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kentauros
(29,414 posts)Upon having some recent viewings of this, I have pondered if the Coens twisted the colloquialism "It ain't over until the fat lady sings" by having a large lady scream at the demise of Waring Hudsucker. Probably. There's a vague reference to that idea in a book, The Brothers Coen: Unique Characters of Violence. I may have to find it and read it
discntnt_irny_srcsm
(18,482 posts)If not, sorry for boring you.
Some years ago I worked for a company that made avionics instruments. A lot of what I do is write requirements. Requirements in this sense are simply definitive statements written in English upon which to base a test which determines whether the product works as desired. After various team members became a bit mechanical in this writing and a bit of a humorous anomaly became apparent to me.
The unit I was working on incorporated 2 main functions: air data (like altitude, airspeed...) and attitude (essentially, which way is up). This box contained a microprocessor that ran the various checks, calculations and communications routines. Numerous built in tests (BIT) were part of the code. (Power-up BIT or PBIT, continuous/CBIT...) Part of many of the various tests included making a note of any failure in a special part of memory called the fault log.
Somewhere during development it was determined that a good test to add to PBIT would be a test to check the integrity of the fault log. Sure enough, some other genius, operating in rote semi-mechanical mode added a requirement to say that when a fault log fault was detected a record of the fault log should be added to the fault log.
I managed to point out the inherent wisdom missing in this line of thinking before the design review.
kentauros
(29,414 posts)The Department of Redundancy Department?
Reminds me, too, of the almost mythical "triple-nested acronym" according to friends that have worked for NASA contractors. That's an acronym made from acronyms composed of more acronyms
discntnt_irny_srcsm
(18,482 posts)I never have. One of the more obscure SOWs (statements of work) was of the DTUPC type. (Design to unit price constraint)
I worked for a NASA contractor awhile back and quit after 6 weeks. The project manager was giving off these 'oh no they might cancel the project any minute' vibes. I think he was just a nervous/panic person but I wasn't interested in finding out.
Being a contractor is tiring.
kentauros
(29,414 posts)A HERETIC I AM
(24,377 posts)"Something"
"Somethings the matter?"
"Yes"
"Well, what is the something that's the matter?"
"I can't say"
"Why?"
"Because something is the matter"
Have I got that about right?
FWIW, I was a Cessna FBO Parts Manager for a time in the 80's and had to deal with the old fashioned Avionics. Seems to me that conversation actually occurred!
discntnt_irny_srcsm
(18,482 posts)- Something's broke.
- What's broke?
- Not sure what else but for sure the thing that can tell me what's broke is broke.
< we need a scratch-head smiley >