Earlier this morning accessing WS, selecting a forum, and picking up specific thread, took forever; The problem didn't happen invoking other sites and so I am wondering if anyone else had the same experience

If so it was no doubt attributable to a software glitch entailing exquisite timing, eg, in which a specific instruction propagated on the Web travels in circles until it finally reaches its destination. Typically it may take as long as 5 minutes to get a single response while a couple of the little green rectangles languish in the box at the bottom of the screen

I have long suspected the phenom was created by our White Knight in order to torment us from time to time so we thereby come to better appreciate His works

So I have coined the term "Gates Loop" to describe it. Do you have a better term

But it has to include "Gates." Another example of the Gates Loop, of which there are hundreds, if not thousands, is the deletion of your followup--while you are actually in the process of composing it--but pause a couple of minutes for instance to go look up a word

Perhaps the Gates Loop is also responsible for the continual and repeated appearance of "Warning: Page has Expired" message again and again, over and over, that so very much slows our navigation through a board

More such examples welcome

I've seen this board be extremely slow quite frequently. Don't see that any Gate has anything to do with it.

Fal: Sorry if my inference wasn't immediately obvious. I use "Gates" as a kind of symbol standing for everything wrong in the world of software

Its just persiflage

yes dale we know, you have a single minded obsession with mr gates.
and no, most of us don't share it, nor do we want to.

What she said.

FTR, I had trouble both getting here and changing pages yesterday morning, too.

From Arnie, a true expert upon matters technical, at a board that must remain nameless for reasons of porotocol:

Tim Berners-Lee invented the Internet, not Bill Gates.

There are all sorts of reasons why a particular site is temporarily slow, but the most common is that one (sometimes more) server on your route to the site is having problems. Your message to the site's server goes through a number of 'hops' to reach it and return, and if there are any problems on the way the site will be slow. Somebody else using a different ISP will take a different route and not have any problems. Usually the operators of the malfunctioning router will quickly discover the problem and it'll be taken out of service or fixed fairly quickly, but sometimes the problem can go on for several hours or even days.

Tim Berners-Lee invented the Internet, not Bill Gates.

Now there you go again, Dale, spreading dysinformation about the Web, the Net, and all things IT. As I said on the Board that dare not speak its name because of the Imaginary Hileman Protocol, Mr Berners-Lee did not invent the Internet. He invented the Web in 1991. You may want to read a book by M Mitchell Waldrop, Dream Machines: J C R Licklider and the Revolution That Made Computing Personal, 2001. It's available in paperback and is a fun and compelling read. It might help to set you straight on the history of personal computing.

[Fixed title of book.]

zm: Thank you for that

But the protocol isn't imaginary. I've been raked over the coals in more than one instance at more than one board for mentioning or even providing a link to another such board. Each has its own protocol or sensitivities while raillery is often misinterpreted as hostility

For instance, one banned me for using the term "offshore" referring to the Continent; another accused me in no uncertain terms of "persiflage" (encouraged at one site but despised at another). I was suspended from a third for using the term "Muslim" in connection with terrorism. Board A encourages the use of the tilde (~ as in all the dictionaries) while Board B decries it, threatening banishment

In still another instance I was resoundingly berated for starting a thread but then not participating in its subsequent progress. Heavens, but I had no idea it was required

As I subscribe to a half-dozen such boards, I have six sets of rules to observe, and admittedly I get them mixed up. Worse yet, somestimes two different administrators at a single site will have conflicting rules, esp in the case of two boards which for reasons of protocol and mutual antagonism I cannot specify

Since the others have already taken care of Gates, I was considering taking on loop, but I've decided that I'm just so glad that you didn't say algorithm that I'm going to leave it alone. ;-)

Apparently I need some synonyms for algorithm

> Gates loop

I dunno, I kinda like it.

I dunno about all of that stuff Dale but as to alluding to other boards, I have to admit that it gets a little annoying. Even that little two-step you like to do; the "I'm not going to mention the other place because people don’t want me to", is getting a little tiresome.

It's a shame because you bring up interesting topics and points, but the constant comments make you seem immature; it has an aura of petulance, an "Oh ya, well I'll talk about it anyway and they can't say I am because I'm not using the name" thumbing of the nose to the group.

It is disrespectful, like putting your feet up on the table in somebody else's home when you've been asked not to. And based on the post you just made, the other boards seem to find your "other board" hyping tiresome too.

I imagine it is habit, like somebody you're talking with that constantly says, "my sister said this" or "yes, but my sister thinks that" instead of speaking from their own experience.

This might sound surprising, but I'm interested in what you have to say.

I am, on the other hand, not interested one whit in what some other person, on some other board, has to say.

bel: Yea, it's persiflage and I'm guilty. Terrible habit, hard to break. Incorrigible

Persiflage - light teasing - sounds very flowery (as in "I'll have those white lillies, and oh, can you add a bit of persiflage for colour?"). I had to look it up since it's not the most common word here in French Québec.

O.k., I'll take it as that. I know I've got bad habits that are hard to break (I feel my Hubby nodding emphatically at that one, as I chatter happlily over breakfast and he needs a coffee in him before he's in any mood for a conversation. )

> persiflage

makes me think of mucilage, Elmer.

I wasn't familiar with it either until just recently. It's an escellent expr and so now in order to firmly establish it in my vocabulary I drop it anywhere it seems to fit

Neither was Laverne. She said it sounds like a huge conflagration

conflagration

HA! That is oddly akin to my thinking it sounds like a flower - both of them need to be watered.

bel: So do I, about four times a week

Quote:

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zm:
As I subscribe to a half-dozen such boards, I have six sets of rules to observe, and admittedly I get them mixed up. Worse yet, somestimes two different administrators at a single site will have conflicting rules, esp in the case of two boards which for reasons of protocol and mutual antagonism I cannot specify

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Amazing! How do you find the time to water your flowers 4 times a week? This allright ? Thanks! Learning all the time.