Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.

DON'T DO THAT THEN!

Specialty Definition: DON'T DO THAT THEN!

Domain	Definition
Computing	Don't do that then! imp. [from an old doctor's office joke about a patient with a trivial complaint] Stock response to a user complaint. "When I type control-S, the whole system comes to a halt for thirty seconds." "Don't do that, then!" (or "So don't do that!"). Compare RTFM. Here's a classic example of "Don't do that then!" from Neal Stephenson's "In The Beginning Was The Command Line". A friend of his built a network with a load of Macs and a few high-powered database servers. He found that from time to time the whole network would lock up for no apparent reason. The problem was eventually tracked down to MacOS's cooperative multitasking: when a user held down the mouse button for too long, the network stack wouldn't get a chance to run... Source: Jargon File.
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits.

Crosswords: DON'T DO THAT THEN!

Specialty definitions using "DON'T DO THAT THEN!": RTFM. (references)

Alternative Orthography: DON'T DO THAT THEN!

Hexadecimal (or equivalents, 770AD-1900s) (references)

44 4F 4E 27 54 44 4F 54 48 41 54 54 48 45 4E 21

Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519; backwards) (references)

Binary Code (1918-1938, probably earlier) (references)

01000100 01001111 01001110 00100111 01010100 00100000 01000100 01001111 00100000 01010100 01001000 01000001 01010100 00100000 01010100 01001000 01000101 01001110 00100001

HTML Code (1990) (references)

&#68 &#79 &#78 &#39 &#84 &#32 &#68 &#79 &#32 &#84 &#72 &#65 &#84 &#32 &#84 &#72 &#69 &#78 &#33

ISO 10646 (1991-1993) (references)

0044 004F 004E 0027 0054 0044 004F 0054 0048 0041 0054 0054 0048 0045 004E 0021

Encryption (beginner's substitution cypher): (references)

384948954238492544235542544239483

INDEX

1. Crosswords
2. Orthography
3. Bibliography

Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.