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Long before the √-button on calculators, and the now-antique slide rules and logarithm tables, people actually had to calculate square roots by hand. Like so many other pre-Computer Age tasks, square root calculation isn’t really complicated, it’s just tedious. The simplest – and, as it happens, the oldest – technique for this the Babylonian method: guess the square root of a number and then continually refine the result by taking the arithmetic mean of the result and the quotient of the number and the result, until you’re satisfied with the precision. In other words:

"After dialing Lenox's toll-free number," Tim Wilde wrote, "I encountered an error message being read to me by a friendly female computer voice. At least the URL it read me was using RFC1918 IP space... though I would love to be able to visit it and find out what I was missing on the actual call!"

J. K.'s boss loves the term "generic." Developing a feature that prompts if one specific field is left blank, that will only be used on that page? Make it generic enough to work on any page. Working on an application that will only ever be used by the local government in Podunk, MA? Make it generic enough to be able to easily change every line of text into Swahili, just in case. He didn't know the ins and outs of what was involved to make this possible, he just wanted his team to wave their collective genericification wand over the application's code.

Ever since the first Free Sticker Week ended back in February '07, I've been sending out WTF Stickers to anyone that mailed me a SASE or a small souvenir. Nothing specific; per the instructions page, "anything will do." Well, here goes anything, yet again! (previous: Makin' It Fit).

If Ben E. was given three words to describe his job, he’d use bureaucracy, bureaucracy, and after filling out Form 811B-AW (Request to Use More Than Three Words Form), serious fricken bureaucracy. But alas, when one works for The State, things like serious fricken bureaucracy, vast documentation, and threats of being hired are simply par for the course.

A Problem at the Personal Level From Shari

Mike W. doesn't know what this means, but is pretty sure that it isn't good.

It was the dirtiest look that Derrick had ever seen. As he stood in the foyer, paralyzed by his wife’s dagger-like glare, his mind rushed through all the things he could have possibly done wrong. Did I forget to pick up the kids? Was it someone’s birthday? Crap, it isn’t our anniversary, is it? After a few-second-long silence that lasted an eternity, Derrick nervously stammered a greeting. “Uhh, hi… honey… I’m home?”

Close your eyes for a moment and visualize with me. (Hopefully you have text-to-speech turned on.) I want to try some guided imagery on you.

Without these sponsors' support, The Daily WTF would most certainly become The Weekly-Or-Whenever-I-Can-Scrounge-Up-Time-Between-Work-Home-Galactica-Lost-Heros-And-Everything-Else WTF. And believe me, that's a tough name to squeeze into the logo. Fortunately, TDWTF's hand-picked sponsors offer some pretty neat products & services that are certainly worth checking out.

For nearly two years, Hank T. tried his best to avoid the CEE system. He even made an effort to not know what CEE stood for (though he was pretty sure it was Customer something Engagement). But alas, the inevitable happened and he was finally tasked with fixing a bug in CEE.

Phil was living the dream, working on a Hollywood feature film. The film's budget was in the $35M range, putting it toward the low end for feature films. This movie in particular would utilize a lot of green screen, and they planned to film entirely digital. The director had (correctly) decided that JPEG-style compression that was common to most tape formats was not acceptable, and that they'd need something that could handle raw, uncompressed high-definition video. They were making a movie, after all, not some podunk town's weather report!

"Hi, honey! How was your first day?" Jon's wife greeted him with a smile. Jon didn't look as cheerful, however — he was white as a sheet. His first day had not gone well. Day One

From Vanessa Thomas: "Line 1110 of the source code just made my day."

After spending a few years working at a large, faceless corporation, John W. decided that it was time to move on to a smaller, friendlier company where he could actually make a difference. He eventually settled on "Primatech," a software services company with a dozen or so developers. What really sold him was how receptive they were to change. Each month, they had a "Greatest Improvement Idea Contest" in their dev meeting, where the developer with the best idea for improvement would win a $100 bill. Surely, John figured, a company like that would be rife with best practices.

"It's tough times all around," Matt D. wrote, "and that means we all have to make sacrifices. After receiving this email from management, I'll make sure to do my part and ration my paper clips."

"Not too long ago," writes R.S., "a coworker left the company for greener pastures. His motto was Keep It Simple and, until now, I wasn't sure how simple he liked things."

SQL Injection seems to be a pretty common theme around here on TDWTF. It's not so much pointing out SQL Injection vulnerabilities (aside from that one state that leaked a whole bunch of SSNs), but instead exploring all those "unique" ways that developers try to address the problem. Well, here are three more to add to the mix.

Color Printing on Seven (from Simon)

Chareth was a junior developer, and he wasn't happy about it. Every task that was assigned him from a senior developer was like another dagger made of salt and lemon juice being jabbed into his heart and exploding. The tasks were insulting, too — increase a font size here, add a "sign out" link there — child's play for a guru developer in junior developer's clothing like Chareth.

Sho Fukamachi was surprised to see such great price a new car. "Unfortunately," Sho added, "even that price is too high for such an ugly, crappy car." I'll reserve my opinion until I figure out what that price translates to in USD.

When we last met Dave, he was all about keeping things on the fast track. So fast, in fact, that he rushed several changes with the potential to break everything straight to production on his first day. For better or for worse, his tenacity remained a burden companion long beyond his first day.

There was a small bug in the PHP order form that Jared L. had developed: the form would complain that "$1000" is an "invalid numeric value." While technically true, Jared's boss wanted to make the form as fool-proof as possible, and asked Jared to fix it.

It's a particularly busy week for me: on top of a few looming deadlines, I'll be at Business of Software 2008 in Boston. So, I figured it'd be the perfect opportunity to revisit some classics.

It's a particularly busy week for me: on top of a few looming deadlines, I'll be at Business of Software 2008 in Boston. So, I figured it'd be the perfect opportunity to revisit some classics.

It's a particularly busy week for me: on top of a few looming deadlines, I'll be at Business of Software 2008 in Boston. So, I figured it'd be the perfect opportunity to revisit some classics.

One of my all-time favorite reader comics was Matt. C's #205432 ("Magenta Kong"). It was one of the many great reader comics on 2.6: A Roadblock. Since then, Matt. C has done the unthinkable: he turned Magenta Kong into an actual Flash-based game. It's built from entirely scratch in ActionScript without a single ROM hack in sight.

It's a particularly busy week for me: on top of a few looming deadlines, I'll be at Business of Software 2008 in Boston. So, I figured it'd be the perfect opportunity to revisit some classics.

It's a particularly busy week for me: on top of a few looming deadlines, I'll be at Business of Software 2008 in Boston. So, I figured it'd be the perfect opportunity to revisit some classics.

It's a particularly busy week for me: on top of a few looming deadlines, I'll be at Business of Software 2008 in Boston. So, I figured it'd be the perfect opportunity to revisit some classics.

Since we're in Classics Week, I wanted to share a couple Series 1 comics that ended up getting cut. They star Zach, the lovable FOSS Fighter that also got the cut. Alt1.22: Some Alone Time

It's a particularly busy week for me: on top of a few looming deadlines, I'll be at Business of Software 2008 in Boston. So, I figured it'd be the perfect opportunity to revisit some classics.

It's a particularly busy week for me: on top of a few looming deadlines, I'll be at Business of Software 2008 in Boston. So, I figured it'd be the perfect opportunity to revisit some classics.