Indeed, the cookie program was something that Robelle used to distribute
as part of the bonus software package.

I wrote the program when I was working for Canadian National Railways
and
brought it with me to Robelle in 1989.  Mike Shumko helped me polish it
up
for distribution.  (He's wicked at testing programs!) When run, the
cookie program displayed 
the next little message in the file...not a cookie of the day, but
perhaps a cookie of the moment.

Interestingly, some customers were complaining about some of the content
of the cookies...I fondly rememebr one cookie that caused your terminal
to wait a few seconds, display garbage, then give a convincing "system
disc
corrupt" message before waiting a few moments and displaying "just
kidding". :-)

Apparently one of Robelle's users got that particular cookie just after
completing
a grueling system upgrade!  They were not amused.  (It also caused some
near
heart-attacks at CN.)

The content was totally configurable, and the program came with
installation
instructions and a manual, and a huge amount of cookies.  You could
change
the cookies yourself to include company propoganda, hints, or whatever.

Mind you, a lot of the content was initalliy developed over hours of
dedicated drinking
in bars after work at CN in the early 1980's...:-) and so some it seemed
a little...off.

A lot of customers sent in their own "cookies" to hopefully be included
in the next release
of the data file.

You can always ask Robelle for the program if you really really really
want it...they
used to send you the cookie program if you asked for it, and you were a
customer.  
There hasn't been an update to the cookie content in quite some time!

Regards,

Ken Robertson
R & D Development
AD Technologies  www.adtech.com
Phone: 514.858.6181 x 236
Toll-Free: 800.667.8903

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