Is there anything scarier than one's own code?
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I was asked to make a minor update to an accounting application that I wrote last year. I jumped in and began poking around and noticed a really stupid addition error. The error, in short, was including items in the total that the user indicated were not to be included in the total. It's one of those errors that feels a great deal like what it must feel like to have one's pants suddenly go missing in the middle of a crowded shopping mall. I stood up at my desk and looked around - nobody seems to have caught on to this incredibly goofy thing I'd done. I'm calmly typing at my computer right now while screaming in my head. Nothing to see here. Just a normal day at work. *omg...I gotta fix this NOW* How about that weather? *how did I .... what was I thinking here* Yeah, the royal wedding was something - talk about it but don't look at my screen. *I need to get this update out ASAP* What? This update? Oh, just some query optimizations... I think I'll quietly fix the problem, submit my resignation, and get a job washing dishes somewhere. I need a job with less "exposure". Publishing the update now...
Can I recommend that you further your education[^]?
Henry Minute Do not read medical books! You could die of a misprint. - Mark Twain Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.” I wouldn't let CG touch my Abacus! When you're wrestling a gorilla, you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is.
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MehGerbil wrote:
Is there anything scarier than one's own code?
Oh yes. Lots: 1) Spiders. 2) Ex-wives. (Not a problem I have, never been divorced). 3) Brain eating zombies. 4) Shark infested custard. And there is a whole list of things people find scary here[^] - including peanut0butter-stuck-to-the-roof-of-your-mouth-o-phobia (Arachibutyrophobia, if you are interested)
Real men don't use instructions. They are only the manufacturers opinion on how to put the thing together. Manfred R. Bihy: "Looks as if OP is learning resistant."
OriginalGriff wrote:
including peanut0butter
Only suffered by those of Irish descent, presumably?
Henry Minute Do not read medical books! You could die of a misprint. - Mark Twain Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.” I wouldn't let CG touch my Abacus! When you're wrestling a gorilla, you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is.
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OriginalGriff wrote:
including peanut0butter
Only suffered by those of Irish descent, presumably?
Henry Minute Do not read medical books! You could die of a misprint. - Mark Twain Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.” I wouldn't let CG touch my Abacus! When you're wrestling a gorilla, you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is.
Only if they remember the Great Irish Peanut O'butter Famine of '86.
Real men don't use instructions. They are only the manufacturers opinion on how to put the thing together. Manfred R. Bihy: "Looks as if OP is learning resistant."
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Can I recommend that you further your education[^]?
Henry Minute Do not read medical books! You could die of a misprint. - Mark Twain Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.” I wouldn't let CG touch my Abacus! When you're wrestling a gorilla, you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is.
Are they seriously suggesting Accountancy Through the Medium of Dance? :omg:
Real men don't use instructions. They are only the manufacturers opinion on how to put the thing together. Manfred R. Bihy: "Looks as if OP is learning resistant."
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I was asked to make a minor update to an accounting application that I wrote last year. I jumped in and began poking around and noticed a really stupid addition error. The error, in short, was including items in the total that the user indicated were not to be included in the total. It's one of those errors that feels a great deal like what it must feel like to have one's pants suddenly go missing in the middle of a crowded shopping mall. I stood up at my desk and looked around - nobody seems to have caught on to this incredibly goofy thing I'd done. I'm calmly typing at my computer right now while screaming in my head. Nothing to see here. Just a normal day at work. *omg...I gotta fix this NOW* How about that weather? *how did I .... what was I thinking here* Yeah, the royal wedding was something - talk about it but don't look at my screen. *I need to get this update out ASAP* What? This update? Oh, just some query optimizations... I think I'll quietly fix the problem, submit my resignation, and get a job washing dishes somewhere. I need a job with less "exposure". Publishing the update now...
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MehGerbil wrote:
Is there anything scarier than one's own code?
Oh yes. Lots: 1) Spiders. 2) Ex-wives. (Not a problem I have, never been divorced). 3) Brain eating zombies. 4) Shark infested custard. And there is a whole list of things people find scary here[^] - including peanut0butter-stuck-to-the-roof-of-your-mouth-o-phobia (Arachibutyrophobia, if you are interested)
Real men don't use instructions. They are only the manufacturers opinion on how to put the thing together. Manfred R. Bihy: "Looks as if OP is learning resistant."
If, you're scared of spiders, check out my next thread in the Lounge.
Craigslist Troll: litaly@comcast.net "I have a theory that the truth is never told during the nine-to-five hours. " — Hunter S. Thompson
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Are they seriously suggesting Accountancy Through the Medium of Dance? :omg:
Real men don't use instructions. They are only the manufacturers opinion on how to put the thing together. Manfred R. Bihy: "Looks as if OP is learning resistant."
Great, ain't it? I think it is the methodology followed by DD.
Henry Minute Do not read medical books! You could die of a misprint. - Mark Twain Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.” I wouldn't let CG touch my Abacus! When you're wrestling a gorilla, you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is.
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The worst code you'll come across is code you wrote last year.
"I have a theory that the truth is never told during the nine-to-five hours. " — Hunter S. Thompson
that's a good one... I'll have to revisit some code I wrote last year here pretty soon, I'm already afraid of what I'll find.
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I was asked to make a minor update to an accounting application that I wrote last year. I jumped in and began poking around and noticed a really stupid addition error. The error, in short, was including items in the total that the user indicated were not to be included in the total. It's one of those errors that feels a great deal like what it must feel like to have one's pants suddenly go missing in the middle of a crowded shopping mall. I stood up at my desk and looked around - nobody seems to have caught on to this incredibly goofy thing I'd done. I'm calmly typing at my computer right now while screaming in my head. Nothing to see here. Just a normal day at work. *omg...I gotta fix this NOW* How about that weather? *how did I .... what was I thinking here* Yeah, the royal wedding was something - talk about it but don't look at my screen. *I need to get this update out ASAP* What? This update? Oh, just some query optimizations... I think I'll quietly fix the problem, submit my resignation, and get a job washing dishes somewhere. I need a job with less "exposure". Publishing the update now...
I was just sucked into a project vortex where our current team didn't write any of the code and that utilizes the following "technologies": - asp.net 2.0 (vb.net) - sql server 2005 - legacy asp (using vbscript) - javascript - jquery - ajax - access - excel - remote databases designed and (preumably) maintained by someone else - a desktop application (in VB6) - enterprise library We added a silverlight module and companion web service that we wrote, but this is the only part of the whole thing that is even partially documented or that has comments in the code. For everything EXCEPT the Silverlight stuff, there is no documentation - of any kind. We inherited the support side, and we immediately discovered problems that the users never said anything about, nor cared about until we found them and started responding to "upgrade" requests with reasons something couldn't be done. We're hoping for a chance to rewrite the entire system from scratch, but real life experience dictates that we'll never have the opportunity, or if it's presented to us, we won't be given the time to properly design, implement and test the system. Add to that the "personal agenda" aspect associated with a high turnover rate at all levels of management, and you can see that we're in an impossible situation that can only be solved if everybody just leaves us the hell alone and lets us cruise pron sites. So yes, there actually *is* something scarier than your own source code.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
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You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
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"Why don't you tie a kerosene-soaked rag around your ankles so the ants won't climb up and eat your candy ass." - Dale Earnhardt, 1997modified on Friday, April 29, 2011 11:48 AM
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I was just sucked into a project vortex where our current team didn't write any of the code and that utilizes the following "technologies": - asp.net 2.0 (vb.net) - sql server 2005 - legacy asp (using vbscript) - javascript - jquery - ajax - access - excel - remote databases designed and (preumably) maintained by someone else - a desktop application (in VB6) - enterprise library We added a silverlight module and companion web service that we wrote, but this is the only part of the whole thing that is even partially documented or that has comments in the code. For everything EXCEPT the Silverlight stuff, there is no documentation - of any kind. We inherited the support side, and we immediately discovered problems that the users never said anything about, nor cared about until we found them and started responding to "upgrade" requests with reasons something couldn't be done. We're hoping for a chance to rewrite the entire system from scratch, but real life experience dictates that we'll never have the opportunity, or if it's presented to us, we won't be given the time to properly design, implement and test the system. Add to that the "personal agenda" aspect associated with a high turnover rate at all levels of management, and you can see that we're in an impossible situation that can only be solved if everybody just leaves us the hell alone and lets us cruise pron sites. So yes, there actually *is* something scarier than your own source code.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
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You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
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"Why don't you tie a kerosene-soaked rag around your ankles so the ants won't climb up and eat your candy ass." - Dale Earnhardt, 1997modified on Friday, April 29, 2011 11:48 AM
I'm working on a bit old C++ (with some C) code base, and I'm happy. :)
"Real men drive manual transmission" - Rajesh.
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The worst code you'll come across is code you wrote last year.
"I have a theory that the truth is never told during the nine-to-five hours. " — Hunter S. Thompson
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I was just sucked into a project vortex where our current team didn't write any of the code and that utilizes the following "technologies": - asp.net 2.0 (vb.net) - sql server 2005 - legacy asp (using vbscript) - javascript - jquery - ajax - access - excel - remote databases designed and (preumably) maintained by someone else - a desktop application (in VB6) - enterprise library We added a silverlight module and companion web service that we wrote, but this is the only part of the whole thing that is even partially documented or that has comments in the code. For everything EXCEPT the Silverlight stuff, there is no documentation - of any kind. We inherited the support side, and we immediately discovered problems that the users never said anything about, nor cared about until we found them and started responding to "upgrade" requests with reasons something couldn't be done. We're hoping for a chance to rewrite the entire system from scratch, but real life experience dictates that we'll never have the opportunity, or if it's presented to us, we won't be given the time to properly design, implement and test the system. Add to that the "personal agenda" aspect associated with a high turnover rate at all levels of management, and you can see that we're in an impossible situation that can only be solved if everybody just leaves us the hell alone and lets us cruise pron sites. So yes, there actually *is* something scarier than your own source code.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
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"Why don't you tie a kerosene-soaked rag around your ankles so the ants won't climb up and eat your candy ass." - Dale Earnhardt, 1997modified on Friday, April 29, 2011 11:48 AM
Nice to see that GD hasn't changed much. In my tenure there we had to write apps using GD-BASIC on HP 21xx minis, and relying on home grown libraries of numbered CALLs. Documentation was closely guarded by the group that wrote the libraries, and only distributed a page at a time after sufficient grovelling at the feet of the current custodian of the item. Updates were never announced, only to be discovered after weeks of coding to an older, now-defunct version from memory.
Will Rogers never met me.
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Nice to see that GD hasn't changed much. In my tenure there we had to write apps using GD-BASIC on HP 21xx minis, and relying on home grown libraries of numbered CALLs. Documentation was closely guarded by the group that wrote the libraries, and only distributed a page at a time after sufficient grovelling at the feet of the current custodian of the item. Updates were never announced, only to be discovered after weeks of coding to an older, now-defunct version from memory.
Will Rogers never met me.
This isn't GD's fault. The code came from the last contractors that had the contract, and our team has never been tasked with fixing it. We can only do what the customer wants us to do.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
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You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
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"Why don't you tie a kerosene-soaked rag around your ankles so the ants won't climb up and eat your candy ass." - Dale Earnhardt, 1997 -
I was asked to make a minor update to an accounting application that I wrote last year. I jumped in and began poking around and noticed a really stupid addition error. The error, in short, was including items in the total that the user indicated were not to be included in the total. It's one of those errors that feels a great deal like what it must feel like to have one's pants suddenly go missing in the middle of a crowded shopping mall. I stood up at my desk and looked around - nobody seems to have caught on to this incredibly goofy thing I'd done. I'm calmly typing at my computer right now while screaming in my head. Nothing to see here. Just a normal day at work. *omg...I gotta fix this NOW* How about that weather? *how did I .... what was I thinking here* Yeah, the royal wedding was something - talk about it but don't look at my screen. *I need to get this update out ASAP* What? This update? Oh, just some query optimizations... I think I'll quietly fix the problem, submit my resignation, and get a job washing dishes somewhere. I need a job with less "exposure". Publishing the update now...
Yeah other peoples code that: - isn't indented correctly - happily deletes local arrays - returns pointers to local variables - fails to work - and are too dumb to realize how dumb they are.
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I was asked to make a minor update to an accounting application that I wrote last year. I jumped in and began poking around and noticed a really stupid addition error. The error, in short, was including items in the total that the user indicated were not to be included in the total. It's one of those errors that feels a great deal like what it must feel like to have one's pants suddenly go missing in the middle of a crowded shopping mall. I stood up at my desk and looked around - nobody seems to have caught on to this incredibly goofy thing I'd done. I'm calmly typing at my computer right now while screaming in my head. Nothing to see here. Just a normal day at work. *omg...I gotta fix this NOW* How about that weather? *how did I .... what was I thinking here* Yeah, the royal wedding was something - talk about it but don't look at my screen. *I need to get this update out ASAP* What? This update? Oh, just some query optimizations... I think I'll quietly fix the problem, submit my resignation, and get a job washing dishes somewhere. I need a job with less "exposure". Publishing the update now...
Actually it’s more along the lines of bizarre! I have gone back and opened code that I have done and began to read it and thought, WOW who did this, this is very cool! Having no recall of ever doing it. Must have been in the Zone for sure!
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The worst code you'll come across is code you wrote last year.
"I have a theory that the truth is never told during the nine-to-five hours. " — Hunter S. Thompson
If that isn't true, then you haven't learned anything in a year.
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I was asked to make a minor update to an accounting application that I wrote last year. I jumped in and began poking around and noticed a really stupid addition error. The error, in short, was including items in the total that the user indicated were not to be included in the total. It's one of those errors that feels a great deal like what it must feel like to have one's pants suddenly go missing in the middle of a crowded shopping mall. I stood up at my desk and looked around - nobody seems to have caught on to this incredibly goofy thing I'd done. I'm calmly typing at my computer right now while screaming in my head. Nothing to see here. Just a normal day at work. *omg...I gotta fix this NOW* How about that weather? *how did I .... what was I thinking here* Yeah, the royal wedding was something - talk about it but don't look at my screen. *I need to get this update out ASAP* What? This update? Oh, just some query optimizations... I think I'll quietly fix the problem, submit my resignation, and get a job washing dishes somewhere. I need a job with less "exposure". Publishing the update now...
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Of course there is... Imagine that your boss comes and ask you to do that minor update in a code that one coworker that is already not working in the company did one year ago... X| Apart of that, don't worry, there would be tons of IT people washing dishes out there if that would be the penitence for making programming errors... They somehow disappear... :~ Good luck with the update! and have a nice weekend...
[www.tamelectromecanica.com] Robots, CNC and PLC machines for grinding and polishing.
What's scary about that? Code that does nothing... I just swear at the @#$@$ developer who isn't around. Code that doesn't make sense... I just worry about sanity - mine or the developer's. Code that's wrong... Well, everyone is human. Code that could be written more effieciently in 10 times fewer lines... Is it worth going through code review and worrying about bean counters finding out you are producing negitive line counts in coding? Finding out you are human and not a DEMI-GOD... Now that is scary.
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I was just sucked into a project vortex where our current team didn't write any of the code and that utilizes the following "technologies": - asp.net 2.0 (vb.net) - sql server 2005 - legacy asp (using vbscript) - javascript - jquery - ajax - access - excel - remote databases designed and (preumably) maintained by someone else - a desktop application (in VB6) - enterprise library We added a silverlight module and companion web service that we wrote, but this is the only part of the whole thing that is even partially documented or that has comments in the code. For everything EXCEPT the Silverlight stuff, there is no documentation - of any kind. We inherited the support side, and we immediately discovered problems that the users never said anything about, nor cared about until we found them and started responding to "upgrade" requests with reasons something couldn't be done. We're hoping for a chance to rewrite the entire system from scratch, but real life experience dictates that we'll never have the opportunity, or if it's presented to us, we won't be given the time to properly design, implement and test the system. Add to that the "personal agenda" aspect associated with a high turnover rate at all levels of management, and you can see that we're in an impossible situation that can only be solved if everybody just leaves us the hell alone and lets us cruise pron sites. So yes, there actually *is* something scarier than your own source code.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
"Why don't you tie a kerosene-soaked rag around your ankles so the ants won't climb up and eat your candy ass." - Dale Earnhardt, 1997modified on Friday, April 29, 2011 11:48 AM
John Simmons / outlaw programmer wrote:
So yes, there actually *is* something scarier than your own source code.
You nailed it. (At least for me.) Being in that situation would be much scarier for me than finding out I am only human. (I found that out much too long ago.)
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Yeah other peoples code that: - isn't indented correctly - happily deletes local arrays - returns pointers to local variables - fails to work - and are too dumb to realize how dumb they are.
I don't think so. Every one of those mistakes can be ascribed to the idiot who doesn't know how to code. If you have been around long enough, you realize you are surrounded by idiots, so you will always find mistakes in code. I think that finding out that you are one of the idiots is one of the bigger breakthroughs you will have to go through in your programming life. John Simmons did nail it in an earlier post. Being completely responsible for a big undocumented system written by someone else who doesn't believe in comments is scarier.
sashan govender wrote:
returns pointers to local variables
That must be a C++ thing? My memory of C++ is dim, but I do remember it having two symbol prefixes to pass an address location two different ways, which seemed kind of an assinine way to handle it. (Can you really blame me? I'm self-taught, with only Microsoft Documentation to help me.) VB.NET is another self-taught language. I thought it was kind of dumb that you could pass a "by value" reference object, now I'm kind of wondering if you pass a "by reference" object that is assigned new memory, would the passed object inherit the new memory location?
