What's Your Job IRL?

Discussion in 'Random Thoughts' started by MoatsArt, Oct 23, 2016.

  1. Syzygy

    Syzygy Friend

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    Yes, it's the I need a function to do X…let me look for a library to do that mindset, versus just writing the necessary 30 lines of code to do it yourself.

    Edit: …often the real reason that software wants 300MB of memory (or more) to run in.
     
  2. Thad E Ginathom

    Thad E Ginathom Friend

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    I was never a programmer, and I admire the skills. Don't think I ever wrote anything longer than a couple of hundred lines.

    I was a systems manager, and I thoroughly enjoyed the unix shell, vi editor, ex, sed, and all that stuff. When I was a newbie, the accounts system I had been given to manage had an upset with its data. I worked with the package supplier to identify and fix the necessary records and ensure they didn't get imported twice. That, more than anything, was the start of my then-new career. The book, The AWK Programming Language, is less than 200 pages long: it played a bigger part in earning my living over the next decade than any other.

    The neatest thing I did was to write a programme that wrote a programme. I'd heard of that being a neat concept, and then the day came. It was a chart-of-accounts redesign/rewrite that required all the existing records being shifted to other accounts, and not on a simple one-to-one basis. One way or another, it was going to be a hell of a lot of if statements (pattern matches in AWK). Nor was it such a vast thing that the runtime really, really mattered. But it offended me... so I rewrote it as a programme that nested the various "ifs" and output the optimised program. A young colleague who left us and rose in the ranks of consultancy in one of the Big Names, told me later that he always remembered that program, and yes, I had actually done something clever. I was just having fun!

    # this is about comments...

    I always commented my code liberally.

    # ...because they help stuff to make sense

    (and I always was a bit of a leftie anyway)
     
  3. Superexchanger

    Superexchanger Friend

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    I'll chime in.

    I work as a scientist, where I design & build sensors that detect and manipulate magnetic/electric fields. Working happily in industry, after discovering the potential perils of the academic path post PhD and pre-professorship (the "postdoc" trap and the over-saturated academic market that sadly enables it). It's unavoidable in any area of life, but after seeing the sheer amount of provincialism and useless dispute among the professoriate at my particular university, it cemented my interest in more practical applications of science and engineering.

    I'm essentially on my first career (finished my dissertation four years ago, got my first job just before my defense), but enjoying the practical application of advanced nanotechnology to address real problems. I spend about 30% of my time at the bench, 50% of my time in simulation/design world, and the rest is analysis/blue-sky work.

    Of course, about 50% of all that is soundtracked/enabled by some sort of personal audio, and is the reason I decided to wander into this website in the first place.

    Cheers!
     
  4. Biodegraded

    Biodegraded Friend

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    Heh - academia, where the battles are so bitter because the prizes are so small. Yep, been there...
     
  5. gixxerwimp

    gixxerwimp Professional tricycle rider

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  6. Thad E Ginathom

    Thad E Ginathom Friend

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    If I were clever enough, I wouldn't have had to click the link!

    It's not an expression that I have used much, but... add my name to those who didn't really understand it anyway.
     
  7. Pharmaboy

    Pharmaboy Friend

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  8. Thad E Ginathom

    Thad E Ginathom Friend

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    unirregardlessly...
     
  9. Pharmaboy

    Pharmaboy Friend

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    quasi-irregardlessly

    these posts are farther & further than usual
     
  10. Syzygy

    Syzygy Friend

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    So it seems that several somebodies have the IRL job of grammar police!

    I play that role sometimes. Thanks for feeding my grammar nervosa!

    I never knew the origin of "begging the question" was in classical logic. I've only ever heard it used in the modern sense of an obvious question brought about by a prior statement.
     
  11. gixxerwimp

    gixxerwimp Professional tricycle rider

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    Which is how it's been misused so often by reporters and other talking heads on TV that the vast majority have no clue of its true and proper meaning. I first found out what it meant in uni ages ago when a more erudite classmate accused me of doing it (begging the question). From then on I pretty much only ever heard it being used improperly. Oh well, horses back in barns and all that ...
     
  12. JustAnotherRando

    JustAnotherRando My other bike is a Ferrari

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    I am usually a pedant when it comes to language, and have the argument "language evolves quickly, get over it" thrown at me from friends.

    One of the instances where I am happy to accept this argument is with "begging the question". The original meaning is so utterly obscure and counter-intuitive that I embrace the more common, if pedantically incorrect, usage.
     
  13. Roderick

    Roderick Facebook Friend

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    I'm an industrial sauce chef. Most of the stuff I make is mundane stuff, that orange goo they serve at a service station. Some of the stuff I make goes to Michelin awarded restaurants. Yes, they too serve it out of the box :)

    Not the most glamorous job, but I like it. I'm the solo chef in my rather large "kitchen". Not that I don't like people but I rather work on my own. :)
     
  14. zerodeefex

    zerodeefex SBAF's Imelda Marcos

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    IRL I'm @jexby's loaner source. That's basically all I do. I have a nice downtown office, though that he is slightly jealous of.
     
  15. YMO

    YMO Chief Fun Officer

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    I gotten another promotion at my bank. I handle consumer complaints at the bank. If someone goes on social media and is complaining about their bank account, guess who needs to reach out to them at 9 PM....
     
  16. Pharmaboy

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    "I am usually a pedant" (quote from 3 posts up)

    Than came "industrial sauce chef" & "orange goo" -- sauces served at service stations and/or Michelin-rated restaurants (?!?)

    I forgot what an interesting & offbeat thread this is...

    When I was 10 or 11 I was friends with a kid who lived up the street. He had an oddly literal way of thinking. It was the early '60s & news of Vietnam was often on TV (pre-U.S. involvement, I believe). We kept hearing about "guerilla warfare." One day Mike confessed this concept baffled him. "I don't understand how can they train these large, dangerous gorillas to accurately fire weapons" (he wasn't kidding).

    7 years later I was working as an orderly in the local hospital: lots of ER time, ride the ambulance, blood 'n' guts. Mike was fascinated by my medical experiences. He invented a new occupation he believed was needed in hospitals & morgues: "vein strippers." This job involved stripping all the veins from dead bodies to be re-used in some manner he never got around to formulating.

    Weird--and true.
     
  17. jexby

    jexby Posole Prince

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    Exit stage left....
    IRL i just pay to ship ZDs loaner equipment to @Hands since ZD doesn’t want to deal with courier fees from his own wallet.
     
  18. Brian D

    Brian D Facebook Friend

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    Aircraft mechanic for a major US airline. Yes, you can yell at me when your flight is delayed...
     
  19. zerodeefex

    zerodeefex SBAF's Imelda Marcos

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    It's a scam. I actually own the courier service you're using so I'm tricking you into putting money into my pocket by lending you gear.
     
  20. ChaChaRealSmooth

    ChaChaRealSmooth SBAF's Mr. Bean

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    IRL I'm @purr1n's man-slave who has to get loaner gear and audition it first to see if it has any merit. I take residence in his sex dungeon not dissimilar to something in "50 Shades of Gray" where the...tools...are used regularly. I also have to make sure everything is clean.

    Sometimes I dress in a red and white uniform with a white cross on it, yell at kids to walk, smile, and tell people "welcome to the happiest place on Earth!"
     

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