Late in my high school years when use of computers was becoming really common for every class, I discovered the wonders and power of the common batch file. The .bat file is basically a list of DOS commands that run when you open the file. While there was probably greater things I could have done with them, it was the simplest things that could be the most fun. For example: take a batch files that opens itself over and over again, label it MARIO.bat and put it on the schools common drive, wait a few moments and then smile as you hear the groans of annoyance as people's computers would try and open ten thousand batch files at once forcing them to restart.
Pretty soon someone discovered the NET send feature that is included in Windows, which allowed one to send a message which would pop up like an error message on a computer of your choice. At first people just used them to communicate with each other between class but if you replaced the outgoing targets login with a * it would send it to everyone on the network. The downside was that your computer would be labeled on the outgoing message so it could easily be traced back to you. This discovery combined with my previous experience with batch files allowed me to wreak some decent, but relatively harmless, havoc on the school network.
So one science lesson when we were in the computer lab I placed another MARIO.bat on the common drive, but this time rather than simply crashing the persons computer it would spam every computer on the network with "COCK-A-DOODLE-DOO I DOODLE-DOODLE-DO LOVE THE COCK!!". Far too many people fell for my trap, and every five seconds you would hear the beeps of every computer in the room being flooded with the messages. Moments later teachers started bursting in the door, annoyed as hell at having their work interrupted by these delightful messages. Of course, they were calling for the blood of whoever was on "COMPUTERS 13, 15, AND 2" as it was there names on the outgoing messages. I quickly deleted the file off my drive, opened up my science work and once the hubbub had died down had a good laugh with my friends.
It was soon announced in roll call that any one found using NET send, or tricking people into using it would have their computer access suspended. Lucky for me I never got caught.
