Deep in the wooded vales of red state America, December is hallowed not just for hunting presents, but also hunting deer. Lo, the season opened on a Friday. Clayton’s consulting firm declared it Camo Day in celebration.

It's a holiday in the US today, which means we're taking a 3-day weekend to dig back through the archives and find a classic WTF. One of my favorite features- one that we run far too rarely- are the true confessions. Sometimes, we are TRWTF, and let's applaud Matthew Schaad's story about his misuse of database triggers. - Remy

It started out as an average day for a developer like me. At 11:30AM, I was just getting into the office and fixing my second cup of coffee for the day. Being in the habit of coding till 3:00AM nightly, I was averaging about three to four cups a day. As I sat down at my desk to tackle one the several projects I had been assigned, I got a frantic call from the Director of IT, Jeremy.

Software needs to run quickly. Whether it's to get a response to a shopper so they don't get bored and click on to the next site, or performing calculations on some data that is urgently needed downstream. Efficiency is important!

To that end, most developers attempt to write code that runs quickly. Sometimes, the code needs to run more quickly than conventional means will allow. In those cases, smart developers will figure out how to game the system to get the computer/network/disks/etc. to get things done more quickly than the usual methodologies permit. For example, you might try to cut network overhead by stuffing multiple small requests into one buffer to take advantage of the leftover space created by network packet sizes.

After a 6-year enlistment with the United States Air Force, followed by a 4-year degree in Computer Science (paid for by “Uncle Sam”), Tony S. joined with a small company that specialized in criminal background checks. “No more unpaid overtime!” he’d thought to himself upon joining the civilian world for the first time since high school. “No more screaming officers! No more sleepless nights from trying to meet deadlines!”