The Old New Thing

Why does clearing document history also clear Run history?

April 28, 2008 Apr 28, 2008 04/28/08
Raymond Chen
Commenter John Topley wondered why clearing document history also clears Run history. Simple: Because people wanted it to. Originally, the button merely erased your recent document history, but with the increasing paranoia over what records the computer kept on your past usage, people began to expect more and even filed beta bugs saying, "I ...

News flash: Universities are more likely to admit students whose parents gave lots of money

April 25, 2008 Apr 25, 2008 04/25/08
Raymond Chen
Earlier, we saw that alumni give money to universities in order to increase the likelihood that the university will admit their children. Today, we learn that the tactic works. The children of big-donor alumni are more likely to be accepted. In fact, you don't even have to be the child of alumni. Just make sure you parents give lots of ...

On the relationship between specific cases and general cases

April 25, 2008 Apr 25, 2008 04/25/08
Raymond Chen
One of the frustrations I have is people who don't see the relationship between specific cases and general cases. Statement: In general, you can't do X. Refutation: You're wrong. Y can do X. Example: The statement "In general, you can't trust the return address" comes with the refutation "You're wrong. .NET trusts the return address." (...

Take Our Daughters and Sons to Work today, unless you work at main Microsoft campus, in which case, wait until summer

April 24, 2008 Apr 24, 2008 04/24/08
Raymond Chen
Today is the fourth thursday of April, which is national Take Our Daughters and Sons to Work Day. The main Microsoft campus is not participating today, but there's a good reason for this. The Washington State Assessment of Student Learning, better known as the WASL (pronounced "WAH-s'l"), is a four-day battery of standardized tests ...

The contradictory dialog: Click Finish to begin

April 22, 2008 Apr 22, 2008 04/22/08
Raymond Chen
I was installing a program and its setup wizard said, and I am not making this up, Click Finish to begin installation. But wait, the weirdness doesn't end there. After you click Finish, the program installation completes, and then you get another page that tells you to click Close. This is misuse of the Finish button. Finish does not mean ...

Fell the force

April 21, 2008 Apr 21, 2008 04/21/08
Raymond Chen
Engrish, the whimsical term applied to poorly-translated or downright bizarre English used in non-English-speaking countries, is not restricted to East Asia, although the most well-known examples certainly come from there. While in Lisbon, I saw someone wearing a t-shirt that said Fell the force...