¦
If you have reached this page it is probably because of one or more of the following reasons:
- You were bored and followed a link from another.
- You were banned for writing unfunny articles and sent here as your eternal Uncyclopedic damnation.
- You figured out what the right Alt key does that the left one doesn't do! Great Job!! Do you want a medal?
- You didn't find out the above and instead were one of Microsoft's loyal minions (you used Ctrl + Alt + ¦ didn't you?!)
- Or you hit ALT + X.... don't know what it does? Give it a shot....if you think your hard enough! 'GGRRRRRR'
¦ What is it?[edit]
The ¦ (known as the Pipe or Broken Bar) was originally used in Unix systems as a means of inter-process communication (whatever that is!). Like most computer non-experts, Microsoft did not know what the real purpose of this symbol was. However, unlike most computer non-experts (any of whom possess even an ounce of sense), Microsoft thought that the ¦ looked like two bullets, one fired shortly after the other. That gave them the clever idea to nick this symbol from the notably more stable Unix operating system, thinking that if they did that all of their crashing and freezing troubles could be solved with a simple press of this button.
Unfortunately, to the dismay of Microsoft, this 'double bullet-like' character didn't send a virtual hitman into the system 'kill off' any errors incurred. Microsoft soon realized that, if they wanted this dream of a virtual hitman to be realized, they had to actually get of their lazy arses to get a cup of coffee and then get back on their lazy arses to do some programming.
Uses of the ¦ in Everyday Conversation[edit]
- Shove this up your ¦ (Pipe/Broken Bar (Depending upon the individual being addressed)) and Smoke it! ~ Oxford English Dictionary
- ¦-) An alternative smiley to the overused :-)
- Oops I stepped on my Mars, now it's a ¦!
- Oops I stepped on my ¦, now it's a Mars!
- Q:Have you seen a ¦ anywhere?
- A:No but I can show you mine!
- ¦^ (Internet Slang for "Pipe Up" - as if there isn't enough of it already)
- ¦> (Pipe down if you turn your monitor on its side - no seriously, I don't want to hear about it - it doesn't take a genius!)
- Comment:"Oh man, I can't get any drinks¦"
- Q:"Where do you get that idea from?"
- A:"Look at the sign it says '¦'!"
- Response:"I wish you would realize how un-funny that is!"
- A:"Look at the sign it says '¦'!"
Microsoft's (Mis)Interpretation of the ¦[edit]
As mentioned previously, Microsoft was set upon believing that the ¦ character was a 'double bullet' key for activating a virtual hitman meant to kill off errors. Not willing to be publicly shamed for thinking that a mere ASCII keycode could do all this, they went about accomplishing the daunting task of doing more than just stealing it for their keyboardm.
MS ¦ Version 2 and the Introduction of the 'MS Office Hitman'[edit]
Soon, a Version 2 of the Microsoft ¦ key was invented which actually did feature a virtual hitman (dubbed the 'MS Office Hitman'). Rumours indicate that this name came about due to notorious and non-virtual MS Office Hitman who allegedly attempted to assassinate Bill Gates several times in his office and subsequently failed each time (apparantly due to faulty electronic doors controlled by Windows (doors controlled by windows? What were they thinking!?). Bill Gates allegedly said to his developer on the MS ¦ V2 project that: "We will call this virtual hitman the 'MS Office Hitman' so that if this one fails too then at least we can claim our OS to be an accurate simulator of reality".
Like all Microsoft projects, except the 'MS Office Vacuum Cleaner', ¦ Version 2 and its so called 'MS Office Hitman' sucked. To put it in more technical (read:boring) terms, the project was a sucksess (that's how Microsoft spell success) in terms of quality due to the fact that whenever 'MS Office Hitman' did decide to get off his lazy arse and do something when his specially designated key was pressed, he was usually shot down on the job by the Blue Screen of Death. In fact, the only errors the 'MS Office Hitman' could successfully kill were the ones that appeared during debuging in VB6. Of course, as Microsoft have done and continue to do they managed to make money from this half-arsed attempt at making Windows less prone to errors by over marketing it to the poor non-techies and telling them that they needed it or they were in danger of being left in the Stone Age!
MS ¦ Version 3[edit]
Sooner or later (Microsoft of course choosing the latter of the two), a Version 3 was released which allowed users to equip their hitman with an automatic weapon instead of his original (and noticeably silent) pistol. Not having figured out what the | key was for they decided to be cute and misinterpret it as a more continuous stream of gun fire than the ¦; hence it was used for automatic weapon equiping. According to the press release, Version 3 of the MS ¦ software contained the following new features:
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MS ¦ Discontinued[edit]
Unsurprisingly, the MS ¦ series was discontinued shortly after the release of MS ¦ V3, but surpirsingly not due hardware corruption or Microsoft's lousy Customer Service. According to analysts, several reasons that this series was discontinued were that:
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With the MS ¦ Series now thankfully discontinued the ¦ and | character render virtually useless to the average Windows PC user nowadays. This has meant that very few have discovered that seeminly unmentionable mess-up of MS between the ¦ and | on the keyboard and what they actually output! There is now only one use of the ¦ character for the average Windows PC user and that is quite simply to say, as the Oxford English Dictionary quite rightly put it, "Shove this up your ¦ and smoke it"