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1:00 PM
@QAdley Yellowee. The business pages to be exact. We have a lot of information we need to print out, but it's stored in a special way in the database so we can't just print it out easily with a loop. I'm going to need to come up with a templatetag of some sort which loops through a set of fields.
Also, is that page loading really, Really, slow for you?
I've noticed it here at the office, but I'm not sure if it's just something wrong with the office.
@Wipqozn Yes
@QAdley Well that's not good.
We released a new major version last night, so hopefully we didn't break something.
@Wipqozn Chrome dev tools confirm: Your site is hella-slow
Latency for the first GET: >11s
Excuse me will I e-mail the server admin.
and ask him why the servers are slow as a tortoise.
We had this on our new site (rollout last week), but only some of the time. Can't remember what fixed it though.
Note: I'm still waiting for the page to load
Things to do in Halifax: Wait for this web page to load - a fun evening for all the family.
Well over a minute now, and the page is still blank
1:04 PM
@QAdley Yup. Took around a minute for me too.
Just emailed our server admin. I'm hoping it's just our server hosters doing some work or something, that will be completed shortly.
Weew! Mario Marathon starts in just under 2 hours. =3
Our beta site seems to be fine.
@Wipqozn Still waiting...
@Wipqozn At work
1:08 PM
@QAdley It's The WEbsite is Down.
Just seemed appropriate to my current situation :P
> Cory has created a poster for the Mario Marathon 5 charity drive, which is basically a bunch of people sitting around playing Mario in order to raise cash for Child's Play. People who contribute get entered into a raffle, and the winner gets the poster along with some other goodies.
Oh hey, cool
@QAdley Yes.
It has loaded!
On FF at least, still waiting on Chrome
FF: 3 minutes
Chrome has now finished!
9 minutes
Incidentally, they seemed to finish around the same time, indicating the server is unhanging itself and fulfilling both requests together
@fbueckert I saw this and immediately thought of you. >.>
user image
2
1:17 PM
@QAdley Yeah, it's slow. WE've tested a few different sites and that one is the only with the problem.
On the bright side, the CEO is currently stuck three provinces away due to her car breaking down, so she probably won't notice.
@Fluttershy Heh.
@Wipqozn Ha, all fine then!
@QAdley And here I was all worried about nothing! :P
@Wipqozn I'm sure she'll be in a good mood when she finally returns, and everything will be just hunky-dory
Who is the blonde girl in the deus ex human revolution opening scene?
1:24 PM
Heh. Arqade.com is by far and away the highest donating site for the Mario Marathon.
@fbueckert Yes.
@QAdley While she was gone we launched the major revision we've been working on for two months, so I'm sure she will be. Assuming that we've fixed this server problem by then :P
@Wipqozn We had a release after 18 months of inactivity. Big deal. Seems to be ok though, no major issues yet!
@QAdley Oh snap.
Well, you put me in my place!
OKay, well the problem is no longer my responsibility. So I can finally return to what I was doing before this happened.
@QAdley My last job was basically tech-of-all-trades. Everything I inherited was written in classic ASP.
The intranet had random slowdowns that made it almost impossible to do your job sometimes. I spent months trying to figure out what was going on.
Never did manage it; as the sole programmer, I kept getting handed stuff that needed to be coded right now.
1:31 PM
@fbueckert Sounds like a fun terrible experience.
@fbueckert Sounds bad. We're a small, but reasonably old company. We do stuff slowly, and for the most part very well.
Sometimes overly cautious for my liking, but meh
@QAppei Good Morning!
@QAdley This is better than doing things right now, badly, because it absolutely, positively, had to be done yesterday.
Even though you only got told about it today.
@fbueckert Yes. That doesn't happen here thank God, we release stuff when it's ready, and never before, and we never tie ourselves too much to dates. Hence 18 month release cycle!
0
Q: When does Sharpshooter become useless?

ThanatosHow much Critical Chance is required to make the Sharpshooter Buff useless in comparison to other Passives like Cull of the Weak?

0
Q: Who is the blonde girl in the Deus Ex: Human Revolution opening credits?

ickleislandsDuring the opening credits for Deus Ex: Human Revolution, after you've played through the epilogue and been caught by Barratt, and subsequently thrown through the glass wall you're presented with a nice cinematic where they're rebuilding Adam and a blonde girl appears in this video multiple times...

1:34 PM
@QAdley We're similar here. We originally had a two-week plan for this thing that took us two months, but after we started we realized it was going to be a lot more work to modify the old code than we realized, so the release date just became "eventually".
@QAdley In addition to my coding responsibilities, I also had the responsibility of keeping the call center computers going, making sure the network stayed up, and trying to keep the database servers from overloading too badly.
My funnest horror story:
@fbueckert At least it will look good on a resume.
@Wipqozn Yes. We have a stack of features to add, we work on them for the next release, if they're not ready, they just roll over to the next one.
@fbueckert You need a new job
6 mins ago, by fbueckert
@QAdley My last job was basically tech-of-all-trades. Everything I inherited was written in classic ASP.
We were upgrading our database server from SQL 2000 to 2005. This absolutely couldn't be down, even for a second.
1:35 PM
@Wipqozn Ah! Congratulations for getting out of that one
So we dumped 2005 onto a separate server, and migrated all the data.
In order to ensure that the data stayed up to date while I was testing to make sure everything was working, I set up some wonky "pass through" replication from the original to the new.
No sooner do I start testing, then I get the operations manager breathing down my neck that we need to switch over right freaking now!
@fbueckert I worked for a popular (~100,000 hits a week) student news site. There was no dev site, you just worked over FTP, saving changes to the live site as you made them. That was fun.
Happily, I didn't work for him, so I told him testing would take time, and I would switch it over once I was sure it would work right.
1:38 PM
@QAdley that should have led to some... funny situations indeed
He goes right past me straight to the CEO. Who comes down like the hammer of god and told me to switch it over instantly.
Also, it was Wordpress (not bad!) with ~50 plugins, some of which were custom-made by various contractors. We weren't allowed to upgrade WP in case it broke something, it's probably still on 1.5 to this day...
So I did. And everything promptly blew up.
I pulled SO much overtime that month reverting it and putting it all back properly.
@fbueckert did you make them sign a waiver to release you from responsibility?
@QAppei That's what a CYA email chain is for. :P
1:40 PM
@fbueckert Was this before or after you'd started looking elsewhere? :-P
@QAdley Oh, after. Definitely after.
@fbueckert bah, I've been given the blame even with a mile long CYA chain
I was sort of happy it went kaboom; I told him it would, and he didn't believe me.
@QAppei Only competent tech on staff; blaming me would've led to me quitting.
that bit them in the ass in the end, but stressful anyway
@fbueckert I'm doing some freelance work at the moment, the client's method of telling me what to do is to send emails. CC'd to everyone, or sometimes less than everyone. I have to leave any task for a week or so before I start to allow the requirements to 'settle'.
@fbueckert Haha, you should write some of it up for TDWTF
1:41 PM
@QAdley I would've loved to have been able to do that.
@QAdley I love that site. I have one of their mugs here at work.
@fbueckert This client doesn't really have a clue how stuff works, so it's easy to make up lies
@QAdley Programming 101
The first piece of work I did for her was setting up her Twitter account. She thought £1000 was a reasonable fee.
@QAdley The most dangerous clients are those who HAVE taken programming 101.
And then think they can do your job better than you.
@fbueckert But not any subsequent courses
1:43 PM
@fbueckert let them try
The operations manager was one of those.
or maybe not if you have to clean the mess afterwards
Happily, my current boss believes me when I tell him it's really complicated and he should leave me alone for a while so I can think about it and figure it out.
@QAppei In a situation where everyone is stupid, exploit, exploit, exploit
@QAdley Wow.
1:45 PM
Put in hideous contraptions that only you can decipher, leave company, but agree to work as a 'consultant' for $$$.
@QAppei This guy was an absolute office politics nightmare. Totally useless at his job, but could play the CEO like a fiddle.
@QAdley need an assitant? :P
@Wipqozn Yes. I hate working for her, but the money's too good.
Absolutely HATED him.
@fbueckert the worst kind
1:46 PM
@QAppei I'll let you know when I can't take it any more :-P
@QAdley I need a job like this.
@fbueckert She's a Baroness. Helps to know Barons n' shit.
@QAdley Ah, nobility. We don't have that here in North America. :P
@fbueckert Yes you do, you just think that because there's no obvious pageantry you don't have a class system.
On the plus side, that last job was my very first coding job out of college. If I can hack that, and succeed, I can do damn near anything when it comes to code.
1:48 PM
@fbueckert My coding is stagnating at this job, worst thing about it.
@QAdley Tell you what: I'll put in a good word for you at my old job. :P
@fbueckert Ha, thanks!
Nothing builds skills like winging 95% of your job.
Another fun story:
The upper management is paranoid as all get out.
They thought the building management was out to get them, and if they found out we were planning on moving into a different building, they would lock us out.
So, they tell us that they're thinking of moving. This is just FYI, so we can think about what needs to get done.
They keep saying that, six months later. We've stopped believing them, as nothing is being done to actually move.
We get pulled into a meeting one day, with all the managers.
And get told that the company has to be moved. NOW.
We had until the end of the month to get everything set up and going.
This was already near the end of the month. We had a grand total of three business days to do it.
I point out that no way, no how, can we do it in three days.
The CEO responds with, "Oh. Just work the weekend too."
@fbueckert classic
Keep in mind this is a 24/7 call center. And downtime was not allowed. Period.
1:56 PM
@fbueckert work in the time between the seconds
We were supposed to move into a new area, with substandard equipment (our tech budget was non-existent for anything not an emergency), and get it all up and running with no downtime in three days.
you can do that, right?
And the tech staff at the time consisted of all of three people. Me, another programmer, and our phone switch guy.
@fbueckert What kind of calls were you doing? In or outbound?
@fbueckert So, they think tech guys are wizards?
1:58 PM
@QAdley Inbound.
@Wipqozn Oh, we're wizards. We're just constrained by little things called sanity.
All in all, it took us three months to duplicate environments and transfer everything over.
@fbueckert Support?
I became the de-facto guru of all during that time, as neither of the others wanted any more responsibility.
@QAdley Translation. Over-the-phone translation.
@fbueckert D:
@fbueckert seriously?
I am pretty sure that everything is trying to piss me off today
2:01 PM
If ever you get a boss that says, "I don't know how to do your job, but it can't take THAT long", run. Run now, run far, and don't stop.
3
like everything I touch performs some completely random action
@QAppei Seriously.
Can somebody check my sanity
1
A: Who is the blonde girl in the Deus Ex: Human Revolution opening credits?

PoindexterThat would be Megan Reed, Adam Jensen's girlfriend. At this point in the story, Adam believes that she is dead.

@fbueckert I have to struggle with things like that everyday
Megan Reed has brown hair
not blonde
Both before the cutscene and after the cutscene
2:03 PM
1
Q: Is ice damage reduced on impact?

happy_emiAccording to developers, Diablo 3 doesn't have elemental damage effects, with the exception of ice which chills/freezes. However the developers said that, because of this added effect, the cold damage is reduced, when compared with other elements. But I don't understand what this means. It's eith...

0
Q: Does Battlefield 3 stop you from spot-spamming?

ApoorvaJDoes the game have a built-in safeguard from spot-spamming (pressing the spot button repeatedly, while aiming in suspicious/distant/smoke-filled locations)?

0
Q: Who are the seven mysterious individuals during the opening scene in Deus Ex: Human Revolution?

ickleislandsDuring the first cutscene in Deus Ex: Human Revolution, who are the seven mysterious individuals that Bob Page is speaking to as their voices are distorted and likenesses hidden?

I had a bit of free time at one point, so I started re-designing our website. I let all and sundry know I'm doing this, as the CEO's been talking about needing to get it re-done in the first place.
No objections. I demo some of what I have to the CEO a little while later. "That looks great!"
A couple days later, I'm told to stop working on it. No reason, no explanation, nothing.
@fbueckert usually the explanation is "you're stealing time from your REAL work"
@QAppei Technically, my real job WAS coding. I didn't have anything beyond routine maintenance tasks at the time (which was technically outside my job description).
The watch words for everything I did there was "patch and pray".
No time for proper testing. Get it out the door as fast as possible.
And then get yelled at when it breaks.
Man, that was a frustrating job.
@fbueckert I don't know what it's like there, but usually here in Italy if you apply as a coder you also have to be a DBA, graphic designer, software architect and sometimes linguist (to understand what the client is asking you)
can someone help me with belial?
i am in front of his door
i just want to progress into act iii
2:08 PM
@ayckoster What difficulty (also, no, because I'm at work)?
inferno :)
@ayckoster Class and DPS?
he is a demon hunter
on inferno
dh 65k and about 100-120 resistance to all
It should be pointed out that if you can't beat Belial, Act 3 isn't going to be any friendlier.
2:10 PM
20k health
i just cannot kill the adds :(
@ayckoster He one shots you, doesn't he?
dunno i have not tried since i upgraded my gear heavily
i do not want to spend like 100k beating him
@ickleislands You're the DH expert. I'll leave this to you.
the snake guys before belial do not oneshot me anymore
@fbueckert I am at work :)
2:12 PM
@ayckoster If I was at home, I'd happily help you kill him.
I just managed to kill him solo yesterday even with the enrage timer.
@ayckoster if you haven't tried since the nerf then I would suggest doing so - you should be able to get into P3 quite easily now and the rest is just avoiding stuff
@fbueckert: can u help me tonight?
i can try a few times
perhaps i get lucky
@ayckoster Uhh. Maybe? No guarantees; Friday nights are usually pretty busy.
If not tonight, tomorrow, definitely.
ok thanks
45 minutes til Mario Marathon! =D Weew!
2:15 PM
@ayckoster isn't that a little too low?
...bullshit
I have 20k hp and i'm still on act 3 Hell
well i guess you do not have 65k dps
the problem is that it costs a lot to gain huge dps and still have good health
especially after the asi nerf
2:17 PM
@ayckoster Try playing melee sometime. :P
He was fucking dead. He didn't shoot his lazer. I died anyway. whargarbl.
It's even worse for those who have to take hits.
@QAdp Poison patch, maybe?
nope, just regular gluttony
@QAdp did he shoot before?
@QAppei er what?
2:20 PM
did you move close to him when he was stopping shooting a previous beam? sometimes hit detection is glithcy
tried, still very hard
got him to 1/2 hp 2. phase
@QAppei no, he was just about to start hitting
I'm now shooting for Basement Boy hoping to unlock something massively overpowered or something
and I got hit again.
aornhpoaijrfoiemjfpoiwhn
@ayckoster it's a boss fight, it isn't supposed to be 'easy'
@QAdp uh... the something-boy achievements don't unlock anything, you know?
what does then? ._.
I think I should have the "all cave bosses" achievement already but it doesn't seem so
2:31 PM
@QAdp you should go for the "kill mom's heart X times" achievements
@QAdp Mostly killing Mom X times. :P
but I can't kill her the first time, dammit!
Uhh. See if you can unlock Cain. He starts with higher damage.
You need to amass...50 coins, I think?
Is someone doing tag or question maintenance? There are more than 2 different games on the front page
oh god
I corner the red walking eye-less guy and blow it up by a X-marks-the-spot rock
2:36 PM
@fbueckert If I remember it right it's 55
@QAdp throttle your CPU in the power control panel
It aspolodes, I see heart and the rock drop
I go to grab my looYOU DIE
one bomb only drops him to corpse and he still damages you when ran over
ieaurhew0rhwoeirninjfaoir'o3wj
@QAppei Either way, best chance of getting it is to get the slot machine to spit out a dollar.
@fbueckert yup
Game gets MUCH easier once you unlock a few things.
And then gets harder again after you kill Mom a few times.
2:40 PM
@agent86 I could just set the graphic quality to Medium
@QAdp this works too :P
I find the game runs super-fast on my machine, and if I don't slow it down somewhat it's a pain to play. Of course, maybe that's the way it's supposed to run? beats me. if it's a cheat/exploit, oh wellz, maybe they'll revoke my steam achievements :O
game?
does it have an FPS limiter built in or similar?
@ickleislands Binding of Isaac
I feel like dropping my FPS voluntarily hurts more than it helps
since you can't really control by how much it slows down and it's so variable
Hmmm, it's a Flash game
So it has a fixed FPS
Flash defaults to 24, but of course the developer can set it higher
Is Gods and Kings out already? Wasn't keeping track of the release date
> June 19, 2012 in North America, and is due to be released on June 22, 2012 in the rest of the world
2:56 PM
@YiJiang the crazy amount of questions in the last day say yes
@YiJiang it kind of snuck up on me as well. logged into steam one day and it was all "BUY THIS IT IS RELEASED!!!" and I was like wtf?
I should poke Endless Space again.
See if any improvements have been made since I bought it.
@QAdp usually I perform better with lower FPS, but I'm used to movement patterns
It's starting!
0
Q: Move character between accounts

JanI'm planning to buy Diablo III for myself. However, I'd like to create a second character for a friend of mine, who is not yet convinced. So I want to let them play that character (in my account) for some time, and if they like it, they could get their own Battle.net account and we could play to...

3:04 PM
@Fluttershy Enjoy watching others play video games! :P
Special Question Alert:
0
Q: Who ''coined'' the term "scare quotes" and when, citation please, and why the word "scare" there?

dan bloomCan someone send some feedback: re: Who coined the term scare quotes and when? Why scare in the term? Might calling them distance quotes be better? Do you ever use this term in your papers? The OED2 draft additions Sept. 2004 has it from 1956; 1956 Mind 65 3 The ‘scare-quotes’ [aka ‘quote-...

@QAdley I keep trying to hit the fast forward button but nothing is happening!
@YiJiang I have this problem so badly with YouTube's live streams.
I'm so used to skipping ahead through YT vids I'll be watching something, and repeatedly think, oh I'll just skip ahead, why isn't the progress bar coming up, I want to sk-oh. Pause for 10 seconds. Repeat.
Come on Wadsworth's Constant!
3:15 PM
This ELU question is magnificently deranged
@LessPop_MoreFizz 13 questions for the price of one!
@LessPop_MoreFizz I think you'll find the user is magnificently deranged, about a number of things.
> Danny Bloom is a freelance writer based in Taiwan, where the mysteries of the English language still confound him. I'm not much a style guy and newspaper style guides don't interest me all that much, but as the coiner of "crash blossoms" and a few other newspaper terms over the past few years -- ''snailpapers'' for print editions arrive 12 hours late, for example -- I have recently taken a keen interest in the term "scare quotes."
Did @Fluttershy just donate? :P
@QAdley Oh yes. Oh yes oh yes.
Or is it someone else using the same name
3:18 PM
It's like reading a bad Vonnegut fan fiction or something.
@LessPop_MoreFizz That's the spot
Dr Jerome Keating in Taiwan, professor here, told me today: Good researching Dan. My guess on the why of 'scare' is that by using it in a braketed way, one can avoid responsibility, but at the same time label someone and draw upon the fear that others have of the term used in labeling. i.e. that "Damn" Bloom is one of those "damn liberals." Thus all of my conservative friends (all two of them) will be afraid of anything that Bloom says. Cheers, Jerome — dan bloom 3 mins ago
It's true, a local expat newspaper in Taiwan in an oped article about my work with climate , written by a Taiwanese editor, called me "Damn Bloom" and the term stuck with a few people. SMILE, signed, -- That Damn Bloom — dan bloom 1 min ago
> it scares the "bejesus" out of me when I read that word! smile
@LessPopMoreFizz Oh wow: plogspot101.blogspot.tw/2012/06/…
Ok, this is getting to TimeCube levels of wtf
> google for answer, i am crowdsourcing this search now. from my cave in Tawain, dannyb loom 1949-2032
"1949-2032" this guy is fantastic
Whatever this guy's smoking, I want some.
It takes an epic level of crazy to sound that weird.
3:23 PM
I think we should start using "scare" quotes more often
It sounds "fun"
@YiJiang Yes. <.< Yes I did.
@YiJiang Like I said, he's like a character out of a vonnegut fanfic
unstuck in time
he has foreseen his own death
Well, he hasn't reached Carreon levels of stupid yet.
@LessPop_MoreFizz Does he have his own theme song yet?
@QAna I don't know.
We could write him one.
3:25 PM
@LessPop_MoreFizz daaaaan blooooooooooooom snaps fingers to smooth jazz
We should introduce him to ronnie
We just got a shout out. =3
4
OMG I am so unbelievably tired today
@Fluttershy from the Mario Marathon?
@QAdley And then sit back and watch them both implode.
@ickleislands Me too, 4 hour bus ride to look forward to in a bit
@fbueckert That implies they are opposites
3:26 PM
@ickleislands Yep. "A very special thank you to our partner site Arqade. They've managed to raise close to $1300 in about a week."
@QAdley no idea why I'm this tired, it's like it's just kicked off int he last 30 minutes, constant yawning
@Fluttershy nice
@Fluttershy And it only cost us $1200!
@QAdley No, that implies that they're both serious and attempting to understand each other.
yawn the comments just started reflecting it
"Wow, $1,300 from a partner site - can't play at that level"
@fbueckert ronnie/dan bloom fan fiction?
3:28 PM
@QAdley I have a hard enough time attempt to understand one of them. Put them both in a room, and I think I'm going to have to go grab a shotgun to keep my sanity.
@fbueckert get on their level bro. pro much?
@QAna click Initiating reboot sequence
@ickleislands Was that in the chat? Or twitter?
He seems to have got confused about his date of death, it seems he is still receiving letters in 2099
3:30 PM
the chat feed on mariomarathon
you have to login to twitter to chat so it may be twitter also
already scrolled off the page
@ickleislands I'm in the IRC chat feed. =P I just missed it.
Dont see a "history" option for the chat
hometime anyway
@fbueckert @agent86 Ug. I just tried out the crew teleporter. Made the mistake of sending my guys over to one of those automated vessels. Turns out, they have no oxygen on board. Everyone died before I could teleport them back :P
3:43 PM
@Sterno :(
I have had poor luck of late, can't seem to really even get 5 systems in the last couple of times
@Sterno That bites.
I'm still trying to use the "default" ship, but I'm kind of tempted to try some others
But it makes sense.
there's also no doors between their rooms. in general, a bad one to teleport to :P
@agent86 Some automated ships actually have doors.
3:45 PM
@fbueckert orly? I guess I'm extrapolating based on the little "rebel scout" ships you tend to encounter early on
I have a severe dislike for the systems that are "too close to the sun"
by the time I've extinguished the fires, new flare causes new fires. FMFTL :(
Depends on the ship model used.
@agent86 That's why I jump out of those systems as fast as possible.
@fbueckert indeed. generally not worth whatever's there, tbh
I found some sort of automated repair arm that subtracts scrap but heals you between fights, but I couldn't afford it :(
@agent86 Story of my life.
Find awesome stuff...but not enough scrap to buy it.
I know that scare quote question is going to be deleted, but damn I don't want it to be.
Big nuke about to drop, apologies in advance
3:56 PM
@QAdley You're really going to town on all those extra tags.
@fredley re ''This whole page is just surreal.'' – fredley .. please bear with me, i always get my man. remember "crash blossoms"? I used the same MO, these things take time. SMILE — dan bloom 1 min ago
@LessPop_MoreFizz Wonderful
I have been in love with logic ever since my father started me on logic in my teens. Logic of itself cannot give anyone the answer to any questions of substance; but without logic we often do not know the import of what we know and often fall into fallacy and inconsistency. Source: Peter Geach, quoted in Steve Pyke, Philosophers (1996). -- ASCRIPTIVISM by Peter Geach (The Philosophical Review LXIX (1960) pp. 221-225) (Some revisions added by the author included in The Nature of Human Action ed. Myles Brand, Scott, Foresman, and Co. 1970) — dan bloom 16 mins ago
It'd been a really good run until that point, too. I'd had the teleporter by system 2, with about 100 scrap extra
3:57 PM
What. The. Crap.
Logic doesn't seem to be part of this at all.
Now I just lost another game because two systems didn't connect up like I thought they would, meaning I had to backtrack 3 systems to get to the exit. And the fleet was waiting :P
@fbueckert You are trying to make sense of a crazy person
@LessPop_MoreFizz I try to make sense of everything. It's what I do.
@fbueckert I'd try and drop that habit if I were you. More trouble than it's worth.
My job can be simply described as "ordering chaos".
3:59 PM
bored bored bored bored bored

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