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The Treacherous Optimization (2006)

"I'm going to beat grep by thirty percent!" I confidently crow to anyone who would listen, those foolish enough to enter my office. And my girlfriend too, who's contractually obligated to pay attention to everything I say.

But Hex Fiend is supposed to be fast, and I want blazingly quick search that leaves the bewildered competition coughing in trails of dust. I imagine the author of grep, Ultimate Unix Geek, squinting at vi; the glow of a dozen xterms is the only light to fall on his ample frame covered by overalls, cheese doodles, and a tangle of beard. I look up at the Ultimate Unix Geek, spinning slowly in his padded chair, and I hear his cackle "old age and treachery...", and in his flickering CRT there is a face reflected, but it's my ex girlfriend, and the last thing I see before I black out is a patch of yellow cheese powder inside her long tangled beard.

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