Everybody knows that there is usually more than one way to skin a cat. Now, I'm not sure about the ways of this. I'm not an expert, but I'd imagine that at the end of all of them you'll get a cat, which has no skin on it. Some ways might be messier than others...
I come across this thing a lot when I see what people have coded in computer programs... usually where someone hasn't realised it's easier to do it another way... this post isn't about sloppy computer programming though. You'll be pleased to hear :-)
In my lab at work (which happens to be in the school of Electrical and Electronic Engineering) we have a computer. This computer is American. Now, I'm not sure where this happened... but... because Americans use 110V instead of 230V someone decided that we'd need these little beauties...
They are two 230v to 110v power convertors, if you'd not guessed. Basically big ass transformers, which weigh a tonne. The little one is for the TFT screen, with the bigger one for the actual computer.
I didn't even know the computer was running like this until I suggested moving it...
Sounds fine so far, no? Well... the little one is plugged in as follows...
If you can't work out what it is because the image is too small... it's a 110V to 12V AC adapter... as if that wasn't bad enough... the big ass convertor is connected to...
You see that little red switch with 11(0V) on it... guess what happens if you switch it the other way...?
Do you know how much the stupid power convertors cost!? They could have paid me that... for switching a switch and buying an appropriate AC adapter... even though I have to buy something, I sense I still may have profitted...
Apologies if the obvious way of doing things isn't as obvious to you :-)