Subject: Stranger Than Fiction?

From: [email-masked] (Miles O'Neal)
Date: 12 Oct 88 18:24:15 GMT

STAR TREK V - The EMAIL Message

(or More Trouble Than Tribbles)

The following was gleaned from a ship's log adrift in space near the
new nebula LANpoop, named for the Starship LANpoop, which disappeared
at about the same time the nebula appeared in the Atlanta Cluster in the
Georgia galaxy, Sector 3, Quadrant 7.

"Stardate 3.1.415.927, Admiral George P. Burdell, MIS Starship LANpoop.

"We recently ran out of space on our F: drive (a networked DOS partition
on STIATL (our unix isolation ward hardware), which is networked to some
VAXen via TCP/IP). We realized we were silly to tie ourselves to 1 drive with
limited potential, and soon schemed to create a truly virtual F: drive from
our available resources. Steve Lyle, our Systems Administrator, 1st class,
carried out the operation, without consulting the Captain of the Starship
LANpoop."

Captain: "Status report, Mr. Spock?"
Spock: "I'm querying the new NetManager, now, Captain."
Sulu: "Captain! All dialup ports frozen solid!"
Captain: "Mr. Scott! Whats happening down there?"
Scott: "I dunna ae tellee burra syncing ona e disks, forsooth?"
Captain: "Huh???"
Chekov: "Sir, I believe he said, "I dunna ae tellee burra syncing ona e
   disks, forsooth?""
Captain: "Say what?"
Spock: "Sir, I believe he said the disks are full, and backfeeding bits
   onto the BI bus. I've got the NetManager query response coming in now."
Admiral: (smiling) "Mr. Chekov, may I remind you that baiting an officer is a
   dangerous game?"
Sulu: (whispered) "It's better than no game at all."
NetManager: "VAX01 : %SYS-F-NODISKSPACE" (pause)
"VAX02 : %SYS-F-NODISKSPACE" (pause)
"VAX03 : %SYS-F-NODISKSPACE" (pause)
"VAX04 : %SYS-F-NODISKSPACE" (pause)
Captain: "Spock! What could have happened?"
Spock: "Insufficient data, Captain, but the ship's disk log seems to indicate
   that the F: drive has broken out of the UNIX isolation ward and grown to
   an incredible size. It must have eaten all of our spare disk to do this."
Sulu: "Captain, we've got inbound WATS customers on TTYs 1, 5, and 7. All of
   them say their respective Commtasks are dying, and they have gone to
   Condition Red. LANfleet command is on the LA120 with an urgent message to
   help them."
Captain: "Spock?"
Spock: "Not without more resources, Ron."
Captain: "Mr. Scott!!! I need more disk! Giga factor 2!"
Scott: "Huh???"
Spock: "Allow me, Captain. Mr. Scott, thah captain sesd heanz seasd na ha
   mure spece onha deesk ana hea musthef 2 gig or mure."
Captain: (head in hands, quietly) "Why did I ever leave the Equifax?"
Scott: "I canna dewit! We hefna thah moolah allocayhted theys fiscahlyeer!"
Captain: "Huh???"
Chekov: "I believe he said..."
Captain: "Myester Sulooh shuhht hyim oop! Iya ken heeyear tha noiz mahself!"
Spock: "Sir, I believe he said we can't afford it."
Captain: "Beam me to finance, Mr. Scott."
Spock: "Wait, captain. Not yet. Dr. McCoy and Lt. Anderson have been training
   a new F: drive expert over in PD. Corporal Lyle, I think. Maybe he can help."
NetManager: "...VAX318 : %SYS-F-NODISKSPACE" (pause)
"VAX319 : %SYS-F-NODISKSPACE" (pause)
"VAX320 : %SYS-F-NODISKSPACE" (pause)
Captain: "Mr. Spock! Can you shut that thing..."
Spock: "Wait!"
NetManager: "STIATL - urgent msg for lyle: F: drive full"
Spock: "Fascinating. Here's the trouble. The STIATL drive filled up, and a
   virtual F:olator kicked in, allowing the other drives on the net to
   consume themselves. Even the Warp drive is full. All the dilithium
   crystals got archived to tape to make room for DOS programs."
Captain: "DOS!!! I thought we pawned those off on the Klingons. We did!
   I remember. The MS plague wiped them out!"
Spock: "Yes, sir, but DOS are like tribbles, but MUCH less friendly, and
   MUCH more dangerous."
Captain: "This is the Captain! Prepare to abandon ship! Mr. Spock, activate
   self-destruct sequence..."

The recorded conversation is followed by a noise suspiciosly similar to that
made by a mongo EMP applied to the recorder circuits of a Starship's log.
The investigation is proceeding apace.

Disclaimer: You know how it goes, I'm sure.