag that is me. But hey ? who knew $hit could be worth so much?? ®
BOFH: Enforcing the excremental IP
By Simon Travaglia
Published Tuesday 16th March 2004 13:22 GMT
Episode 9
BOFH 2004: Episode 9
So my plan to extort money from company staff under threats of legal action is coming along nicely. The case is fairly open and shut in that the staff consumed food grown with the aid of my excrement, which was in turn used without my knowledge or approval.
As I later revealed, my excrement is the 'fruit' of considerable intellectual effort, both in the selection of food of varying types, and the amount of lager to accompany it so as to reach it's full nutrient potential.
As expected, the weaker staff caved in almost immediately to my threats of legal action and bought licenses to use my excrement. The rest of them though, are waiting to see how things go, so it seems a couple of examples need to be made...
...a day later, the Boss and the PFY aren't happy.
"But I paid my license fee in pints!" the PFY snaps, annoyed, whilst scanning the content of my lawyer's letter.
"If that were true, you'd have a license certificate, surely."
"What, you actually printed license certificates for the use of your excrement?!" the Boss asks.
"Of course! What sort of vendor would I be if I didn't issue license certificates?"
"I paid!" the PFY snaps.
"Alright, have a license document," I say, handing over a tastefully printed document headed with a three letter acronym recognised in the computing community as being synonymous with excrement.
"You can't prove that I had any of the fruit or veg that has your IP in it!" the Boss blurts, placing his summons on my desk.
"You may be right," I say, "but I'm sure that a quick subpoena would sort everything out."
"Subpoena?" he asks. "What for?"
"Just a sample of your DNA - to prove that you now contain some of my IP."
"It won't show anything!"
"Oh, don't worry, I'd subpoena your tissue again if the first test was inconclusive."
"And keep on doing it until you find something I suppose?"
"Oh no. No, we only get two cracks at it - unless you've got three testicles"
"WHAT!"
"Yes, Well you realise that if you've absorbed my IP, any children you have would have to be licensed, and of course the only way I can prove absorption would be through your reproductive organs."
"That's preposterous!"
"I have the documented opinion of a couple of medical experts."
"You bribed them!"
"No," I lie. "If I'd bribed them, they'd say that they needed both your testicles to start with, and if any IP were found you'd need to be subjected to six months of female hormones to cleanse your system. Hmm, I might just make a quick phone call...."
"Do you take cheques?" the Boss asks, snapping like a twig.
"Of course. Made out to 'BIP PLC'."
. . .
As with all good plans, the PFY is there to throw a spanner in the works...
"Course..." he says, once the Boss has left, "I'd need my share."
"Of what?"
"Your IP - for my unpaid consultancy."
"When?"
"When I diagnosed the non-solid portions of your IP."
"?!"
"My opinion on your flatulence. Beta testing if you like. You altered your food intake in response to my diagnosis. Therefore not all the development credit is yours."
"And?"
"And so you owe me credit for what you call 'your' IP."
"?"
"Your product was modified in response to the feedback I gave you! Say I'd licensed some software off you, it was complete and utter crap - the stuff that all your clients couldn't WAIT to be shot of when something - ANYTHING - better came along. For instance. Hypothetically. Now because it's so crap, I'd be placing service calls to you to report the faults in your product, which would, in turn, cause you to alter your product in some way. In effect if you've actually modified your code in response to my service call, which means I'm helping to shape your product with my diagnosis. Now unless you had a contract with me that expressly stated that any problems I logged with you would become the property of your company, I would in fact be owed some compensation for helping to develop your software."
"So you're saying that by pointing out how smelly I am, you deserve a share of my product license fees for helping to develop it?"
"That's what my lawyer tells me," the PFY says, handing over an envelope.
"So you're suing me for a share of my excrement!"
"In a nutshell - to be O'Relily-like" he chirps.
"You bastard!"
"However, I will bring something tangible to the party."
"What's that?"
"I won't tell anyone that the supermarket down the road put you up to this, AND, I do believe that you could claim your food, drink and toilet paper as business expenses."
"Oooo yes," I blurt, penny dropping.
"So I take it I'm a 50 per cent shareholder in BIP PLC?"
"Ah... 25 per cent, and the company will shout you curry and lagers - for research purposes."
"Done!" ®