Once upon a midnight dreary, fingers cramped and vision bleary, System manuals piled high and wasted paper on the floor, Longing for the warmth of bedsheets, Still I sat there, doing spreadsheets… Having reached the bottom line, I took a floppy from the drawer. Typing with a steady hand, I then invoked the SAVE command and waited for the disk to store, Only this and nothing more.

Deep into the monitor peering, long I sat there wond’ring, fearing, Doubting, while the disk kept churning, turning yet to churn some more. “Save!” I said, “You cursed mother! Save my data from before!” One thing did the phosphors answer, only this and nothing more, Just, “Abort, Retry, Ignore?”

Was this some occult illusion? Some maniacal intrusion? These were choices undesired, ones I’d never faced before. Carefully, I weighed the choices as the disk made monstrous noises. The cursor flashed, insistent, waiting, baiting me to type some more. Clearly I must press a key, choosing one and nothing more, >From ” Abort, Retry, Ignore?”

With my fingers pale and trembling, Slowly toward the keyboard bending, Longing for a happy ending, hoping all would be restored, Praying for some guarantee Timidly I pressed a key. But on the screen there still persisted, words appearing as before. Ghastly grim they blinked and taunted, haunted, as my patience wore, Saying.”Abort, Retry, Ignore?”

I tried to catch the chips off-guard – I pressed again, but twice as hard. I pleaded with the cursed machine: I begged and cried and then I swore. Then I tried in desperation, sev’ral random combinations, Still there came the incantation, just as senseless as before. Cursor blinking, mocking, winking, flashing nonsense as before. Reading, “Abort, Retry, Ignore?”

There I sat, distraught, exhausted; by my own machine accosted Getting up I turned away and paced across the office floor. And then I saw dreadful sight: a lightning bolt cut through the night. A gasp of horror overtook me, shook me to my very core. The lightning zapped my previous data, lost and gone forevermore. Not even, “Abort, Retry, Ignore?”

To this day I do not know The place to which lost data goes. What demonic nether world is wrought where data will be stored, Beyond the reach of mortal souls, beyond the ether, in black holes? But sure as there’s C, Pascal, Lotus, Ashton-Tate and more, You will one day be left to wander, lost on some Plutonian shore, Pleading, “Abort, Retry, Ignore?”

…..

YESTERDAY

Yesterday, All those backups seemed a waste of pay. Now my database has gone away. Oh I believe in yesterday.

Suddenly, There’s not half the files there used to be, And there’s a milestone hanging over me The system crashed so suddenly.

I pushed something wrong What it was I could not say.

Now all my data’s gone and I long for yesterday-ay-ay-ay.

Yesterday, The need for back-ups seemed so far away. I knew my data was all here to stay, Now I believe in yesterday.

…..

He’s a real UNIX Man Sitting in his UNIX LAN Making all his UNIX plans For nobody.

Knows the blocksize from du(1) Cares not where /dev/null goes to Isn’t he a bit like you And me?

UNIX Man, please listen(2) My lpd(8) is missin’ UNIX Man The wo-o-o-orld is at(1) your command.

He’s as wise as he can be Uses lex and yacc and C UNIX Man, can you help me At all?

UNIX Man, don’t worry Test with time(1), don’t hurry UNIX Man The new kernel boots, just like you had planned.

He’s a real UNIX Man Sitting in his UNIX LAN Making all his UNIX plans For nobody … Making all his UNIX plans For nobody.

…..

When I find my code in tons of trouble, Friends and colleagues come to me, Speaking words of wisdom: “Write in C.”

As the deadline fast approaches, And bugs are all that I can see, Somewhere, someone whispers: “Write in C.”

Write in C, Write in C, Write in C, oh, Write in C. LOGO’s dead and buried, Write in C.

I used to write a lot of FORTRAN, For science it worked flawlessly. Try using it for graphics! Write in C.

If you’ve just spent nearly 30 hours, Debugging some assembly, Soon you will be glad to Write in C.

Write in C, Write in C, Write in C, yeah, Write in C. BASIC’s not the answer. Write in C.

Write in C, Write in C Write in C, oh, Write in C. Pascal won’t quite cut it. Write in C.

…..

Something in the way it fails, Defies the algorithm’s logic! Something in the way it coredumps… I don’t want to leave it now I’ll fix this problem somehow

Somewhere in the memory I know, A pointer’s got to be corrupted. Stepping in the debugger will show me… I don’t want to leave it now I’m too close to leave it now

You’re asking me can this code go? I don’t know, I don’t know… What sequence causes it to blow? I don’t know, I don’t know…

Something in the initializing code? And all I have to do is think of it! Something in the listing will show me… I don’t want to leave it now I’ll fix this tonight I vow!