
                 THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERATOR
                 ---------------------------

   The time is 3a.m. and I am sitting in front of my favourite computer

 terminal debugging my little eyes out because I have to have a lexical

 analyzer program slipped under my prof's door by nine in the morning or

 I can kiss the course good-bye.  Things are looking good because there's

 almost no one on the system and response is like lightning, when what

 to my wondering eyes should appear but

       C

        R

         A

          S

           H !

 Translation for those who've never worked on that piece of silicon

 silliness called a computer: the system just went tits up and I died

 along with it.

    Okay, am I worried? First reaction is naturally to shout the foulest

 obsenity that springs to my tongue, but am I really worried? No.  I sit

 back and say to myself, what the  hell, the operator will boot the system

 and then I can carry on.  Three or four more shots at compiling and all

 the obvious bugs will be gone, then I can tackle the documentation and

 still have the whole schlamozzle done in time to watch 20-Minute Workout.

 I rise from my swivel chair, kip into the undergrad lounge for a Sweet Marie

 from the vending machine, then chomp my way back to the terminal room

 where I expect to see the system alive again.

    Well.  Silly me.  I hit the RETURN key and what do I see but a big nothing.

 Nada.  As Julius Caeser might have said, Nihil.  The system is still flatter

 than a squirrel on the highway, and me with my degree on the line.  This is the

 moment that the Kid realizes all the operators buggered off and won't

 be back till 8 a.m.(All right, I should have remembered sooner, but here I've

 been a good and noble student all my life and have never before had to

 pull an all-nighter to finish an assignment.  And if you believe that,

 I have some farmland in Arizona you might like.)

    Anyway, this leaves me in a quandary, because I can't very well get my

 bloody program working if the machine won't talk to me.  I pace out into

 the hall in search of inspiration.  On the door of the machine room is a

 cheery little sign decorated with happy faces:"The Operators will be back

 on duty at 8 a.m. If the system goes down during the night, contact

 Campus Security and describe the problem.  They will attemp to help."

    So, ever the optimist, I truck back to the terminal room and pick up the

 on-campus phone that's there for just such emergencies.  Dial the number and

 wait six rings before a gruff voice says, "Hello."

    "Hi.  The Bun just went down and it would be real nice if someone came

 over to boot it." Now of course the Security guy doesn't know that the

 Bun is our pet name for the computer, but he's well trained in talking to

 apparent loonie's and he's no doubt keeping me on the line so someone

 can trace the call, when all of a sudden the phone goes dead.

    Friends, a free testimonial to the wonders of the telephone monopoly:

 never in my life have I had a phone go dead on me.  I've benn hung up on

 more times than I can count, but never has the phone system dropped out

 from under my very lips.  I can't believe it.  I say lame things like

 "Hello? Hello? Wakey, wakey, " and such like until I really cotton onto

 the fact that something has come between me and my friendly Kampus Kop.

 Then, my first instinct is to imitate the old movies and jiggle the little

 jobbie that the reciever rests on, all the while saying "Hello? Hello?" . . .

 which is all very amusing and makes me feel Barbara Stanwyck, but does sweet

 dick all as far as the phone is concerned.  Of course, it never works in the

 movies either.

    I hang up again and return to the terminal, on the off chance that

 someone with a key to the machine room was working late somewhere else

 in the building and has arrived to resurrect the late great machine.

 I hit RETURN and lo and behold, a little sign-on message scampers its

 way across my screen.  At least, it looks a bit like a sign-on message.

 Usually the computer prints out something like

      HSLA-2, 003

      WATERLOO TIME-SHARING,MAY 1, 3:15 a.m.

      userid--

 and this is what I am expecting.  (by the way, "userid" stands for User

 Identification, TABRADLEY in my case, if you're interested.) As I say, I

 expect to see something pretty mundane, but what actually greets my

 baby browns is

      HSLA-13, 666

      WALPURGISNACHT TIME-SHARING, HOUR OF THE SNAKE

      ABANDON HOPE, ALL YE WHO SIGN ON HERE!

      userid--

 Ha Ha, say I.  Comical buggers abound at the university and all of them

 are interested in screwing up the system.  Every April Fool's Day they do

 something to the computer:change the sign-on message to something they

 find funny, for example.  One of the usual gang of idiots is mucking about

 in the machine room for giggles, but what do I care provided the hunk of

 metal works? I type in my userid, comme ca,

      userid--tabradley

 as well as my password, which I am sure as hell not going to put in print,

 and I'm off to the races.

    At this point, I expect to see news.  The news is usually tit-useless

 trivia about changes to programs nobody uses, but you suffer through

 it anyway in case something important comes up.  This night, the news that

 prints out is this:

      01/May/84 : Satanic Victory

         The forces of hell have overthrown the

         Bun as of 3 a.m. this morning.hence-

         forth the system will be used for

         administering the large population of


         the netherworld, which has been grow-

         ing rapidly during these times of moral

         decay.  All users signing on in the future

         are automatically damned to eternal

         perdition.  We apologize for the incon-

         venience.

      01/May/84 : PROGRAMMERS WANTED!

         His Satanic Majesty wants experienced

         programmers for immediate employment.

         Must know Fortran and Cobol ; Pascal and

         ADA an asset.  Apply in blood c/o the Dead


         Letter Office or send electronic mail to

         userid 'lucifer'.

 Ha Ha, and ha ha again.  I give the requisite minimum number of chuckles,

 resolve to gripe like hell in the morning to whoever will listen, and

 proceed to go about my business.  Said business involves running my

 program on a given collection of test input.  I type in the command and

 recieve the not-so-welcome reply PROGRAM NOT FOUND.  This is annoying

 to say the least.  I poke in my catalog of computer files and discover,

 much to my dismay, that it's empty.  Nothing.  Nada.  As Jean-Paul Sartre

 might have said, Rien.  This, as they so aptly put it, is the last straw.

 I type the USER command to find out who is currently signed on, and I get

      +lucifer     *tabradley


 Wow.  The Prince of Evil and me sharing the same computer.  Pardon me for not

 being awestruck.  I summon up the electronic mail program and fire off the

 following epistle.

      *mail to lucifer

   .   Will your Satanic Majesty kindly bug off

   .   with the cute stuff and let me get some

   .   work done? Bring the system up properly

   .   and return ye to the depths from whence

   .   ye came.

 I sit and simmer for a few moments, and of course I get a reply.

      1  lucifer , Walpurgisnacht , Hour of the Snake U


      Mortal Worm, how dare you address me in

      that tone of voice? Your soul is forfeit!

 Uh-hunh.  A classic example of why the impressionable should be kept

 from fantasy role-playing games.  This feeb has allowed the pigeon of reason

 to fly the coop.  I give it one more shot the polite way.

      *mail to lucifer

   .   Dear Lord of Infamy:

   .     I have an assignment due at 9 in the

   .   morning, I am in a rotten mood, and I

   .   will personally fill your nose with Dr.

   .   Pepper if you don't stop being a smartass.

   .   Comprendo?


 The answer:

      2 lucifer, Walpurgisnacht, Hour of the Snake U

      You shall be cast into the outer dark-

      ness, human vermin.  Tremble at my power!

 This is the very momment that the lights go out in the terminal room.

    So okay.  I'm sitting in the terminal in the dark with this curse

 glowing greenly at me from the display screen, and I am really and truly

 pissed off.  Mad as hell and not going to take it any more, to coin a phrase.

 I type

      *mail to lucifer

      .this means war.


 Let me explain that I am just an ordinary computer science student.

 I do not have any super-permissions that let me make the computer

 walk and talk backwards;I don't have any clever way of getting around

 the security system;I don't have a key to the machine room door,

 or any of other sneaky things someone else might use to clobber this bum.

 I simply have native wit and a colossal Mad on.  I sign off and start again.

      HSLA-13, 666

      Walpurgisnacht, Time-Sharing, Hour of the Snake

      Abandon hope, all ye who sign on here!

      userid--

 I type in 'lucifer' as my userid.  It asks for my password.  This is the

 point at which the Kid has to be clever.  Most people use really predic-


 table passwords:it's just a matter of psychoanalyzing the subject,

 then a bit of trial and error.  I try the following errors.

      satan

      satanic

      majesty

      damnation

      hell

      hades

      dis

  @   brimstone

      god is dead


 Bingo on 'god is dead'.  I get signed on, sweet as a charm.  People with

 delusions of deviltry are so predictable.

    I am now very dangerous to this "lucifer" turd.  As far as the computer

 is concerned I am him.  I am about to commit suicide in his infernal name.

    It takes me all of thirty seconds to write the following program:



      /* Take this */

      'SP DISC'

      Do forever

         Say 'Satan and dead bears have an understanding.'

         End

      Exit /* never gets here */




 This, ladies and gents, is called an infinite loop.  It just keeps printing

 out the same message forever and ever, amen.  It eats up processor time, it

 eats up storage space and it racks up an incredible usage bill in no time flat.

 For those unfamiliar with our noble system, everyone (including mush-for

 brains like "lucifer") has a dollar limit on how much computing resources

 he can use.  Go over the limit and the computer craps you off into the

 outer darkness where you can wail and gnash your teeth till doomsday

 as far as the machine is concerned.  And one little infinite loop program

 can consume 47 times its own wieght in excess resources in the blink of

 an eye.


    I start 80 of them.  All running simultaneously under good ol' Lucifer's

 account.  His bill shoots up faster than the dials at a gas pump.  Money

 bleeds out of him like water.  A conservative estimate says he has

 ten minutes to live.  Tops.

    I walk down to the lounge for another Sweet Marie.  The place is

 deserted.  God knows where the janitors have gone.  For a second or two

 I get kind of edgy about being alone here, but what the hell?

 These computer nerds aren't violent, they just like power-tripping.

 I'm okay, provided he doesn't have a pitchfork handy.

    Back to the terminal room and turn on the lights as I enter.

 I check his Satanic Majesty's resources and find that his number

 (666?) is almost up.  I have no idea what he's doing at this momment.


 What would Lucifer do if he signed onto a computer? Write Cobol programs?

     Tickety-tick, tickety-tick, and Lucifer's resources hit the big

 goose egg.  All the terminals running my infinite loops beep in outrage

 and display the message

      resources exhausted***

      cp disconnects

 Tee double-hee, say I.  Put that in your pit and smoke it.

    Suddenly, there comes this humungous scream of fury that echoes through

 every corner of the Math building.  Papers shake off the desks, hand-driers

 turn on in the washrooms, vending machines belch out Taco chips in shock.

 I start toward the door to see what's going on.  when I am hit by a stinking


 cloud of sulphurous smoke that is billowing from the general direction

 of the machine room.  I do the usual gagging number, hack hack, double over,

 fight back the chocolate bars that are intent on debarking my stomach,

 and by the time I am in any condition to contemplate hitting the fire alarm,

 the smoke is completely gone and the corridor is as quiet as a grave.

    Okay.  I admit it.  I am just the tiniest bit freaked out.  Running home

 looks like an attractive prospect.  Running home and killing a case of beer

 looks like a REALLY attractive prospect.

    But I have an assignment to do.  I go back to the terminal, very slowly

 but I go, and I hit RETURN.

      HSLA-2, 003

      Waterloo Time-Sharing,May 1, 3:45 a.m.


      userid--tabradley

      password

      #############

      1 mail message waiting

      *mail printunread

      1 god  May 1, 3:45 a.m.   U

      Well done, my good and faithfull servant.

    And the TRUELY weird thing about this whole business is that my program

 works perfectly the first time.










                  THINK ABOUT IT...













 A STORY BY JIM GARDNER @ WATERLOO



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