Poetry Written in Code Contest

Andrew Rissing

A few coworkers were joking about writing poetry in code and I was curious to put it up here as a challenge to others. The premise is that you must write something that is poetry that is reasonably compilable (i.e. excluding the scaffolding of the language of choice). Bonus points if it produces output that is relevant to the theme of the poem. Here is an example to get you started:

float myhope;
float mypride;
if (myhope is Empty)
Goto ZeroDivide;

OriginalGriff

Burn the infidel! Using the "G" word where impressionable young monitors might see it!

Ideological Purity is no substitute for being able to stick your thumb down a pipe to stop the water

Dalek Dave

. . / | { , , SYSTEM HALTED

. . / Ampersand bracket bracket dot dot slash, | { , , SYSTEM HALTED Vertical-bar curly-bracket comma comma CRASH.

------------------------------------ I will never again mention that I was the poster of the One Millionth Lounge Post, nor that it was complete drivel. Dalek Dave CCC Link[^] Trolls[^]

OriginalGriff

LOL!

Ideological Purity is no substitute for being able to stick your thumb down a pipe to stop the water

Henry Minute

Thank you Sid James. It only needs a last line of Hick. Hike. Hock.[^] to be perfect.

Henry Minute Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.” I wouldn't let CG touch my Abacus! When you're wrestling a gorilla, you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is. Cogito ergo thumb - Sucking my thumb helps me to think.

Marc Clifton

And in Haiku:

double myTrouble;
if (sheFindsOut(myTrouble))
{
SummerDaysAreGone();
}

Marc

My Blog
An Agile walk on the wild side with Relationship Oriented Programming
Melody's Amazon Herb Site

Rage

Plain awesome. Tchak klick boum.

Rage

if (life == ToBe)
return Question
else if (life != ToBe)
return Question

Andrew Rissing

:-D +5

Andrew Rissing

Not really poetry, but amusing regardless. +5

AspDotNetDev

At first, I thought you were talking about William James Sidis, and I thought, "it wasn't THAT good."

Thou mewling ill-breeding pignut!

Henry Minute

Wikipedia wrote:

From writings on cosmology, to American Indian history, to a comprehensive and definitive taxonomy of vehicle transfers

What's one of them?

Henry Minute Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.” I wouldn't let CG touch my Abacus! When you're wrestling a gorilla, you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is. Cogito ergo thumb - Sucking my thumb helps me to think.

Lost User

/* Program LIFE
Implementation date: 04/12/60
Author: H.H. Evans
www.hiraethog.org
Notes: Run once only.
Parameters: None.
Date : 07/10/95
*/

While NOT EndOfLife
DO();
Seek_Nipple();
Mimic_Betters();
Rebel();
Seek_Nipple();

  MULTIPLY self BY wife GIVING children;
  If Age < PastCaring% then
     Birthday\_Candles% = Birthday\_Candles% + 1;
  endIf

  Regret(Lost\_Opportunity);
  WishFor(Youth);
  ACCEPT Fate;

ENDDO;

EndWhile;

STOP RUN.

www.hiraethog.org

StephenPhillips

if (life == ToBe)
return Question;
else if (life != ToBe)
return Question;

given only two wholly mutually exclusive conditions, this could be simplified to

return Question;

Either Hamlet was overcomplicating his problem or he was a stickler for convolution. Or perhaps it should be taken more literally as

return (ToBe == true);

But no, this is silly - this only takes the first condition and ignores the rest of the system specification. Besides which, it somehow doesn't have the same ring to it this way.

Rage

Seems like you are slightly getting all the subtleties of Shakespeare's genius ;P OTOH, it is disastrous to see how the best translation in programming language, namely return Question; ( as you very correctly pointed out ) completely ruins the effect.

Member 4289613

We can optimize it! :))

if (life == ToBe || life != ToBe)
return Question

So, finally, that's the statement:

if (true)
return Question

Norman Dziedzic

Question = (2 * b) || !(2 * b); Is a nicer form but still only = Question; Then again Wit.soul = brevity;

User 8527408

//OK, so it's plagerism! bool shallI; string thee; shallI = chkShallI.Checked; thee = txtYou.Text; string str1 = "Summers Day"; woman thou; if (shallI) { if (thee.Compare(str1) > 0) { thou.Loveliness += str1.Loveliness; //string extension method thou.Temperateness += str1.Temperateness // or you.Temperature ?? } else { thou.Loveliness -= str1.Loveliness; thou.Temperateness -= str1.Temperateness } }

Peter Kassenaar

Very Nice. The full circle of life in a while loop.

Jeffrey Ryman

I don't have a poem, but I do have an interesting (I hope) story. I learned to program back in the 1960s on IBM equipment using punch cards. One evening four years ago I was waiting for my food in a Mexican fast food joint in Las Vegas and having a casual conversation with a couple of other customers about my age when the discussion somehow turned to old computers and using cards. It turned out that this lady and her husband had been programmers in the military back during the Vietnam war. While her husband was stationed someplace in South Vietnam, she was back in the US. During the period he remained overseas they exchanged love letters on punch cards. Their correspondence may or may not have rhymed, but I'm sure it was poetry to them. :-D