Microsoft "help"
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Microsoft is not the only one. Step 7 of Siemens (PLC Programming) is most like that and sometimes even worst
Regards. -------- M.D.V. ;) If something has a solution... Why do we have to worry about?. If it has no solution... For what reason do we have to worry about? Help me to understand what I'm saying, and I'll explain it better to you Rating helpfull answers is nice, but saying thanks can be even nicer.
Nelek wrote:
PLC Programming
PLC programmers can't. I have personal experience with them. "You mean I have to install the TCP/IP module to make this work?" :rolleyes:
Software Zen:
delete this; -
I remember a time some 15 years back when I was asked to implement some OLE2 features in our application (i. e. some views on Excel tables, both for entering and reading data). I looked up official documentation of OLE, but pretty much the only information it turned up was a pointer to the documentation of the Excel Automation Interface. This documentation looked something like this:
SetViewRectangle(Variant, Variant, Variant, Variant)
And that was it. No explanation of the function, or even argument names to indicate which is which! While the purpose was halfway clear from the function's name, I had no idea about the type and unit of the parameters, or whether it was top left x/y, bottom right x/y, or bottom left, top right, or maybe bottom right plus width and height? And that was the easy part, at least there was only a small number of possible ways. The problem was that the documentation was like that for Every. Single. Function. Fortunately that wasn't the only available documentation: there were in fact some quite useful books out there, just none by MS. But even those books didn't help when I migrated the application from Win NT to Win95, and found the effect of that function to be totally changed! I had to trial-and-error all over again to find the correct use of the function X|
I've gotten to the point where I simply exclude any results from MSDN. It's worthless. I think the thing I hate the most is their "samples" which generally don't compile and more often than not have absolutely no relevance to what you're looking up. My favorite though is when you hit F1 over a method of a .net class like say Page.LoadControl and instead of outlining the parameters for LoadControl instead it just coughs up the general Call() help article. Because I was unaware that I was calling a function? Bastards!
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Couldn't resist adding some "Community Content" on what I found looking through Microsoft documentation. ========================================= "layoutRect RectangleF structure that specifies the layout rectangle for the string." What an inane comment! So layoutRect specifies the layout rectangle! Who wouldda thunk?? What would we do without Microsoft to point out the obvious, while not giving a goddamn clue HOW a layout rectangle is relevant to the goddamn measurement! It's idiotic comments like this that make Microsoft "help" the butt of jokes!
"Microsoft -- Adding unnecessary complexity to your work since 1987!"
My "favorite" :) was the documentation for encryption. I was charged with programming the AES 256 encryption of credit card numbers. I don't have the exact code handy but the MS example was virtually this...
Create Key //storing key is beyond the scope of this document
Create Salt //storing salt is beyond the scope of this document
String = "Test" //assign string to encrypt
Encrypt String //string is now encrypted
//storing encrypted string is beyond the scope of this document
Decrypt String
//Decryption works!!If I hadn't already created an encryption plugin for SQL Server 2000 by ripping the AES guts out of TrueCrypt and encapsulating it in a C++ wrapper, I would have been totally lost.
Psychosis at 10 Film at 11 Those who do not remember the past, are doomed to repeat it. Those who do not remember the past, cannot build upon it.
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Couldn't resist adding some "Community Content" on what I found looking through Microsoft documentation. ========================================= "layoutRect RectangleF structure that specifies the layout rectangle for the string." What an inane comment! So layoutRect specifies the layout rectangle! Who wouldda thunk?? What would we do without Microsoft to point out the obvious, while not giving a goddamn clue HOW a layout rectangle is relevant to the goddamn measurement! It's idiotic comments like this that make Microsoft "help" the butt of jokes!
"Microsoft -- Adding unnecessary complexity to your work since 1987!"
The funny thing is that you can actually find two different docs on MSDN about the same subject; one explaining well and the other useless. I think that MS do not pick their authors very well, some are good and some are clueless about documentation skills.
"To alcohol! The cause of, and solution to, all of life's problems" - Homer Simpson "Our heads are round so our thoughts can change direction." ― Francis Picabia
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Couldn't resist adding some "Community Content" on what I found looking through Microsoft documentation. ========================================= "layoutRect RectangleF structure that specifies the layout rectangle for the string." What an inane comment! So layoutRect specifies the layout rectangle! Who wouldda thunk?? What would we do without Microsoft to point out the obvious, while not giving a goddamn clue HOW a layout rectangle is relevant to the goddamn measurement! It's idiotic comments like this that make Microsoft "help" the butt of jokes!
"Microsoft -- Adding unnecessary complexity to your work since 1987!"
What I hate is having to go to Google to do a worthwhile search on the Knowledge Base.
Those aren't bugs, they're randomly generated features.
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Couldn't resist adding some "Community Content" on what I found looking through Microsoft documentation. ========================================= "layoutRect RectangleF structure that specifies the layout rectangle for the string." What an inane comment! So layoutRect specifies the layout rectangle! Who wouldda thunk?? What would we do without Microsoft to point out the obvious, while not giving a goddamn clue HOW a layout rectangle is relevant to the goddamn measurement! It's idiotic comments like this that make Microsoft "help" the butt of jokes!
"Microsoft -- Adding unnecessary complexity to your work since 1987!"
I believe Microsoft does this intentionally in order to get "support" revenue. I do know I was hired for a couple of months to create SharePoint documentation. We were told specifically to not explain anything. Make sure to be totally accurate, be sure to read the code so you understand what is the purpose. That's so you don't accidently contradict it, but also don't document it. I think we blew it, because our documentation was better than the usual you see from MS.
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Couldn't resist adding some "Community Content" on what I found looking through Microsoft documentation. ========================================= "layoutRect RectangleF structure that specifies the layout rectangle for the string." What an inane comment! So layoutRect specifies the layout rectangle! Who wouldda thunk?? What would we do without Microsoft to point out the obvious, while not giving a goddamn clue HOW a layout rectangle is relevant to the goddamn measurement! It's idiotic comments like this that make Microsoft "help" the butt of jokes!
"Microsoft -- Adding unnecessary complexity to your work since 1987!"
Alan Balkany wrote:
"Community Content"
is a joke as the community is not keen on updating it. A very loose patrolling of community content by Microsoft as its not 'popular'. ;)
Regards, Jwalant Natvarlal Soneji http://jwalantsoneji.com[^]
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Couldn't resist adding some "Community Content" on what I found looking through Microsoft documentation. ========================================= "layoutRect RectangleF structure that specifies the layout rectangle for the string." What an inane comment! So layoutRect specifies the layout rectangle! Who wouldda thunk?? What would we do without Microsoft to point out the obvious, while not giving a goddamn clue HOW a layout rectangle is relevant to the goddamn measurement! It's idiotic comments like this that make Microsoft "help" the butt of jokes!
"Microsoft -- Adding unnecessary complexity to your work since 1987!"
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http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx/kb/168702[^] Method 2. I dare anyone to find something less useful!
-= Reelix =-
"Do not stop moving the mouse until all the data has been returned to Microsoft Excel. (...) it may take several minutes."
They must have had fun while writing this insanity. I have just imagined a group of developer all... moving their mouses... for several minutes :laugh:
Greetings - Jacek
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I've gotten to the point where I simply exclude any results from MSDN. It's worthless. I think the thing I hate the most is their "samples" which generally don't compile and more often than not have absolutely no relevance to what you're looking up. My favorite though is when you hit F1 over a method of a .net class like say Page.LoadControl and instead of outlining the parameters for LoadControl instead it just coughs up the general Call() help article. Because I was unaware that I was calling a function? Bastards!
Agreed about the examples though I finally found out how they are created and feel more for the creators and the process than the examples. Anyone that works in Microsoft Consulting is expected to "remain up to date on most current technology". Of course, the only way to demonstrate that is to write samples of the code. So they are required to be the ones to create the examples, usually at night, after 8-10 hours of coding for a client, when they should be spending time with their families.