we do no longer have lisp machines. but we do have javascript machines.

It is natural that stuff gets broken, especially during a refurbishment, as it currently appears in my university. So I was only a little angry when the leaking toilet drenched my pants while flushing.

Well, I thought, let us try to find out the number of the janitor, and tell him. The department's page has a list with employees, but their function is not mentioned explicitly. So I called the head office, and they gave me a name. Unfortunately, this name did not appear on that list, so I googled it.

I found his mail address hidden in the deep forests of my universitie's website, and mailed him immediately.

I got a reply that there is a web interface for notifications about broken things, and he gave me a link to this web interface. So I followed this link.

A site showed up, telling me that plugins are missing. Well, I thought maybe it needs Java, and clicked on automatic installation.

It turned out that it requires Silverlight. Or Moonlight, in my case. And of course, after Moonlight was installed, it showed a shiny progress wheel around a percentage which did not get beyond 0%.

The university has a Windows Terminal Server, and I could get an account there, but ... only for noticing the janitors about a broken toilet? Well, our friendly admin sent me to a person who got that stuff work with his computer and usually does these notifications.

Silverlight... seriously? I mean, what could be the content of such a site? A textarea for the problem. Maybe something that searches for already filed damages. Maybe something to choose the room, and some address-field for correspondence. Why the heck would such an interface use Silverlight? I wonder how much they had to pay for this interface.