[2011-Sep-08] Human Programming is Human Daycare

[Edminster]

yo dawg, i heard you like programming, so i programed a program, that programs new programs, so you can program, while your program, programs new programs.

[DonRetrasado]

http://twitter.com/#!/mrxtothaz/status/1266000157

Well, he tried, anyway.

[cavpollo]

I just subscribed to tell a little myth we had around our school that came to my mind while reading this. But first of all, i gotta say that SMBC is my all time favorite comic and sketch producer =P

Anyway... there was something that was like a myth around school some years ago, and it went by like this:

Once upon a time, there was a student taking a computer programming class. He was supposed to finish a program at a given deadline. The night before the deadline, he was struggling trying to make the program work. He changed this and that, lines of code here and there, but nothing seemed to work. as time went by and the deadline approached, he grew more and more frustrated. Finally he reached a point were he was so exasperated and beaten that all he did was compile the program over and over again without good results. He compiled it without rest... but then something unexpected happened! The program compiled successfully, the program worked as it was supposed to do!

Nobody knows how this really happened... but the poor kid never questioned what happened, and he didn't cared. All we know is that this happened, and has never happened again to anyone.

Hope you liked it.

Keep up the amazing work Zach! I got my own comic website too, and I know how hard is to do what you do.
Kudos from Guatemala ^_^

[Astrogirl]

cavpollo I would like to see your comic. Even if it's in Spanish.

I have to say, when I was halfway down the page I was expecting a joke about intronic DNA, but computer programming totally works too!

Yeah, the "junk code" of DNA was the first thing that sprang to my mind. If you think about it, DNA is "self-programming" in certain ways as well - I wonder if an AI programming system would find it useful to keep the unused code lying around as well, even if it wasn't using a genetic algorithm for incremental changes. Not that there isn't a lot of dead code in most human programmed projects, especially after they have been hacked on for more than a year

I was also fully expecting a DNA punchline. Then I was disappoint.

[weird_dave]

Have you guys ever seen a TV show or movie where two characters are playing chess, and one player goes and is all like, "Check!" Then the other player is shocked! He thinks for a while, and then makes a move saying, "Checkmate!" To anybody who has ever played chess, this sequence appears incomprehensibly stupid. Yet, it has been repeated often enough that I'm confident you've seen an example.

The problem with computer programs is that they do exactly what you tell them to do. That's the cause of every bug that I've ever seen. With the way that we test programs these days, the idea that something is happening at a lower level is beyond silly. Not meaning to crap all over the comic, but it's really one of those, "GAAAHHHH! WHY DON'T PEOPLE UNDERSTAND?" moments.

[Gangler]

You mean to tell me that the scenario laid out in this gag-a-day comic is implausible? Well shit. I don't know what to believe anymore.

Any historians here wanna confirm the claims Zach made today about Lincoln? It's a damn shame that it's come to this but we might have to start putting these comics under some scrutiny. There are allegations of misinformation!

[Kaharz]

yo dawg, i heard you like programming, so i programed a program, that programs new programs, so you can program, while your program, programs new programs.

When I first read that post I was kind of drunk and my immediate response was to just reply, "Sup dawg, we heard .... KILL YOURSELF." But I decided to wait until I was sober before deciding whether to tell the poster to kill themselves* and never got around to it. So thank you for doing it.

*I'm no cyberbully**
**It is too impersonal, I only get satisfaction from physically tormenting someone

[Roark]

The problem with computer programs is that they do exactly what you tell them to do. That's the cause of every bug that I've ever seen. With the way that we test programs these days, the idea that something is happening at a lower level is beyond silly. Not meaning to crap all over the comic, but it's really one of those, "GAAAHHHH! WHY DON'T PEOPLE UNDERSTAND?" moments.

Except...every time you compile a program it's converted into assembly code and then eventually into binary (lower level languages). This would easily be possible with any program smart enough to program by itself in spite of the fact that part of the premise of the comic is that the computer is creating junk code that doesn't actually mean anything.

[GUTCHUCKER]

But somebody is wrong on the internet

[Roark]

But somebody is trolling on the internet

Fix'd

[GUTCHUCKER]

Gosh, now who could that be?

[Edminster]

it's me i'm the troll

[GUTCHUCKER]

No way

[Apocalyptus]

A forum with a troll as the overlord? But that would be some kind of hellish, vicious cesspit!

[Lethal Interjection]

A forum with a troll as the overlord? But that would be some kind of hellish, vicious cesspit!

WELCOME!