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Comment by ColinWright | Hacker News Reader

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ColinWright·

Another classic:

Can log in while sitting down, can't log in when standing up.

I need to find the reference ...

Edit: OK, here's one version:

https://www.reddit.com/r/talesfromtechsupport/comments/3v52p...

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I recall reading a variant of that where a terminal had a "print screen" button, and the claim was it would work when standing but not when sitting down (or was it vice versa).

In the end there were two print screen buttons, only one of them functional, and one of them more obvious when standing (or sitting).

These kind of stories are classic debugging parables that teach you to step back and consider what you may be assuming incorrectly when something absolutely doesn't make sense or seems impossible.

Based on the title, I expected this to somehow be related to "Office chair turns off monitors" (it wasn't, but that is also a good one).

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21978004

[Edit: I see this one has also been mentioned a few times already in the thread]

I had experienced this one and felt like I was going mad, and then I guess the humidity changed and I gave up/stopped thinking about it. It wasn't until a couple years later I saw a post here about the gas cylinders causing monitors to blank.

There's a Mister Bean episode in which his TV will only work when he's sitting next to it (where he obviously cannot see it). I think he manages to watch TV by creating a copy of himself with his clothes next to the TV, while he's sitting naked in front of it

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