Comment On Ahh, No One Will Notice

Where is the CodeSOD?

mdk:

Where is the CodeSOD?

(will be populated by ALEX_OF_THE_DAILY_WTF at lunchtime)

I suppose it depends upon the context...

If it's just in-the-works, then yeah, I think we've all filled out place-holders like this at one time or other.

If this made it into production, then yeah, major QA wtf.

What software is this supposed to be?

Maybe it tracks QA processes.

"ridiculously expensive" is a relative term.

If the features are this poorly tested, then even charging ten dollars would be considered "ridiculously expensive" but if somehow the developers did everything else right, ten dollars might be a bargain.

Who wants to place bets on which category this application falls in?

For what it's worth, there does seem to be another mechanism or two in there for creating a new document. Maybe not as convenient, but I'd bet "New Document From Template" was just as comprehensive as this list would have been, barring additional WTFs not documented here.

Convenience like this may indeed be not-quite-so-significant in the vast scheme of things... it's embarrassing, but not a deadly show-stopper.

It's an ETL tool, costs upwards of USD 20000 per cpu.

Their website is annoying as hell: http://www.abinitio.com/

What, they use Javascript to center divs after rendering?!

And yeah, I couldn't find pricing information, but $20k? Geez.

I just found out that another team at my company bought a software "package" that cost upwards of $1MM, only to discover afterward that the license explicitly precluded them from modifying built-in reports, or ex/importing data to/from other systems.

WTF?

Programmer: It's so ridiculously expensive no one will buy it. And thus no one will ever find this glitch.

(The next day)
Programmer: What? Discounts for bulk orders? NOOOOOOOOOOOO!

JamesKilton:

What, they use Javascript to center divs after rendering?!

Naturally, yes. Because that is way more enterprisey than using something like:

#main{
width:763px;
margin: 0 auto;}

That's nothing, we have timeclock software that not only is full of typos, but also can't seem to do basic math at times.

(or be entirely in one language, it also crashes when you try to export the data to quickbooks)

The (unemployed) Graduate:

mdk:

Where is the CodeSOD?

(will be populated by ALEX_OF_THE_DAILY_WTF at lunchtime)

I think this post gets the best post of the thread award :)

Test_subj:

That's nothing, we have timeclock software that not only is full of typos, but also can't seem to do basic math at times.

(or be entirely in one language, it also crashes when you try to export the data to quickbooks)

is it kronos?

Don't hate me for ruining all the bashing, but have you considered that this could be a result of a failure to load a module. Maybe it is an installation gone bad, or some dumb administrator messed up the configuration. There is hardly enough evidence, that the developers left this like this after deployment.

Don't hate me for ruining all the bashing, but have you considered that this could be a result of a failure to load a module. Maybe it is an installation gone bad or some dumb administrator messed up the configuration. There is hardly enough evidence, that the developers left it like this after deployment.

Note the 3 separate New commands...

OK, so sure maybe it's a configuration issue, but it's still a WTF that the software gets all the way to the main screen without crashing when an important module is missing. I find it humorous nonetheless.

I think it's more likely a configuration error than actual code error.

The (unemployed) Graduate:

mdk:

Where is the CodeSOD?

(will be populated by ALEX_OF_THE_DAILY_WTF at lunchtime)

Hehe, nice...

#define ALEX_OF_THE_DAILY_WTF 1/0

for $20K this kind of WTFs are just a pain in the ass (for the buyer that is).

All software is expensive - it's simply a matter of how many copies get made that make it affordable.

chris:

Test_subj:

That's nothing, we have timeclock software that not only is full of typos, but also can't seem to do basic math at times.

(or be entirely in one language, it also crashes when you try to export the data to quickbooks)

is it kronos?

Oh Noes!!!!!11!!1!
Not Kronos!
I left my old job partially because of that WTF.

Stephen:

It's an ETL tool, costs upwards of USD 20000 per cpu.

AFAIK, its the most expensive of the ETL tools out there, and definitely the most secretive. This is why their website doesn't actually provide any real information about the product. If you don't already know, you can't afford it.

They stamp the users' guides with serial numbers so that if one is recovered from "the wrong hands" they can trace it back to the original recipient.

Ab Initio doesn't care what you think it's a pain in the ass or not.
Why don't you call them up, and ask them about buying a license? Ab Initio won't even return your call.

If you've got several million to spend on a data integration project, they might deign to perform a demonstration for you. And, maybe not.

And, after you see it, you'll buy it- (and pay way more than 20K/cpu for it).

ninjas:

chris:

Test_subj:

That's nothing, we have timeclock software that not only is full of typos, but also can't seem to do basic math at times.

(or be entirely in one language, it also crashes when you try to export the data to quickbooks)

is it kronos?

Oh Noes!!!!!11!!1!
Not Kronos!
I left my old job partially because of that WTF.

You left a job partially because of bad timeclock software? I agree Kronos is a WTF but I wouldn't leave a job because of it...... Were you administering it or maintaining it?

It's a big WTF to me how many WTF timeclock solutions there are out there. Seems like a pretty simple application to me....

anonymous kronos user:

ninjas:

chris:

Test_subj:

That's nothing, we have timeclock software that not only is full of typos, but also can't seem to do basic math at times.

(or be entirely in one language, it also crashes when you try to export the data to quickbooks)

is it kronos?

Oh Noes!!!!!11!!1!
Not Kronos!
I left my old job partially because of that WTF.

You left a job partially because of bad timeclock software? I agree Kronos is a WTF but I wouldn't leave a job because of it...... Were you administering it or maintaining it?

It wasn't the only reason I left, but it was a factor. We had to track PTO through it. It continually kept saying I had no PTO remaining (even though I had not taken any). So whenever I would request PTO, my manager would deny it because Kronos showed I had no PTO available. And, yes, my manager was a big WTF as well, as was the company in general, well at least my organization.

Program is fine. Minor bug.

If you look there IS a NEW menu item above it (above the new from template). Assuming this works, the only bug is an accidental duplicate creation of the NEW menu item, which is not anything above MINOR in my opinion. Embarassing but MINOR

I pulled up the website and got BINGO on my buzzword bingo card by the second paragraph. (And all the text is an image. Surely that should fill in a wildcard space?)

Here I was thinking it might be an interesting quantum chemistry program. No such luck...

/Capcha: Waffles. Tasty, tasty waffles.

According to Wikipedia, they're founded by the ex-CEO and several other execs of Thinking Machines, which went bankrupt in the mid-1990s.

Chris Mattern

anon:

Ab Initio doesn't care what you think it's a pain in the ass or not.
Why don't you call them up, and ask them about buying a license? Ab Initio won't even return your call.

If you've got several million to spend on a data integration project, they might deign to perform a demonstration for you. And, maybe not.

And, after you see it, you'll buy it- (and pay way more than 20K/cpu for it).

Exactly. Their mentality has always been something akin to "If you need us, you'll know." The only way I found out about Ab Initio at an old job was complaining to a friend at another company who used it. He, in turn, learned about them the same way. We called them in to show them our problem, and they came back in THE SAME DAY with a functioning solution. It took Oracle almost two weeks to provide a demonstration prototype. It's all a little cloak-and-dagger, but damn if they don't make it work.

That screenshot seems to be taken in 256 colours. WTF?!

Ok, write a Hello-World-Program in C (looks like if you are pro), get a nice name:

CCOSITA, C Compatible Operating System Installation Testing Application

and sell it for some $$$. The more $$$ you ask for the more people buy it. Whoose law was that?

CAPTCHA: xevious - *WTF* is that?

Quoted from their website:

PORTABILITY The Co>Operating System runs
heterogeneously across a huge variety of operating
system and hardware platforms, from OX/390 on
mainframes, to 10 different implementations of
Unix, to Windows NT and Windows 2000.

madjo:

That screenshot seems to be taken in 256 colours. WTF?!

Indeed, that's The Real WTF(TM). That a supposedly tech-savvy site would take a 16-color bitmap and post it on the web as a JPG, thus making the file larger and the quality worse.

Wheee!

mjb:

Program is fine. Minor bug.

If you look there IS a NEW menu item above it (above the new from template). Assuming this works, the only bug is an accidental duplicate creation of the NEW menu item, which is not anything above MINOR in my opinion. Embarassing but MINOR

But the "New" at the top is just new, while the "New" with the message has a pointer for sub menus. I would assume this would a choice of a variety of new wizzbangs that could be created. And the list of the wizzbangs is missing, hence the inability to load.

However, in that case, proper interface design would caused that menu option to be disabled or omitted, not yield a WTF?! when activated.

Chris:

According to Wikipedia, they're founded by the ex-CEO and several other execs of Thinking Machines, which went bankrupt in the mid-1990s.

Chris Mattern

This article is excellent:

http://www.inc.com/magazine/19950915/2622.html

anon:

Ab Initio doesn't care what you think it's a pain in the ass or not.
Why don't you call them up, and ask them about buying a license? Ab Initio won't even return your call.

If you've got several million to spend on a data integration project, they might deign to perform a demonstration for you. And, maybe not.

And, after you see it, you'll buy it- (and pay way more than 20K/cpu for it).

Uh, so what is it? What does ETL even stand for?

Extract, transform, load - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Etl

(captcha: bathe)

the website has red background and is hosted on Lotus Notes (.nsf)

and they want my $20k. pppffftt get lost. losers :D

The (unemployed) Graduate:

mdk:

Where is the CodeSOD?

(will be populated by ALEX_OF_THE_DAILY_WTF at lunchtime)

Who didn't see that coming?

Yup, it costs a helluva lot. The company I used to work at nearly bought it.

We spent a day at their offices reviewing the product. They have quite simply the best staff canteen I've ever seen. I went to the Asian counter where the chef cooked my stir-fry exactly to my specification. Nice.

Also, the application spells the word "queue" as "que" throughout. I'm so damned glad we didn't buy it - I couldn't have worked with that every day.

It didn't quite do what we wanted, so I wrote a program that did (in about a week). My boss told me off because he hadn't pre-approved that work and so we weren't allowed to use my program. I guess it just made my boss look bad...

mjb:

Program is fine. Minor bug.

If you look there IS a NEW menu item above it (above the new from template). Assuming this works, the only bug is an accidental duplicate creation of the NEW menu item, which is not anything above MINOR in my opinion. Embarassing but MINOR

From a developer point of view, it is minor. Assuming of course that the functionality provided by that interface isn't crippled by the missing menu.

From a users point of view this is a major bug. A whole menu item is missing. Doesn't inspire confidence. Which also makes problems for sales and marketing (but then, they don't actually have to have a product in order to sell it, so screw 'em).

Whatever the reason, be it configuration or actual missing features or just a bit of code that should have been removed, this is very unproffesional. This shouldn't happen outside of development and testing.

SomeCoder:

The (unemployed) Graduate:

mdk:

Where is the CodeSOD?

(will be populated by ALEX_OF_THE_DAILY_WTF at lunchtime)

I think this post gets the best post of the thread award :)

I second that ...

chris:

is it kronos?

Better hope not, or you may end up with a bunch of irate Klingons* on your doorstep.





*yeah I know, lame Star Trek reference. I'm a geek, what do you expect?

:)

I doubt you'll find any Ab Initio developer out there that doesn't just smile. In the absence of another module (PlanIt), the offending New should just be greyed out.

Do they care you don't like their site? Not a damn bit.
Do they turn things around quickly? You bet.
Do people beat a path to their door? Enough of them do.
Does it fly? Yeap!!!

chris:

is it kronos?

Pendulum

Should be .nsfw!

JamesKilton:

Their website is annoying as hell: http://www.abinitio.com/

You're too kind. I don't understand how anyone can even look at that color. It's like a teenager's lime green background site.