Cardboard Cutout Dog (2003)

sjbaker.org

33 pointsfoldor6 comments

Which came first? Although this technique must stretch back into antiquity. It's kind of a trope in movies and books with scientists / inventors. Watson sometimes was Sherlock's rubber duck / cutout dog.

In fiction (and film particularly) these sorts of characters are often a narrative device so that things can be explained without needing an omniscient narrator.

> Jake served as our key code review expert for many years (Dog Years that is) - but finally was lost to the organisation when he starved to death during an especially complete checkout of the Transaction Interchange Manager's Scheduling Algorithm.

Should I take this sentence literally or is the checkout —or for that matter, Jake’s starvation — metaphorical?

I admire your empathy for the dog, I love animals too! From the ironic tone of the rest of the article, I feel confident that Jake the Labrador is fictional. “No animals were injured in the making of this satire.”

But what about the sex toys? Did the author really have a dangling pointer? I think more research is required, after all the field has advanced somewhat since that was written

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