Let's Be Inclusive

I am always making fun of nerdy things mathematicians do. After all, that's who I talk to everyday. So today I am branching out to an Electrical Engineer. A particular EE professor wrote a paper in which he referenced a book he was still in the process of writing. Isn't that cheating? To make it legit, he included a note indicating that he would share the book manuscript (at least everything he had written so far) upon request. So I requested. As it turns out, the book is online, protected by a username and password. After I agreed to keep the information privileged, he gave me the username but not the password. Instead he gave me a hint to the password which was based on his published work. I don't know if it was for fun, some sort of Turing test to prove I was actually interested in his work, or a way around the fact that I was using corporate email which could be inspected by my employer. Whatever the reason, I was amused. By the way, I got the password.