I’ve decided I should get a job with Microsoft, or some other large company, to come up with better error messages. The old “fatal error: 0x03F33B458C out of memory” just isn’t cutting for me, because it doesn’t have much meaning to the average computer user.
“Fatal error? Am I going to die?” they ask, and I have to reply, “No, it’s just fatal to the program.”
“Oh. Am I going to have to buy a new computer?”
And I weep.
No, what we need are error messages that convey the true importance of the problem at hand. Here are a few suggestions I’d like to make:
| Old error | MattHearn.com version |
| 404 Not Found | That’s not here, doofus. You clicked an old link, or something, who knows? Anyway, it may have been here at one time, and somebody moved it, or else you didn’t type the URL right because your brain is made of old guacamole. Mmm…man, an enchilada would totally hit the spot right now, right? |
| EXPLORER caused a general protection fault in module CM8330SB.DRV | Dude, what the hell did you do? I feel like you just kicked me in the groin, if I had a groin. Let’s say you kicked me in the N button, or something, where N stands for “Nads.” Anyway, I’m going to go reboot now and try not to throw up. |
| This program has performed an illegal operation and will be shut down. | Girl, I totally got caught with 2 keys of Colombia’s Finest on my personal person, if you catch my illicit drift, and I need to disappear for a while. I’ll call you. Don’t call me. I’ll call you. I totally swear I’ll call you! |
| Invalid system disk. Replace the disk and then press any key. | Yeah, it looks like you stuck a CD in my 5 1/4″ floppy drive again. Well done, son. I’ll tell you what, nobody uses 5 1/4″ disks anymore, let’s just leave that in there. Put the pliers down. Dogg, I am not playing, if you put that screwdriver in me, I will totally fry your ass. |
| Commgr32 caused an invalid page fault in module Kernel32.dll. | Uh…dude, I totally can’t find the info you’re trying to use. No, no, it’s cool, I didn’t lose it, it’s just…misplaced. For a second. I WILL TOTALLY FIND IT. But, uh, you might wanna think about a reboot, you know, just in case. |
| One or more of your disk drives may have developed bad sectors. Press any key to run ScanDisk with surface analysis on these drives. | So your 5-year-old totally left his “Fun With Magnets Lil’ Genius Science Kit” on me, and now that unpublished novel looks pretty much like this: 111111111111111111111111111 etc. Tough luck, man. |
| An error has occurred in your application. If you choose ignore you should save your work in a new file. If you choose close, your application will terminate. | I am TOTALLY about to corrupt the only extant copy of your last will and testament! |
| SPOOL32 caused a Stack Fault in module Kernel32.dll at 0x3F43C3FB.” | Screw this man, I’m going to a bar. |
I think this would be totally way better than the current messages, right? At least it’s entertaining. 404’d!
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Folks have been having fun with 404. Including using haiku.
Test comment. Check check it.