the answer is silence

what is the best strategy when the reaction to your action is silence?

to ask?

to assume everything is as it should?

to declare the action the acutal aim, consequently rendering an answer unneccessary?

to trust that there would be a response in case something went wrong?


these days i quite fancy the redefinition approaches; sadly they are not completely risk free..

relativizing opposites

left = right;

sometimes i really like program logic... :)

another approach to problem solving

the crux with being innovative

it seems a sad fact that in order to be innovative and form something nice and cool, you have to really know the basics... so no way around the old stuff :(

shortcuts

i wonder when i will ever learn that shortcuts in maths(and everythink like it) are no good...

Happy moment

Everyday I recieve some advertisment on god knows what fancy things and recently this makes me happy for one reason: I rejoyce realizing that I DO NOT NEED all this stuff! :)

Who owns the problem?

Very often it can be observed that people start to argue about something. Usually these arguments start off by some very basic remark of person 1, which by some unknown reason is taken very badly by person 2, who reacts unappropriately, and there we go..
If afterwards person2 is asked why they became so upset, they are likely to say something like: 'oh, this p1, he really irritated me with what he said! so outrageous!'
Of course it is possible that p1 said something wrong or in a wrong tone but: there is nothing p2 could do about it. On the other hand though, the feeling irritated by it actually is not p1's problem: it belongs to p2, who has to accept that this happened and then can start to draw constructive conclusions from that point. So to speak, p2 can change their own role from that of a victim ('it's all p1's problem, they were very rude!') to that of a person accepting the responsibility for their problem ('i got really irritated by this and this is my problem which i have to solve').
I find this approach very useful, as often in an argument or a difficult situation people tend to get stuck in mutual blaming but fail to see that there is the possibility that the other one actually did not at all intend things badly, but happened to push some unknown button on ones own 'panic-list'. Consequently, p2 could continue to ask: why does this irritate me so much? and also: do I really, honestly believe that this person wants to deliberately annoy me?
The first question might challenge p2 to face not so nice experiences they have made in their lives so far which have left a considerable mark on how they tend to look at things (which also implies that there is not one 'right' view of the world but rather that they are all right for one person but possibly complete nonsense for another, but that's another issue). We can not really expect another person to know about these things, which then also leads to the second question. If we can not assume another person knowing about our reasons for being annoyed about a certain way of behaviour, it might well be that these poor souls are completely unaware about the how and why they were causing a nuisance to us. Consequently it might well be that it was not the least their intention to get at us, but rather an unhappy series of events. Considering this, quite often quarrels can be condensed down to what lies beneath it. It might be nothing at all, or some corpses in the basement of p2's mind - but it is actually p2, accepting the ownership of their problem, who has the possibility to sort them out and thus break the circle of the argument.

Speed applying - aka JIT submitting

The new alternative of speed dating:
The trick is to wait with starting your online application just one hour before midnight and then submit 1 minute before, heavvily relying on your internet connection and all sending and receiving servers.
Some more adrenalin can be added by forgetting about some invalid data in some boxes which then have to be searched for in a fever.
Enjoy, but don't hold me responsible if it doesn't work out.

Soundless

Yesterday's ride on the underground left me very impressed and fascinated. Listening to my music, being completely cut out of my environment I witnessed a strange situation.
A quite fragile looking woman entered the coach, carrying a little suitcase, some child-painted cloth bag, and some sheets of paper. She sat down on the bench diagonal to me and started observing the people around. No sooner had we left the station that she bent over to the girl next to me, handing them the papers and pointing on it in a very urgent manner, but the girl didn't want to know anything about it.
At first I was startled as I wondered if she was actually begging; it's not usual here and also her simple cloths did not look ragged. Then she stretched out to me, so I felt I ought to have a look. So I took out my earplugs to ask her what it was all about. The answer surprised me: it was some ununderstandable sound, paired with the same clear body expressions she had showed with the other girl. The woman was deaf-mute. But she was not begging. Contrarily, she was campaigning for subtitles in television programmes! In fact, her sheets displayed statistics on subtitle coverage in various countries, with the US leading way ahead and European countries being all pretty bad.
I felt so much respect for this women: she seemed rather shy in her way of behaving, not at all intrusive, but at the same time she was fighting for being part of society. So she choose to overcome her hesitation and actually do something about the situation by bringing the problem to those people's minds who usually are not even aware about its existence.
In the end, she was more or less successful - all the people that actually gave her a chance to show her case signed her petition.

The latest possible moment

What is it about that particular moment that people so often try to push each and every decision until it is reached? In some very hairy issues it might be useful, I suppose, because you need to know more about your situation to get a better estimate. However, in daily life, it does not seem to pay off that well, especially if it results to postponing and accumulating things that have to be done nevertheless. Additionally, this phenomenon becomes even more frustrating the more people are involved. Even though there might be a common goal to be achieved, noone seems willing to decide and passes around responsibility, sometimes even despite knowing more than others. So I just wonder what it is that makes people so scared on making even the smallest decisions that would maybe cause a temporal loss of complete freedom for about 5 minutes..

Nachtrag..

now, after my presentation, i will ask you one big question: what happens after the thesis defense?
--- easy answer: the preparation of the next one, it's obvious...! and there we go...




(other topics where proposed, however they were too cruel or too creative :P)

Application fairy tales

Once upon a time, a little girl decided to study. The world was nice and shiny and the application procedure was very easy. Also the studies went well, so she managed to finish and get a shiny new Bachelors degree (-- hang on, it is actually called Laurea--- why? it is written Bsc on the homepage.. -- Oh, that is just for marketing reasons--).
After her graduation, the day came when she should make up her mind about how and where to continue with her studies, because she felt it was time for some Master plan. So our little girl dived into the world of electronic communication and browsed for weeks and months to find some suitable program. It was a long, hard task, especially as most of the requirements where written in a very demanding way so that even superwoman could hardly fulfil them. In the end she decided to still give it a try and this was when the bureocratical monster woke up and left its cave.
'You want an English version of the diploma? We dont have such a thing! Just take this certificate.' 'But.. there is not the same stuff written on it.. and it is different from the diploma supplement as well.' 'Does that matter?'... So our poor little girl fought her way through the wilderness of certificates, language proofs, course transcripts, reference letters, and curriculum vitaes until the last big hurdle came up on the horizon: the game called 'collect the signatures you need'. Currently she is stuck there, and if you have any idea of how to solve this task, please let post them so her chances of letting destiny rule over her applications will be better...

The Student Solution

Reverse Engineering.... also partially known as Ctrl-C/-V with random combination from different sources.
Gives a (more or less) tasty salsa of (more or less) connected content, which hardly ever contents the (more or less) interested person taking a look at the output of the procedure.
Somehow seems safer to use (at least some) books as in this way at least everything has to be rewritten anyway so rephrasing seems less effort (and furthermore improves the knowledge people have about their own essays...).

The E Solution

If you have any computer problems... why dont you just re-install your OS (and everything else)?

Been told not to give credits to anyone for this straightforward, brute force, "make my computer work again, please" solution... :D You could bet on it though..

The Kolping Solution

defined as 'waiting till your current problem dissolves in terms of fire and smoke' (credits to andrea janes for coining the term :)
Not to be recommended as main strategy if you dont need to build a new roof anyway...

For anyone not knowing what this all refers to, look here.