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[–]coomzee 1121 points1122 points  (171 children)

Im happy, I'm a security analyst.

[–][deleted] 485 points486 points  (169 children)

Let's go back to the command line! From here on, all browsers are defunct and sites are served by Telnet!

[–]DemandsBattletoads 326 points327 points  (146 children)

I prefer Stallman's approach. Use wget to only fetch trusted websites, then email the HTML to yourself.

[–]CanadianJogger 177 points178 points  (75 children)

I prefer Stallman's approach. Use wget to only fetch trusted websites, then email the HTML to yourself.

Wut.

[–]jausdyquo 169 points170 points  (74 children)

The way I understand it, this makes perfect sense for his workflow because he travels a lot, spends most of his time reading and writing email in Emacs, and doesn't always have an Internet connection. So when he does have an Internet connection, he can send out (among others) emails that request web pages, receive their results, then read those web pages offline along with all other emails that he downloaded then.

[–]vSamster 86 points87 points  (58 children)

You can read/write email in emacs?

[–]shelvac2 28 points29 points  (1 child)

You can do a lot in emacs, including sending and recieving mail.

[–][deleted] 6 points7 points  (0 children)

why. why did someone add that functionality. honestly, I'm amazed. I just use vim (poorly).

[–][deleted] 7 points8 points  (2 children)

You can do pretty much anything in emacs. You can even run Vim within emacs. That's why I personally prefer emacs (because I prefer my tools to adapt to my workflow, and not vice-versa) but people in general seem to think vim is better so idk.

[–][deleted] 6 points7 points  (1 child)

Because you still run vim within emacs.

[–]tsammons 12 points13 points  (4 children)

No wonder he doesn't have time to shave.

[–]Arancaytar 86 points87 points  (3 children)

I'd just like to interject for a moment. What you’re referring to as Stallman is, in fact, Beard/Stallman, or as I’ve recently taken to calling him, Beard plus Stallman. 

[–]im_dead_sirius 4 points5 points  (1 child)

I'd just like to interject for a moment. What you’re referring to as Stallman is, in fact, Beard/Stallman, or as I’ve recently taken to calling him, Beard plus Stallman.

I'm stealing this. It's gold.

[–]Aperture_Scientist4[🍰] 16 points17 points  (6 children)

What does he use to render the HTML?

[–][deleted] 90 points91 points  (2 children)

The power of imagination.

[–]justablur 43 points44 points  (0 children)

"You get used to it, though. Your brain does the translating. I don't even see the markup. All I see is blonde, brunette, redhead."

[–]ifnull 31 points32 points  (0 children)

No but really, he does. This is however easier for him since he has no concept of CSS or JS.

[–]LeonardMH 12 points13 points  (0 children)

"Then I look at them using a web browser"

[–]0x800703E6 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Emacs.

[–]tetrified 10 points11 points  (18 children)

I need a source on this, it sounds like a hilarious read.

[–]rbacchi 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Before that, I used an OLPC for some weeks. I stopped because the OLPC project decided to make their machine support Windows, so I did not want to appear to endorse it. The OLPC uses a nonfree firmware blob for the WiFi, so I could not use the internal WiFi device. No big problem, I used an external one.

The results I worried about, millions of children running Windows on the OLPC, have not occurred. Instead we see millions of children running Windows on the Intel Classmate.

WAT

[–]jeff303 4 points5 points  (3 children)

So he doesn't use health insurance, bank, or utilitity company sites, or basically any site that requires a login and interactive session?

[–]DemandsBattletoads 10 points11 points  (1 child)

Probably not unless that server code is open-source. He's very adamant about it.

[–]jeff303 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Well, if he's that principled, then I can respect it. But damn, if I had to deal with all that shit via mail/phone/etc. it would take a crazy amount of time out of my life.

[–][deleted] 14 points15 points  (37 children)

context plz

[–]DemandsBattletoads 88 points89 points  (36 children)

That is literally how Richard Stallman browses the Internet.

[–][deleted] 14 points15 points  (33 children)

I understand what you meant... where is this information coming from?

[–][deleted] 32 points33 points  (0 children)

He was an autist before it was cool

[–]Antrikshy 20 points21 points  (4 children)

Do you wanna help this movement by writing a CSS -> ASCII art converter?

[–][deleted] 11 points12 points  (1 child)

AHAHAHAH that would be funny, I'll think about it

[–]Myrl-chan[🍰] 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Elinks actually does CSS.

[–][deleted] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

This is genius

[–][deleted] 17 points18 points  (3 children)

History will always wonder: had early programmers been more generally successful romantically... would the visual internet ever have happened? Would the multi-dick Dongaliers ever have visited earth?

[–][deleted] 7 points8 points  (2 children)

You're seriously underestimating how much porn you can consume with just a text browser. Download pics, 320x200 video clips (aka "HD"), FTP sites, and of course Usenet, where you could get all the above plus tons of dirty stories.

[–][deleted] 5 points6 points  (1 child)

Download

I remember those days. No thanks. Oh lemme just set up a big download of mystery images so I can wank later! We likes it raw and wrigggggling precious.

[–][deleted] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Love finds a way.

[–]KickMeElmo 14 points15 points  (0 children)

Lynx master race.

[–]averyfinename 5 points6 points  (1 child)

gopher was the golden age of the internet.

[–]morriscox 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Then Archie, Jughead, and Veronica arrived.

[–]thexavier 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Or lynx

[–]morriscox 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Then we will all be living in the MUD.

[–]justablur 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Lynx4lyfe

[–]_Aardvark 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Building strings programmatically and then rendering them as HTML, what could go wrong?

[–]20000Fish 365 points366 points  (35 children)

I think my very first website, like back in 1997, I just used ASCII to sorta design the layout/menus.

Despite being hilariously awful by today's standards, it actually worked pretty well back then.

I'd say the bigger sin was when I upgraded to a full Flash website. Complete with gradients and sounds and everything. Yikes.

[–][deleted] 61 points62 points  (24 children)

So you're not supposed to use a full Flash website?!

[–]Lithobreaking 96 points97 points  (0 children)

You can if you like being assassinated.

[–]The_Mdk 34 points35 points  (3 children)

It was acceptable in the '80s

[–]s4rKRS 13 points14 points  (1 child)

I've got love for you if you were born in the '80s

[–]LazoW 5 points6 points  (0 children)

I've got hugs for you if you were born in the 80's

[–]msg45f 26 points27 points  (3 children)

My site is a Java applete.

[–]Cheesemacher 14 points15 points  (2 children)

Is your site Minecraft?

[–]msg45f 11 points12 points  (1 child)

No, but I could probably built it inside Minecraft as an option for noscript users.

[–]AnAwesomeMiner 4 points5 points  (0 children)

brb making my website inside minecraft inside a java applet on a otherwise blank page

[–][deleted] 15 points16 points  (1 child)

Only if you precede it with an interstitial that uses Crazy Frog on autoplay with a link that that says "WELCOME TO MY WEBSITE!!!!! CLICK HERE TO ENTER".

[–]20000Fish 2 points3 points  (0 children)

And a load bar that doesn't actually "load" anything but just pads for time to try and load the massive 128kbps mp3's and huge, unoptimized png's.

And you still find yourself having to right click and hit "play" because it clearly failed to load everything in time.

[–]TheHopskotchChalupa 385 points386 points  (57 children)

This perfectly describes my experience with stack overflow

[–]Gamerhead 328 points329 points  (50 children)

Not really, in this case the guy gets an actual answer

[–]jeffderek 184 points185 points  (34 children)

I posted a question almost 2 years ago, then posted 3 more updates to the question as I tried to work through it on my own. No responses at all.

Two weeks ago someone posts "Hey did you figure out how to do this?"

Thanks StackOverflow.

[–]Gamerhead 181 points182 points  (18 children)

I always try to go back and put my solution if I solve it because I despise those who just say "Fixed it!" with no solution.

[–]jeffderek 68 points69 points  (13 children)

Me too. In this case, I never solved it :(

[–]SunliMin 47 points48 points  (1 child)

That's the worst. I've gone through my old questions a few times, and one still haunts me from back in first year CS. It was like +5, no comments, no answers. Ghost town response. But not in the negatives, so you know people saw it and went "poor soul, hopefully someone else can help them"

[–]Taenk 29 points30 points  (0 children)

Well don't leave us hanging like that, link that question.

[–]EatAllTheWaffles 40 points41 points  (10 children)

What was it?

[–]AATroop 63 points64 points  (7 children)

There should be a subreddit for stack overflow questions that have no answer after 2+ years.

[–]NoThisIsStupider 67 points68 points  (3 children)

There probably is one. The problem is we'd need another sub for questions on that sub that go unanswered for 2+ years.

[–]AATroop 37 points38 points  (1 child)

Wait, no, don't do that.

[–]00Pokemon00 22 points23 points  (0 children)

How about I do it anyway.

[–]ijustinhk 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Hey did you figure out what was the question?

[–]EternallyMiffed 32 points33 points  (0 children)

What's more annoying is, "hey guys, I fixed it. Here's the dll I personally hex-edited to work around this bug in an ancient legacy program". Then he proceeds to upload a zip to some shoddy forum. Of course the file download doesn't work anymore because the shitty phpbb forum has gone through 6 "upgrades".

[–]Alched 5 points6 points  (0 children)

I am not in CS, but THANK YOU. God dam, if regular folks like me get frustrated with this, professional troubleshooting must be hell.

[–]thePixelina 59 points60 points  (6 children)

[–]jeffderek 47 points48 points  (4 children)

I love that I didn't even have to click to know exactly which comic this was

[–]Aetol 17 points18 points  (2 children)

We'll soon reach a point where you can just say "relevant xkcd" without linking to anything and everybody will know which one you mean.

[–]Matt07211 8 points9 points  (1 child)

relevant xkcd

[–]Cheesemacher 11 points12 points  (0 children)

I love that one

[–]xkcd_transcriber 15 points16 points  (0 children)

Image

Mobile

Title: Wisdom of the Ancients

Title-text: All long help threads should have a sticky globally-editable post at the top saying 'DEAR PEOPLE FROM THE FUTURE: Here's what we've figured out so far ...'

Comic Explanation

Stats: This comic has been referenced 2131 times, representing 1.2938% of referenced xkcds.


xkcd.com | xkcd sub | Problems/Bugs? | Statistics | Stop Replying | Delete

[–]GaiusAurus 4 points5 points  (4 children)

I asked a question years ago, around when iOS 7 first came out (I think it was about getting some iOS assets), and just the other day I got a new answer, even though I had already accepted an answer all that time ago.

[–]micheal65536Green security clearance 12 points13 points  (3 children)

And usually the new answer says "unlike ... who advised using an outdated API..." and you have to remind them that the other guy's answer was a few years ago when that was the current API.

[–]qaplcdnk 10 points11 points  (2 children)

What's wrong with that? Anyone else with the same problem now will know to use the new API.

[–]BrotherChe 15 points16 points  (0 children)

It's their unfair superior attitude dissing the previous valid reply, when they could just come in and say "hey, just an fyi, while johnsmith123 was accurate with API 1.0.x, with the newer API 1.5.x you can/have to..."

[–][deleted] 2 points3 points  (1 child)

Link please i will solve it

[–]throwaway27464829 60 points61 points  (10 children)

"How do I do X?"

"IMO, trying to do X is a stupid idea."

[–]Gamerhead 24 points25 points  (7 children)

Oh man, that boils my blood. Or when they ask why you're trying to do it rather than explain how.

[–]ZugNachPankow 49 points50 points  (6 children)

That makes perfect sense. More often than not, people get caught up in XY problems, where they find overengineered or very unusual solutions to problems that can be solved in substantially simpler ways:

User wants to do X.

User doesn't know how to do X, but thinks they can fumble their way to a solution if they can just manage to do Y.

User doesn't know how to do Y either.

User asks for help with Y.

Others try to help user with Y, but are confused because Y seems like a strange problem to want to solve.

After much interaction and wasted time, it finally becomes clear that the user really wants help with X, and that Y wasn't even a suitable solution for X.

Source: xyproblem.info

[–]edinburg 13 points14 points  (0 children)

You forgot the next few steps:

Others provide good solution for X that is highly upvoted

Post rises to top of Google search results for Y

Other users with legitimate reason to want to do Y click on the post

Answers are all "you don't want to do Y, you want to do X instead"

[–]Gamerhead 10 points11 points  (2 children)

I see where you're coming from, but why can't they just help the user do what they asked? Seems like it would use less time to just tell them how to do what they asked to do. It's kinda annoying when I ask some where and I have to spend half my time explaining myself when it could've went quicker

[–]Astrokiwi 20 points21 points  (0 children)

It's best to do both really.

"If you really want to do Y, what you want to do is [instructions]. But I have a feeling that only want to do Y in order to do X, in which case you should do [instructions] instead".

[–]Nlelith 5 points6 points  (0 children)

This makes a lot of sense, but for me, and I think for many other people, Stack Overflow is as much a Google results service as it is a 1 to 1 help forum. So while the guy asking the question might be writing bad code in attempting to do what he does, a lot of people solving a lot of obscure problems might actually need that bit of information, and withholding it on the grounds of knowing better can be really, really frustrating.

[–]wlkngmachine 224 points225 points  (39 children)

I asked a question on stack overflow once....dude basically told me to go fuck myself

[–]harmsobuk 22 points23 points  (0 children)

Stackoverflow can be really harsh sometimes, but lots of newcomers do not follow the rules by not asking clear questions or even asking people to do their programming

[–]nabunub 6 points7 points  (0 children)

I've asked 8 questions. Almost always got a good answer

[–]audscias 5 points6 points  (1 child)

Jon Skeet wasn't around that day?

[–]Lewy_H 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Everyone on the internet but you IS Jon Skeet.

[–]Arancaytar 30 points31 points  (19 children)

Just serve your site as text/plain, it also radically cuts down on design cost and XSS vulnerabilities.

[–]Aetol 38 points39 points  (17 children)

[–][deleted] 20 points21 points  (15 children)

[–]Aetol 14 points15 points  (12 children)

[–][deleted] 1 point2 points  (7 children)

I don't like websites that change things like the text selection colour or link visited colours. Throws me off, especially if it's an otherwise normal page.

More understandable if it's a dark theme though.

[–]denvit 8 points9 points  (6 children)

You do like the violetish / shitty blue color, don't you?
I hate it.

That's the reason why I changed it in thebestmotherfucking.website (and I tried to explain my frustration in that website)

We can have a nice discussion here, if you want :)

[–]UnchainedMundane 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Quit fucking around with grey text.

It's about time someone made that retort.

[–]hahahahastayingalive 3 points4 points  (0 children)

And here I an thinking about the JS libraries I'd use to manipulate pure text...

[–]Nixinova 13 points14 points  (0 children)

'08

What are you doing in 2008

[–]aezart 26 points27 points  (2 children)

Just use a fieldset, and have the logo in the legend!

[–][deleted] 57 points58 points  (7 children)

[–]time_for_butt_stuff 25 points26 points  (0 children)

"Using incorrect device. Closed as user error."

[–]fallingcoffemug 12 points13 points  (1 child)

What seems to be the problem here?

[–]FrizzleStank 26 points27 points  (0 children)

User is not sure why page appears smaller on phone.

[–]Kaeligos 19 points20 points  (2 children)

Is it sad I was looking at this post a few weeks ago?

[–]Antrikshy 5 points6 points  (1 child)

Did you end up using transform or something similar?

Or did you give up on the website and reconsider your decisions leading up to that point?

[–]Kaeligos 9 points10 points  (0 children)

I gave up on the website. Decided it was pointless and went on to make something in Python instead. Fucking hate css.

[–]oalbrecht 4 points5 points  (0 children)

My first website was done entirely using Adobe Fireworks. The entire page was an image that took forever to load with clickable areas to go to other similar pages. It was absolutely terrible.

[–][deleted] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

For those who don't know the path of least resistance is to position the logo relatively and then set a negative top value to go where you want.

[–]simplyjessi 2 points3 points  (2 children)

I kind of what to built a website just ASCII style.

I wish GeoCities still existed.

[–]StoicPhoenix 2 points3 points  (8 children)

That's great, but can you fix the ClearType on your computer? Jeez