Documentation, who needs it!
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I am part of a team that makes software to run large-scale, commercial ink-jet printing systems. These multi-million dollar machines are definitely not your mama's DeskJet. We occasionally make custom versions of the product. In most cases, we never have the hardware in-house to test against, and are told "we will do system integration at the customer's site" :wtf:. What this means, of course, is that one or more engineers goes to live at the customer's facility until the @#@$!@## thing works.
Software Zen:
delete this;Hahahaha, reminds me of when I programmed conveyor systems. We couldn't program them until they were built and the client expected the system to start up the moment the last nut was tightened. Each system was custom and there were no simulators. When I interviewed for the job, they said I'd be out of town 3 days out of the month. It turned out to be the other way around! It was check into a hotel near the site and start coding. When you get it up and running, the plant manager expects you to cover all three shifts to make sure everything is working. I was in the field for six months on one system, most I cranked out within two weeks, but this one the company oversold its capabilities and the client wasn't going to sign off until it performed per spec. It didn't matter that the salesman used the wrong formula and sold it with less than 1% safety margin. The first thing you learn in material handling is that 10% is the minimum to plan around. I had to create the correct formula and found it could NEVER perform to contract. My boss got fired over that, but the salesman kept his job and commission.
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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Once in my long and infamous career, I was tasked with programming automatic phone dialers (to my eternal shame). I asked the hardware designer (it was a custom interface card for an Apple II) for the documentation on how to talk to the hardware. The SOB pointed to the schematic and said, "That's all you need." :wtf: And then left. They have yet to find the body. Luckily for me, this was the day of standard chips and I dug out the specs for the big ones and color coded inputs, outputs, and bi-directionals. It was good that I knew his name, it made it easier to curse him. Along the way I found out why certain features on the card did not work. It seemed nobody knew the difference between milli- and micro- symbols when attached to time units.
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.
Ahh, Standard Chips the good old days, today you get a Micro or Programmable device some interfacing dodads and thats about all, ask for the code program in the programmable device and you either get some hacked C or a vendor specific file (usually in a format that can't read, except by the costly program) and pray what you have been told is correct. Glenn