Comment On Classic WTF: Integration Nation

Where's the TIBCO interface?

My Enterprise Nervous System makes me involuntarily make a FIST!

Couldn't they work Powerpoint in there somewhere?

Now that is a long data path....

Where is the wooden table?

Enterprise:

My Enterprise Nervous System makes me involuntarily make a FIST!

My gut reaction makes me involuntarily make a FINGER!

OneMHz:

Where's the TIBCO interface?

I nearly shot water out my nose from this...

C++ is used for COM. VB6 is/was used for COM. I wasn't aware that C# was used for COM. No managed code?

I wonder what would happen if app2 tried to modify records in app1 (i.e., what would happen if you tried to go backwards?).

Shouldn't there be a helium balloon that gets popped by a pin which drops a fishing weight onto a switch that turns on a fan which blows air that pushes over a book which...

Where's the misused Excel-as-database step?

...why else would you dig into the past entries to pull out something that could've just as easily been accessed via the search box or archives link?

BTW, your "classics" really are distracting -- any chance we'll see you move back to positing only original, non-repeated stories?

The DailyWTF was great when it stuck to the original format (hell, it was great when it was called DailyWTF!), but c'mon, man. I've already seen these "classics."
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FredSaw:

C++ is used for COM. VB6 is/was used for COM. I wasn't aware that C# was used for COM. No managed code?

Any .NET assembly can have a COM Interface exposed. (There's a little check box somewhere in the project properties page in Visual Studio). So even if it uses a COM interface, it's still managed code.

Yowzers, That's like driving from Pittsburgh, PA to Los Angeles, CA to get to New York, NY. It gets you there, but wouldn't have been faster to just travel east to begin with?

How the hell does a Word Document execute VBA Code?

Jeff T:

How the hell does a Word Document execute VBA Code?

Through magic!

Badly.

Jeff T:

How the hell does a Word Document execute VBA Code?

Very slowly, I imagine.

diaphanein:

OneMHz:

Where's the TIBCO interface?

I nearly shot water out my nose from this...

Me too. And I wasn't even drinking any water at the time!

Flippit:

...why else would you dig into the past entries to pull out something that could've just as easily been accessed via the search box or archives link?

BTW, your "classics" really are distracting -- any chance we'll see you move back to positing only original, non-repeated stories?

The DailyWTF was great when it stuck to the original format (hell, it was great when it was called DailyWTF!), but c'mon, man. I've already seen these "classics."
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Please STFU.

A couple weeks ago, when we were getting early 2007 "Classics", that would have been a valid point. This one actually did reach back a way. I for one, had never seen this article before, and I did get a giggle from it.

Jeff T:

How the hell does a Word Document execute VBA Code?

As much as I thought the other answers were more appropriate, I'll put this question out of its misery: Word macros are VBA.

At the foundation of every great application lies Java!

Flippit:

...why else would you dig into the past entries to pull out something that could've just as easily been accessed via the search box or archives link?

BTW, your "classics" really are distracting -- any chance we'll see you move back to positing only original, non-repeated stories?

The DailyWTF was great when it stuck to the original format (hell, it was great when it was called DailyWTF!), but c'mon, man. I've already seen these "classics."
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Give me a break... Read the post before this one on the main page... They've been a little busy...

You're like the few people at my office who complain about the free lunch we get on Fridays... I've never worked anywhere that gave us free lunch every week, but sure enough, there are people that bitch about it because we had Chick-Fil-A one week.

You're getting something pretty awesome for free... Stop complaining please.

I think we just rolled out an update to this last week. Honest!

FredSaw:

C++ is used for COM. VB6 is/was used for COM. I wasn't aware that C# was used for COM. No managed code?

COM interop is pretty easy with any .net language.

Adam Petaccia:

Where's the misused Excel-as-database step?

They're already misusing Access as a "real" database... you want more?!

Captcha: "muhahaha", which really should be "muahahaha" IMNSHO

Take that ServiceMix(http://incubator.apache.org/servicemix/home.html), a new Microsoft Office ESB Architecture.

Same here...

I think it's brain fluid...

Ah well, it's a good laugh and I'll only lose fifty precent off my brain functionnndsandsad...

:D

Mio:

(There's a little check box somewhere in the project properties page in Visual Studio). So even if it uses a COM interface, it's still managed code.

You mean "Register For COM Interop"? A COM wrapper around your code, sure... I just didn't consider that a COM dll.

I guess it's a matter of perspective. Oh, well, whatever works.

SmashAndGrab:

I think we just rolled out an update to this last week. Honest!

Let me guess. You added a "simplified" user interface that enters the data into Access by simulating mouse clicks and key presses.

For some reason, yellow starburst designs make everything funny.

Beautiful. Just Beautiful.

Rube Goldberg could do it better, though.

rjnewton:

Flippit:

...why else would you dig into the past entries to pull out something that could've just as easily been accessed via the search box or archives link?
etc..

Please STFU.

I like your neat blend of swearing and manners.

Josh:

I wonder what would happen if app2 tried to modify records in app1 (i.e., what would happen if you tried to go backwards?).

*THEN* you use the wooden table picture with the updates

Rob:

Shouldn't there be a helium balloon that gets popped by a pin which drops a fishing weight onto a switch that turns on a fan which blows air that pushes over a book which...

I'm reminded of Mouse Trap, a game I used to love when young!

rgz:

Josh:

I wonder what would happen if app2 tried to modify records in app1 (i.e., what would happen if you tried to go backwards?).

*THEN* you use the wooden table picture with the updates

That's it, next database I design has to have one of it's important tables named "Wooden_Table" just sop I can...
UPDATE Wooden_Table
SET Photo = true

That's nothing. Large org has very old dos app, which it never has succeeded in rewriting. So how do we do business now?
Web app front end(Java, j2ee, yada, yada)
packages request into xml
COTS package passes requestxmls on to bank of servers, acting as load balancer
custom C++ webserver parses xml into ancient db format, runs ancient dos app, automated via OS2 pipes, reading screen memory etc.
custom web server packages up response in xml and replies
This is how a very large business is doing business today.

No No No.

The Wooden_Table has an image column inside of it. That would make it really cool.

dustin:

No No No.

The Wooden_Table has an image column inside of it. That would make it really cool.

So update the image in the Wooden_Table, then snapshot it and send it via email to your backup process.

And I always though what I made for my work was a WTF...

My boss wanted a system to basically manage everything. Customer data, computer intake, working times employees worked, making contracts, etc.

He though it would be best done web-based. Apache + PHP, in Windows. I though it'd do. So I started coding. I tried to use the printing libraries I could find for PHP, but none of them would work. So he would just have to manually print it in his browser. It worked fine.
But he needed more and more. He had a receipt printer and wanted receipts being printed automatically, for instance.
Needles to say, the system started becoming one huge junk of hacked-up pieces.

I won't go into detail how it got where it is now, but this is how it works now:
The PHP page writes to a certain directory. This file contains a filename to a Word document, followed by the printer to print to, followed by keywords/replace items.
A VBS script was constantly running in the background (the server happens to be one of the workstations as well). It would test the directories. If a file existed, it'd open it, open Word, open the word document, replace all keywords with the replacement items and automatically print it. Well, not completely in the background, when printing, some windows pops up for a fraction of a second.

He also wanted the ability to allow people to create contracts through the website. Obviously, two entirely different servers and networks. It was already a hacked piece of crap... So here's how this works now:
A user enters a form. An email is sent to him. The email has two links to the local server, one to allow or one to deny. Both of them have a base64 encoded query string containing all the requested variables. That's the only place where the user's entery has been stored.
This PHP file writes to another directory. The VBS sees the file, opens word, opens the file, replaces all entries. Then it prints to some PDF print which converts it to .ps. Then the VBS runs a batch-script to convert it to PDF. It is then uploaded and an email is sent to the user.
All of it is timed. So at first, it was entering a time and just hoping it was done in time. The timeouts needed some tweaking though, after it was done.
I know there's a library to write to PDF files directly. However, he had the entire contract in .doc and it would be a horrible job to convert it all to a PDF or to PHP's PDF printing manually.

Another function of the VBS I won't go into detail about is printing HTML pages...

The system had quite some bugs the first few weeks. But steadily, it grew better and better and it actually works quite good now. It always does the job it's supposed to do now. Albeit in a really silly way. Although that's partly because of the silly wishes of my boss, and his inability to know what he wants before I start working on something...

jimlangrunner:

Beautiful. Just Beautiful.

Rube Goldberg could do it better, though.

Or Wile E. Coyote.

Sgt. Preston:

jimlangrunner:

Beautiful. Just Beautiful.

Rube Goldberg could do it better, though.

Or Wile E. Coyote.

Or Doctor Frankenstein

Obviously, there are some steps missing. The XML document should be sent to a satellite, which sends a signal to the Virtudyne Donkey, which has been enhanced with neural implants. This enables the donkey to graze a DataMatrix pattern in the field. Once the Google Earth satellite passes and takes the shots, the pattern is digitized into OpenStreetMap, served as Web Feature Service, and only THEN it is supposed to be passed to the ATL interface.

Now, That's enterprisey! I see an interesting market. Is there any VC willing to sponser this fabulous idea? The underpant gnomes will never beat this :)

Jonah:

SmashAndGrab:

I think we just rolled out an update to this last week. Honest!

Let me guess. You added a "simplified" user interface that enters the data into Access by simulating mouse clicks and key presses.

No, probably they added webservices, so data can be entered from anywhere. They hired last Tuesday's genius for the programming.

Where's the TIBCO interface? That would be the little arrows.

This is like a game of Telephone. One database or document stores the data, and mis-transforms it for the next step. Are they even reasonably sure the final output is correct?

DOMs to store...Alms for the poor...Calms the floor?

OneMHz:

Where's the TIBCO interface?

You must be from Amazon...

The fact is, it probably works perfectly. Although, obviously it's just not maintainable.

This is why the Enterprise application should be reading from a Visio VSD to determine the process, rather than hardcoding everything.

rjnewton:

Please STFU.

Perhaps a more proper response in these cases is "Please STWTFU."

Flippit:

The DailyWTF was great when it stuck to the original format (hell, it was great when it was called DailyWTF!), but c'mon, man. I've already seen these "classics."

At least this classic is from 2 years ago. Most of the classics we've seen lately have been from earlier this year.