Most counter-intuitive device?

[sturmhauke]

@winterhawk11

Reverse Polish Notation calculators. Ever watch somebody who doesn’t know how to use one try? It would be amusing if it wasn’t so sad. “Seven Enter Four Plus…”—what the hell?

I wasn’t a math major but I had a very geeky friend teach me to use one back in college. I can do it, but I’m still not entirely sure why anyone would *want *to.

edit: math, not match

RPN is only counterintuitive because it’s not what most people are taught. Its advantage is that it’s completely unambiguous without relying on order of operation rules or parentheses, and therefore much easier to implement on a computer.

[Jragon]

@Punoqllads

Hah. Vi is nothing. Real programmers use ed.

Ed, man! !man ed- GNU Project - Free Software Foundation (FSF)

Sigh Here we go again…

cues four Yorkshire men sketch

I don’t understand the cable guide thing, I always figured that it’s:

1. A numbered list.
2. Those tend to go higher number the farther down you go.
3. Like this one!

I never really thought about the channel button being different…

My nomination goes to Cell Phones, I’m a tech geek, I program, I play video games and I STILL hate those goddamn little things. I JUST WANT TO MAKE A PHONE CALL WHAT THE HELL ARE ALL THESE BUTTONS!? Okay, I’m not that bad, but still there are so many little buttons I want to burn it, I never use the features anyway. I also am convinced that text-messaging was introduced by an agent of the devil to facilitate a sneaky form of newspeek into our vernacular, therefore I spell my texts out. Needless to say that due to this I have sent 3 texts in my life, but they had impeccable grammar and spelling! But that’s another rant.

[control-z]

@Jragon

I also am convinced that text-messaging was introduced by an agent of the devil to facilitate a sneaky form of newspeek into our vernacular, therefore I spell my texts out. Needless to say that due to this I have sent 3 texts in my life, but they had impeccable grammar and spelling! But that’s another rant.

And texting on a regular phone keypad is so damn cumbersome for a fast keyboard typist. Aren’t we supposed to be progressing here instead of regressing? Plus all the damn fool kids getting killed texting while driving.

And get off my fucking lawn you little shits!

[gravitycrash]

I don’t even understand text messaging. It makes my brain hurt.

[WarmNPrickly]

@threemae

Perhaps they ought to be marked in some way to warn someone about the reverse-thread

Every reverse threaded nut I have ever seen has hashes along the corners that are unmistakable. This is always the case on regulators.

Take a look here.

Go down to the picture that says “Y - connectors for hoses”. There are two joints. The top one has no hashes, so it is regular threaded. The bottom has the hashes so it is reverse threaded.

I’ve never seen one that was not marked that way. That doesn’t mean they don’t exist, but it is a very old standard marking.

[mack]

@Kyla

Comcast’s digital cable remote. You can bring up a listing of the current shows and scan through them, which is cool, but the channel listing goes from the low channel numbers to the high numbers. So, in order to scan the UPPER channels, you have to press the DOWN button. It’s totally counter intuitive and I find myself scanning in the wrong direction about once a day.

Think of it as the scrolling arrows on a computer. If you want to get to the higher numbers you scroll down.

The stupid thing about the comcast remote and show guide is that if you’re in high channels and want to see what’s on channel 2 and hit channel 2, the channel changes. It ought to just take you to channel 2 on the guide like time warner and direct tv (the ones I’m familiar with).