Badgers Ate My Software

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Voting on the Summer Romance Contest is delayed because the fucking voting software does not work. The old software worked, poorly but it worked, the new stuff does not and the old software is not available now.

I've spent two-and-one-half hours on this and I've got bupkiss. I'm going to bed.

Hugs,
Erin

Comments

You actually DELETED software?

Frank's picture

Wow...no one does that!!

Ummm..why couldn't we just send a PM to a generic voter_here username, since we are only voting for one story?

Hugs

Alexis

Hugs

Frank

I had noting to do with it ...

and as far as I know no other Wisconsin members of BC tampered with your software, Erin.

Plus badgers are soft cuddly animals that love to play and pounce and purr a lot ... no that's cats.

John in Wauwatosa

P.S. Danielle is off for her heart and aneurysm surgery soon but is hoping to get back to Duty, Honor, Country, Family once she is well. I got an advance copy of an upcoming chapter to test read this morning so I take that as a positive sign

John in Wauwatosa

Nope

erin's picture

I didn't delete it, I upgraded the system. The old voting module doesn't work with the new system and the new voting module doesn't work correctly. There's a chance I can get it to work, having spent hours on it last night, I have some ideas about it's quirkiness.

Hugs,
Erin

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

"Now kids,

laika's picture

here is something you should never, ever, EVER do to a family of wild badgers-

Guh-DEEK! Guh-DEEK! Guh-DEEK! Guh-DEEK!!

Aaaaaah! Arrrrrrrggghhh! No! Oh God help get 'em offa me-"

~Ernest P. Worrell

.
What borders on stupidity?
Canada and Mexico.
.

My sentiments exactly

erin's picture

Having gotten up early this morning and bribed the beasts with gopher bacon, I'm proud to say, the voting thingie is up. If there are any errors in it, please don't tell me as it can't be edited.

Hugs,
Erin

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

Gopher Bacon

Hmmmmm. Big Ten references abound.

"License to kill gophers by the government of the United Nations. Man, free to kill gophers at will. To kill, you must know your enemy, and in this case my enemy is a varmint. And a varmint will never quit - ever. They're like the Viet Cong - Varmint Cong. So you have to fall back on superior intelligence and superior firepower. And that's all she wrote." - Carl Spackler

Angela Rasch (Jill M I)

Angela Rasch (Jill M I)

I've already had to hack

erin's picture

The results and reset the voting because the stupid software closed the voting after ONE vote.

This stuff can't ever have been used in the real world and I doubt if it's even been tested.

No hugs for bad software,
Erin

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

Your efforts

Angharad's picture

in dealing with software written by aliens, is much appreciated.

double hugs,

Angharad

Angharad

Bupkiss

How much is bupkiss worth and is it a commodity that can be traded in the commodity market?

Jill Micayla
May you have a wonderful today and a better tomorrow

Jill Micayla
Be kinder than necessary,Because everyone you meet
Is fighting some kind of battle.

Nothing If Not Yiddish

erin's picture

Bupkiss is Yiddish, meaning "nothing at all". Literally it means "beans" or "big beans" and originally referred to goat droppings that have a bean-like shape. It's from a Slavic (Polish?) phrase that went something like, "Not worth big round beans from the ass of a palsied goat." There is no commodity market in such things but sayings like that are pure gold. :)

Hugs,
Erin

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

There is too

...a commodities market for bupkiss. Or should be, anyway. To a gardener it's not just the saying that's pure gold. My citrus trees love it.

Bobkes

Puddintane's picture

The word is changing its meaning rapidly, and seems to be a fairly new import into English, or Yinglish at least. "Gornisht" (compare German "gar nichts") is the official Yiddish word for "nothing at all," where "bupkis" originally meant something that is worth nothing, a subtle distinction that's being rapidly lost, in the USA at least. The beans referred to by "bobkes" are fava beans, not the more familiar common, haricot, or "French" beans found in US markets. These latter have many common appellations as well, depending on colour and exact species, "navy beans," "Lima beans," "red beans," "snap beans," and so on.

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

Fava beans are shaped roughly like a human foetus, and many amongst the ancients thought it extremely unlucky, or even immoral, to eat them, which may account for the word "beans" being used in English, and *many* other languages to mean exactly the same thing as meant by "bupkis," which is a diminutive in Yiddish, as well as Czech, Russian, and many other Slavic languages to an original "Bob," which meant exactly "bean." Anyone who has experience with animal husbandry will have figured out that many animals produce "pellets" which may look remarkably like beans, so the euphemism of "Beans!" to replace "Shit!", quite common in English, exists in *many* languages, not just Yiddish. Use a phrase often enough, especially when exposure to the Slavic original, "bob," has become far less common, and the euphemism can capture the meaning of the original indelicate word. Bobkes, or bupkis, is in transition, still not indelicate, but beginning to mean "shit" rather more than "beans."

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

We have in English, for example, the phrase "not worth a hill of beans," the expression "bean counter," a derisive implicit suggestion that the things that accounting departments count may not, in fact, be "worth shit."

And then we have the interesting, if surely coincidental, factoid that, in Hebrew, "beans" translates as "shu'it."

Isn't life wonderful?

Cheers,

Puddin'
----------------
Beans, beans, beans
Jessie had some beans
He was happy, happy, happy
And he ate some beans
--- Beans, by Nirvana

Beans, beans, the wonderful fruit...
--- Folk doggerel

-

Cheers,

Puddin'

A tender heart is an asset to an editor: it helps us be ruthless in a tactful way.
--- The Chicago Manual of Style

Heinz...

Puddintane's picture

I suspect a lot of the bad press about beans is that many varieties are poisonous unless properly prepared at high enough heat and time to destroy the toxin, usually the lectin Phytohaemagglutinin, most abundant in red and kidney beans. Fermentation also destroys this toxin, so in some cultures fermentation is a preferred method of preparation, such as for soybeans, as it also eliminates or reduces the indigestible (for humans) sugars which cause flatulence.

And they are fruits, by the way, not vegetables.

It's surprising that there are so many food plants used by humans for thousands of years are poisonous, cassava, many beans, certain acorns, vetch, sweet pea, grass pea, and on and on, for all of which proper preparation and/or limited intake is the key to a long life.

Ricin, the famous poison used in recent assassinations, comes from castor beans, which aren't really a bean at all, which are quite deadly. Eight beans may do one in, and they look quite nice.

-

Cheers,

Puddin'

A tender heart is an asset to an editor: it helps us be ruthless in a tactful way.
--- The Chicago Manual of Style

fruits

I hate to do this, but all fruits are vegetables. Tomatoes, however, are berries, and strawberries are roses.

Jan

True...

Puddintane's picture

...but so are some people. There are also those who distinguish "generic-but-good-for-you" *vegetables* from fruits and many other things whose origin is within the Plant Kingdom, like nuts, berries, and rose hips, so when your mum says, "Are you eating your vegetables?" and you answer "Yes, Mum." you'd best not be referring to chocolate bars and Irn-Bru, even though a chocolate bar is made up of vegetable substances and Irn-Bru is allegedly at least partly vegetable in origin as well.

Cheers,

Puddin'

-

Cheers,

Puddin'

A tender heart is an asset to an editor: it helps us be ruthless in a tactful way.
--- The Chicago Manual of Style

Well, sugar

Me Mom took care of most of that by declaring that sugar was not a vegetable and, having seen sugarcane, it was hard to argue the point. But she also ruled out potatoes and rice as being vegies, and I never got that; but then I have never been able to fathom adult reasoning about many things.

Joy; Jan

Nature, red in root and vine

erin's picture

Potatoes are poisonous, too, though the varieties grown for food in most parts of the world have to be partially sprouted and consumed raw to have levels of toxin high enough to be dangerous. Potatoes are in the nightshade family and the toxin is a potent cousin of belladonna.

North American wild potatoes are a different species from the domesticated South American-origin spud. It's possible to eat them safely though; cover them in mud, bake them in a fire. The toxin will be in the baked mud where it is safe since it binds tightly to kaolin. Some Southwestern Indians liked boiled or fried wild potatoes, so they cut them up and sprinkled them with clean, washed clay before cooking them.

Carrots are in the same family as the hemlock Socrates drank and wild carrots are very dangerous. Cashews come from a plant that is poisonous in every part except the fruit and nut and the nut is mildly poisonous if not heated slightly. So cashews sold as raw aren't completely raw. Almonds and all their kin, cherries, plums, peaches, apricots, have poisonous parts. Apple seeds contain the same posion, laetrile, which is a chemical that can release cyanide.

Chili peppers contain a vile substance, not a poison exactly, but most mammals can't stand it. Birds can't even taste it so they eat the peppers and spread the seeds far away. Humans, a contrary breed, seem to like the taste of capsaicin or, at least, some of us do.

Let's not talk about mushrooms.

Onions, grapes, chocolate, tea and coffee contain substances poisonous to dogs and cats but not humans unless the doses are gigantic. Broccoli is poisonous to cattle and plants grown in certain places (like near the Greasy Grass River) will kill or sicken horses. Frozen then thawed and sprouted grains like millet and rice can contain enough cyanide to kill sheep.

The skin of some birds is poisonous, so is the liver of most carnivores. And then there's fugu.

Ah, natural foods are the best, aren't they? :)

Hugs,
Erin

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

Bopkiss

I was a naive and innocent teenager so never got to try this but I understand that it involved snogging on a dancefloor in the 1960's.

The problem with most software is that the supplier usually sells it for an exorbitant fee and the buyer then debugs it. Version 2 then is bug-free until the supplier adds the upgrade, introduces new bugs and sells it... a self-defeating circle if ever I saw one.

If computers are supposed to help us do things quicker, why do we spend half our lives waiting for them to decide whether or not to work?

You must have infinite patience, Erin. I would by now have a lot of broken glass because the *&@%$£#* thing would have gone through the window - closed, of course.

Susie