# What HOLY BLOOD WARS exist in your profession? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [May 14, 2013, 7:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300 "2013-05-14T07:08:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2013, 5:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300/141 "2013-06-02T05:17:24Z")
> [@Jragon](#): > > I’ve also seen the colloquial “or” used to mean “and” and any other number of crazy things, but can’t think of any examples. In the mid-1980’s (IIRC), there was a profoundly demented Supreme Court interpretation of the word “and” as used in the Eighth Amendment: > [@Bill of Rights](#): > > Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted. It was an appeal of a ruling in a (utterly frivolous, IMHO) “cruel and unusual punishment” case. The appellant, a prisoner, claimed that his 8th Amendment rights were violated because he wasn’t allowed to watch TV in prison. It just doesn’t get much crueler than that. :rolleyes: I’ll be damned if I can imagine why the Supreme Court even took the case. Anyway, IIRC, the SC ruled that the Amendment says that a punishment must be simultaneously both cruel _and_ unusual, for it to be prohibited. (Sorry, I don’t recall and can’t guess which of these criteria the TV-less prison was imagined to violate, but apparently it didn’t violate _both_ conditions.) SO: It must be improper to burn prisoners at the stake because that is both cruel _and_ unusual. But if we were to start burning prisoners regularly and often, then it would be perfectly acceptable. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2013, 8:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300/142 "2013-06-02T08:57:44Z")
> [@Jragon](#): > > I’ve also seen the colloquial “or” used to mean “and” and any other number of crazy things, but can’t think of any examples. “Can I get you some tea, or a biscuit?” - Doesn’t mean you’re actually limited to taking one, and in fact the two rather go together as a unit. To continue in the hot beverage theme: “Coffee? Cream or sugar?” ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2013, 9:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300/143 "2013-06-02T09:44:13Z")
“Cream or sugar?” – Yes, please. “Both?” – No. Just one. ---
**Author:** ![Jragon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e19b73/32.png) [@Jragon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jragon)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2013, 9:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300/144 "2013-06-02T09:57:09Z")
> [@WhyNot](#): > > “Can I get you some tea, or a biscuit?” - Doesn’t mean you’re actually limited to taking one, and in fact the two rather go together as a unit. > > To continue in the hot beverage theme: > > “Coffee? Cream or sugar?” That’s the inclusive or that I mentioned in the post (aka OR). I meant literally **and** meaning you’re being offered both or nothing. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2013, 10:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300/145 "2013-06-02T10:04:16Z")
> [@Jragon](#): > > That’s the inclusive or that I mentioned in the post (aka OR). I meant literally **and** meaning you’re being offered both or nothing. Precisely. I was offering a couple of examples, as you said you couldn’t think of any off hand. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![drewtwo99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d07c76/32.png) [@drewtwo99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drewtwo99)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2013, 11:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300/146 "2013-06-02T11:12:56Z")
I remember my algebra teacher in high school teaching us the logical meaning of the word “or”. She said something like, “now just because you’ve learned what it really means, next time you go to the drive thru and they ask ‘would you like fries or onion rings’ don’t just answer ‘yes’.” 😃 ---
**Author:** ![garygnu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/garygnu/32/2924_2.png) [@garygnu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/garygnu)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2013, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300/147 "2013-06-02T17:28:57Z")
Oil vs acrylic. Not so much a blood war, just both groups looking down their noses at each other while the watercolorists are busy muddying up their paper over in the corner and cursing their life choices. ---
**Author:** ![jackdavinci](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackdavinci/32/3259_2.png) [@jackdavinci](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jackdavinci)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2013, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300/148 "2013-06-02T18:11:43Z")
> [@garygnu](#): > > Oil vs acrylic. Not so much a blood war, just both groups looking down their noses at each other while the watercolorists are busy muddying up their paper over in the corner and cursing their life choices. This is why I’ve always chosen “mixed media” 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Cheshire\_Human](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/5f8ce5/32.png) [@Cheshire\_Human](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheshire_Human)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2013, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300/149 "2013-06-02T23:16:42Z")
> [@Orionizer](#): > > In Delphi, the with statement. > \ Although I don’t use it professionally, I do my hobby number-crunching with [FreeBASIC](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FreeBASIC), and they have been steadily derating the GOSUB / RETURN as ‘bad programming practice’. No, it’s _exactly_ analogous to the (6502) assembler instructions of JTS / RTS (which is the first programming language I learned). It’s _not_ bad programming practice to _use_ it for subroutines, it is just that _idiots_ can _abuse_ it for bad programming practices. The things they introduced to replace the GOSUB / RETURN, although they force the programmer to use good programming practice, are far less clear than a properly formed GOSUB / RETURN subroutine when reading it months after you wrote it, when repurposing previously written code. ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2013, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300/150 "2013-06-03T00:41:45Z")
One problem in programming is mindless managers who think that every function needs to be commented even if it is self-explanatory, leading to use of the so-called “Bukazoid Documentation Pattern” that looks like this: //Gets a username from a user repository. //parameters: //userId: Type: Guid. Purpose: The userid of the user that you want to get the username of //userRepository: Type: UserRepository. Purpose: The repository that you want to use to get the username of the userid that you passed as the userid parameter //Effects: Calls the repository referenced by userRepository to obtain the username of the user referred to by userId. //Returns: Type: string. Holds the username of the user whose userid is userId according to the user repository pointed to by userRepository. string GetUsernameFromUserRepository(Guid userId, UserRepository userRepository) { //Call userRepository to get the username of the user referenced by userId. string username = userRepository.GetUsername(userId); Log the request to retreive the username of the user referenced by userId in the singleton log available through LogManager under the log entry type of GetUsernameFromUserRepository. LogManager.LogRequest(RequestType.GetUsernameFromUserRepository, userId); //clear all references so that they can be garbage collected sooner userId = null; userRepoisitory=null; //Return the userid that we obtained from the repository in pursuit of the objective of this method return username; } ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2013, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300/151 "2013-06-03T00:53:29Z")
[quote=“Gary “Wombat” Robson, post:119, topic:658300”] I think the greatest HOLY BLOOD WAR in the book business is the traditional publishing vs. self-publishing war. To traditionalists, there is one and only one financial model for authors: money always flows FROM the publisher TO the author. Authors do not pay editors, cover designers, proofreaders, copy editors, illustrators, indexers, or designers. The publisher pays everything. To self-publishers, the author pays all of the costs up front, does far more of the work, and keeps far more of the money. The author also does virtually all marketing. From a bookseller’s perspective, self publishing (well, vanity presses and POD these days) seems to be entirely about eliminating all proofreading, fact checking, and professional design – and then reducing the discounts to distributors and bookstores. Oh, and cheap covers that curl up if you look at them funny. [/QUOTE] In academia, there’s also a big resistance to “competency based” programs that don’t care if you went through a traditional program with admissions applications and required classroom time hours and long nights doing homework problems and movie night on the quad, concentrating instead on whether or not you actually know the material involved in the program, and if you don’t, shows you your gap analysis and teaches you just that, and for-profit models where anyone can pay to be taught whatever knowledge and skills they want and if they can show that they actually learned it and can demonstrate the skills expected of graduates, they get the degree/certificate/whatever. If you weren’t good enough to get admitted to a highly prestigious program or you didn’t have the time to attend, pity you, what you know and can do means squat. People point out that there have been allegations that some of these newfangled programs might not be as rigorous and conclude that the whole thing is just a dollars for degrees scam. ---
**Author:** ![Jragon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e19b73/32.png) [@Jragon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jragon)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2013, 3:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300/152 "2013-06-04T03:23:54Z")
I looked through some of my documentation for a program and found a “strange” use of the word “or”. “The type of the returned value is engine.Data, or the empty interface, so don’t forget to cast to the correct type before using it.” In this case, engine.Data is an alias for interface{} (long story). “Or” means AKA here. You could make an argument that logically it’s a superfluous logical OR that always evaluates to true (value.(type) == engine.Data || value.(type) == interface{}), but it really has very little relation to the logical “OR” (or “XOR”) at all, and in fact I’d argue that its meaning is closer to AND, or perhaps even an assertion of equality or entailment (value.(type) == engine.Data ⊨ value.(type) == interface{}). ---
**Author:** ![Jragon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e19b73/32.png) [@Jragon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jragon)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2013, 10:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300/153 "2013-06-04T10:26:14Z")
> [@robert\_columbia](#): > > One problem in programming is mindless managers who think that every function needs to be commented even if it is self-explanatory, leading to use of the so-called “Bukazoid Documentation Pattern” that looks like this: > > //Gets a username from a user repository. > //parameters: > //userId: Type: Guid. Purpose: The userid of the user that you want to get the username of > //userRepository: Type: UserRepository. Purpose: The repository that you want to use to get the username of the userid that you passed as the userid parameter > //Effects: Calls the repository referenced by userRepository to obtain the username of the user referred to by userId. > //Returns: Type: string. Holds the username of the user whose userid is userId according to the user repository pointed to by userRepository. > string GetUsernameFromUserRepository(Guid userId, UserRepository userRepository) > { > //Call userRepository to get the username of the user referenced by userId. > string username = userRepository.GetUsername(userId); > Log the request to retreive the username of the user referenced by userId in the singleton log available through LogManager under the log entry type of GetUsernameFromUserRepository. > LogManager.LogRequest(RequestType.GetUsernameFromUserRepository, userId); > > //clear all references so that they can be garbage collected sooner > userId = null; > userRepoisitory=null; > > //Return the userid that we obtained from the repository in pursuit of the objective of this method > return username; > > } I’ll be fair and say that package/file-level, class-level, and function-level documentation can sometimes be excused when they’re obvious because documentation programs/generators (eg godoc, javadoc) usually omit the code. So if you have a method called SetValue(value int) it can be useful to have it in the documentation whether it simply sets the value to the argument or if it does some sort of normalization or bounds checking because somebody might be using a documentation generator and not using the actual files. There’s really no excuse at the line-level though. ---
**Author:** ![doverpro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/838e76/32.png) [@doverpro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doverpro)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2013, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300/154 "2013-06-04T17:33:00Z")
> [@usedtobe](#): > > Small hijack, if you please: > > First: at last, a current gen IT person who sees “Cloud Computing” for the massive security breach it is. > > As to mainframe security: What happened to ACF2? > While not familiar with Top-Secret, I am quite familiar with the RACF v ACF2 debate. > There really shouldn’t be. RACF is the equivalent of letting everything execute at admin level authority, and wondering why the bad guys can break your security at will. > > IIRC (and I’m certain I do) RACF allowed anyone access to anything UNLESS a specific rule had been entered to block it. > ACF2 disallows access to anything by anybody UNLESS they have been given specific authority (read, update, create, delete/rename). > (yes, you create “profiles” for different groups - “assign newhire same security as ddapgmr”. > > Please say we’re learning about leaving the keys next to the lock? RACF has had the PROTECTALL option for quite some time now, which essentially makes it operate the same as ACF2. Really, all three products do a fine job. And they do it better than security on any other platform. ---
**Author:** ![the\_diego](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7bcc69/32.png) [@the\_diego](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/the_diego)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2013, 9:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300/155 "2013-06-05T09:38:51Z")
Real geologists as opposed to mere geophysicists. ---
**Author:** ![CanvasShoes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/74df32/32.png) [@CanvasShoes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CanvasShoes)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2013, 6:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300/156 "2013-06-06T06:22:05Z")
> [@Noelq](#): > > THERE ARE TWO, TWO TWO GODDAMN SPACES AFTER A PERIOD IN A SENTENCE. > > THAT’S HOW WE’VE DONE IT SINCE TIME IMMEMORIAL, THAT’S HOW WE’LL KEEP DOING IT, YA WEE BASTIDS! > > TWOOOOOO SPACES! **TWO**! \_ \_ SUCK IT, YOU SINGLE-SPACE FREAKS! > > :mad::mad: > > Blood feud, indeed. This. And Times New Roman vs. the HIDEOUS Arial font. (Luckily TNR usually wins, as it’s the industry standard, but there are a few mavericks out there…sigh). ---
**Author:** ![Jragon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e19b73/32.png) [@Jragon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jragon)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2013, 6:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300/157 "2013-06-07T06:13:46Z")
> [@CanvasShoes](#): > > This. > > And Times New Roman vs. the HIDEOUS Arial font. (Luckily TNR usually wins, as it’s the industry standard, but there are a few mavericks out there…sigh). Knuth’s Computer Modern is the best font. Ever. Period. I am in no way a graphic designer. ---
**Author:** ![Zyada](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zyada/32/3028_2.png) [@Zyada](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zyada)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2013, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300/158 "2013-06-07T22:54:07Z")
> [@septimus](#): > > I’m afraid that quibbling about C coding and other computer-related trivia is the only way I can participate in this thread. ☹ > > 😕 The most supreme rule of coding is that _you use the existing style when modifying or adding to any body of code_ … (no matter how demented and brain-damaged that style might be 🆒 ). You mean you haven’t run into the “I’ll do it my way because it’s The. Right. Way. and no I won’t change just because someone else did it the wrong way in the file and no I won’t fix their mess because I have Better Things to do with My Time” type? ---
**Author:** ![gaffa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e68b1a/32.png) [@gaffa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gaffa)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2013, 9:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300/159 "2013-08-22T21:58:05Z")
[Apparently some writer for Wired reads the Dope.](http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2013/08/tnhyut-coil-cable/) ---
**Author:** ![GargoyleWB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gargoylewb/32/199_2.png) [@GargoyleWB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GargoyleWB)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2013, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300/160 "2013-08-23T22:03:48Z")
> [@jackdavinci](#): > > Ah, I can see how that would be important in technical or legal contexts. I imagine “or” should always be replaced with either “either/or” or “and/or” where the distinction matters. You’ll still find regional and cultural differences in interpretation. This then can snowball into “including, but not exclusive to, X, unless Y is optional…” convoluted narrative. My preference is a “style definitions” section in a document that explicitly defines “OR” vs “or” usage. You’d be amazed how many engineers and programmers somehow either skipped Boolean logic, or didn’t pay attention to it. Now let me tell you about the nightmares surrounding “may” vs “can” vs “should” vs “shall” 😃 I need a beer just typing this… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300.md?page=7) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-holy-blood-wars-exist-in-your-profession/658300.md?page=9)