A start-up engineer is someone who solves a problem you didn't know you had, in a way you don't understand.
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Real Engineers consider themselves well dressed if their socks
match.
Real Engineers buy their spouses a set of matched screwdrivers for their
birthday.
Real engineers have a non-technical vocabulary of 800 words.
Real Engineers repair their own cameras, telephones, televisions, watches, and
automatic transmissions.
Real Engineers say "It's 70 degrees Fahrenheit, 25 degrees Celsius, and 298
Kelvin" and all you say is "Isn't it a nice day?"
Real Engineers wear badges so they don't forget who they are. Sometimes a note
is attached saying "Don't offer me a ride today. I drove my own car".
Real Engineers' politics run towards acquiring a parking space with their name
on it and an office with a window.
Real Engineers know the "ABC's of Infrared" from A to B.
Real Engineers know how to take the cover off of their computer, and are not
afraid to do it.
Real Engineers' briefcases contain a Phillips screwdriver, a copy of "Quantum
Physics", and a half of a peanut butter sandwich.
Real Engineers don't find the above at all funny.
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What's the difference between mechanical engineers and civil
engineers?
Mechanical engineers build weapons.
Civil engineers build targets.
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An engineering student is walking along when a fellow student
arrives on a new bicycle. Impressed, he asks, "Where did you got this beautiful
bicycle?"
"Well," the second engineering student says, "A couple of days ago I was just
walking along when this gorgeous blonde pulls up, hops off the bike, rips off
all her clothes, and says 'take what you want'."
The other engineering student nods and says "Good choice. The clothes probably
wouldn't have fit."
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Three freshman engineering students were sitting around
talking between classes, when one brought up the question of who designed the
human body.
One of the students insisted that the human body must have been designed by an
electrical engineer because of the perfection of the nerves and synapses.
Another disagreed, and exclaimed that it had to have been a mechanical engineer
who designed the human body. The system of levers and pullies is ingenious.
"No," the third student said "your both wrong. The human body was designed by an
architect. Who else but an architect would have put a toxic waste line through a
recreation area?"
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The Dictionary: what engineers say and what they mean by it
Major Technological Breakthrough
Back to the drawing board.
Developed after years of intensive research
It was discovered by accident.
The designs are well within allowable limits
We just made it, stretching a point or two.
Test results were extremely gratifying
It works, and are we surprised!
Customer satisfaction is believed assured
We are so far behind schedule that the customer was happy to get anything at
all.
Close project coordination
We should have asked someone else; or, let's spread the responsibility for this.
Project slightly behind original schedule due to
unforeseen difficulties
We are working on something else.
The design will be finalized in the next reporting period
We haven't started this job yet, but we've got to say something.
A number of different approaches are being tried
We don't know where we're going, but we're moving.
Extensive effort is being applied on a fresh approach to
the problem
We just hired three new guys; we'll let them kick it around for a while.
Preliminary operational tests are inconclusive
The darn thing blew up when we threw the switch.
The entire concept will have to be abandoned
The only guy who understood the thing quit.
Modifications are underway to correct certain minor
difficulties
We threw the whole thing out and are starting from scratch.
Essentially complete.
Half done.
We predict...
We hope to God!
Drawing release is lagging.
Not a single drawing exists.
Risk is high, but acceptable.
100 to 1 odds, or with 10 times the budget and 10 times the manpower, we may
have a 50/50 chance.
Serious, but not insurmountables, problems.
It will take a miracle. God should be the program manager.
Not well defined.
Nobody has thought about it.
Requires further analysis and management attention.
Totally out of control.
The project is designed for high availability.
Malfunctions will be blamed on the operators mistakes.
This project has low maintenance requirements.
We wouldn't let the technicians change a light bulb, much less fool around with
our baby.
The software is being developed without excessive process
overhead.
The documentation will be written in clear and lucid Chinese.
The delivery is scheduled for the last quater of next
year.
This leaves us plenty of time to decide who to blame for it being late.
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There are three engineers in a car: an electrical engineer, a
chemical engineer and a Microsoft engineer. Suddenly the car just stops by the
side of the road, and the three engineers look at each other wondering what
could be wrong.
The electrical engineer suggests stripping down the electronics of the car and
trying to trace where a fault might have occurred.
The chemical engineer, not knowing much about cars, suggests that maybe the fuel
is becoming emulsified and getting blocked somewhere.
Then, the Microsoft engineer, not knowing much about anything, comes up with a
suggestion, "Why don't we close all the windows, get out, get back in, open the
windows again, and maybe it'll work?"
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An engineer dies and reports to the pearly gates. St. Peter
checks his dossier and says, "Ah, you're an engineer -- you're in the wrong
place."
So the engineer reports to the gates of hell and is let in. Pretty soon, the
engineer gets dissatisfied with the level of comfort in hell, and starts
designing and building improvements. After a while, they've got air conditioning
and flush toilets and escalators, and the engineer is a pretty popular guy.
One day God calls Satan up on the telephone and says with a sneer, "So, how's it
going down there in hell?" Satan replies, "Hey, things are going great. We've
got air conditioning and flush toilets and escalators, and there's no telling
what this engineer is going to come up with next."
God replies, "What??? You've got an engineer? That's a mistake -- he should
never have gotten down there; send him up here." Satan says, "No way. I like
having an engineer on the staff, and I'm keeping him." God says, "Send him back
up here or I'll sue."
Satan laughs uproariously and answers, "Yeah, right. And just where are YOU
going to get a lawyer?"
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There was an engineer who had an exceptional gift for fixing
all things mechanical.
After serving his company loyally for over 30 years, he happily retired.
Several years later the company contacted him regarding a seemingly impossible
problem they were having with one of their multi-million dollar machines. They
had tried everything and everyone else to get the machine fixed, but to no
avail. In desperation, they called on the
retired engineer who had solved so many of their problems in the past.
The engineer reluctantly took the challenge. He spent a day studying the huge
machine. At the end of the day, he marked a small "x" in chalk on a particular
component of the machine and proudly stated, "This is where your problem is."
The part was replaced and the machine worked perfectly again.
The company received a bill for $50,000 from the engineer for his service. They
demanded an itemized accounting of his charges.
The engineer responded briefly:
One chalk mark $1
Knowing where to put it $49,999