Note: “I” here doesn’t mean “me.” It’s some guys who posted their true experience on the web.

Joke 1

One of our customers, a major non-US defense contractor, complained that their code ran too slowly. It was a comedy of errors.

Act I

Contractor: “Can you make our code run faster?”
Tech Support: “Yes, but we have to take a look at it.”
Contractor: “We can’t, the code is classified.”
Tech Support: “Can you explain to me what your code is doing?”
Contractor: “No, that’s classified.”
Tech Support: “Can you tell us what functions you use?”
Contractor: “No that’s classified.”

Act II

So, on a hunch, we sent them the latest version of our software for Windows NT.

Contractor: “Why is this running faster on our 800MHz Pentium than on our VAX?”
Tech Support: “When did you buy that VAX?”
Contractor: “Some time in the late 1980s.”

Act III

Finally, some of their code was declassified. We looked at it, and one piece of it contained a routine for reading one million or so integers from a file. Rather than opening the file once and reading them all in, there was a loop: it would open the file, read the first integer, and close it; then open it again, read the second integer, and close it; etc.

Joke 2

I ran across this gem while debugging someone else’s old code once:

if (value == 0)
return value;
else
return 0;

Joke 3

One time I had to walk a Windows 95 user through a particular procedure.

Me: “First you need to open DOS-prompt. I’ll guide you–”
Customer: “MY COMPUTER DOES NOT HAVE DOS! YOU THINK I RUN THAT ANCIENT SOFTWARE?” (click)

Joke 4

A customer called in with modem problems.

Tech Support: “Ok, we’re going to check your modem settings. First thing we need to do is make sure all programs are closed.”
Customer: “How do I know if everything is closed?”
Me: “Make sure all windows are closed.”
Customer: “But…I’m in the basement. I don’t have any windows here.”

Lucky me, I made it to the the mute button in time!

Joke 5

Tech Support: “How can I help you?”
Customer: “Well, everything is working fine, but there is one program that is not.”
Tech Support: “What program is it?”
Customer: “It’s called ‘MSDOS Prompt’.”
Tech Support: “What’s wrong with it?”
Customer: “Well, I click on it, a black screen shows up with NOTHING but a sign that reads: ‘C:\WINDOWS>’, and it just sits there and doesn’t do anything. I have to turn off the system to go back to Windows.”