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All together now...

Frist resource missing!

I can understand text and buttons missing as those could be read from resource files but the directory names? Those should be read straight from disk.

That's a surprisingly helpful error dialog.

Personally, I prefer to make error messages as descriptive as possible, since at the point of failure, the author KNOWS what happened, but the poor user probably won't(even if it's a different developer). But even *I* am in awe of that second one!

Resource Resource Resource Resource Resource Resource Resource Resource Resource Resource Resource Resource MISSING MISSING!

snoofle:

Personally, I prefer to make error messages as descriptive as possible, since at the point of failure, the author KNOWS what happened, but the poor user probably won't(even if it's a different developer). But even *I* am in awe of that second one!

I think the second one is ok. It's got paragraphs, some carriage returns separating paragraphs, some indentation. I'm just wondering how it's all supposed to fit on a single screen.

I'm a huge fan of "Resource missing 6.1"

Pretty impressive that virtually every text item on the last dialog is affected. Pretty challenging to make an app go bonkers like that, I would think, unless a file got whacked.

Um, the first dialog is hardly Worse than Failure nor WTF. Just klutzy. #2 wins largest dialog award. Was this M$ trying to expand on its bloatware?

Car gone! Car gone!

The Real WTF is the 12 hour clock. 11:59 AM is followed by 12:00-12:59 (noon and) PM and then 1:00 PM?!? If 12 AM and PM were renamed 0 it would make a little more sense.

Apparently none of Skype's testers use the 12-hour clock.

I loved the last one. I started by reading the dialog text, and assumed it was some wild overproduction of the string "resource missing". Then, of course, I read the buttons, and started to panic. Then, a glance over the rest of the window, the menubar -- truly, WTF.

I think I know the problem. The user has his keyboard set to "English - Canadian", and the internationalization team for the app just didn't think to produce a Canadian English translation. So it fell back to the most reasonable default, en-WTF.

That last one is fantastic!

Daz

Veinor:

Resource Resource Resource Resource Resource Resource Resource Resource Resource Resource Resource Resource MISSING MISSING!

I think the worst part is that you suddenly got that Badger song stuck in my head.. I had forgotten about it for months now!

Novus:

The Real WTF is the 12 hour clock. 11:59 AM is followed by 12:00-12:59 (noon and) PM and then 1:00 PM?!? If 12 AM and PM were renamed 0 it would make a little more sense.

I'm not sure what you mean, but most humans count from one and not zero. This makes counting from 1-12 instead of 0-11 perfectly reasonable, although I agree that a 24-hour clock is altogether less confusing (and easier to code).

That last one is like the scene in Being John Malkovich where everyone is replaced by Malkovich.

> Pretty challenging to make an app go bonkers like that

Unless the resource is missing?

operagost:

Novus:

The Real WTF is the 12 hour clock. 11:59 AM is followed by 12:00-12:59 (noon and) PM and then 1:00 PM?!? If 12 AM and PM were renamed 0 it would make a little more sense.

I'm not sure what you mean, but most humans count from one and not zero. This makes counting from 1-12 instead of 0-11 perfectly reasonable, although I agree that a 24-hour clock is altogether less confusing (and easier to code).

maybe, but counting from 12 to 11 (through 1-10) makes a whole lot less sense.

First time I was supposed to have some IRC meeting with a couple people living in the US and canada, I showed up 12 hours late due to that. (you should have seen the rant I posted on the forums later on)

AI0867:

operagost:

Novus:

The Real WTF is the 12 hour clock. 11:59 AM is followed by 12:00-12:59 (noon and) PM and then 1:00 PM?!? If 12 AM and PM were renamed 0 it would make a little more sense.

I'm not sure what you mean, but most humans count from one and not zero. This makes counting from 1-12 instead of 0-11 perfectly reasonable, although I agree that a 24-hour clock is altogether less confusing (and easier to code).

maybe, but counting from 12 to 11 (through 1-10) makes a whole lot less sense.

First time I was supposed to have some IRC meeting with a couple people living in the US and canada, I showed up 12 hours late due to that. (you should have seen the rant I posted on the forums later on)

So, the real WTF is ... you?

Novus:

The Real WTF is the 12 hour clock. 11:59 AM is followed by 12:00-12:59 (noon and) PM and then 1:00 PM?!? If 12 AM and PM were renamed 0 it would make a little more sense.

Apparently none of Skype's testers use the 12-hour clock.

I'm told Skype is written in Delphi, which happens to be my day-to-day language. It appears they used a locale-dependent formatting routine (e.g. TimeToStr) that would look fine with a 24-hour clock (00:01:45) but terrible with a 12-hour one (12:01:45 AM). Changing it to use FormatDateTime('hh:nn:ss', TimeLeft) would fix it for everybody. I fix stuff like this all the time. Your comment about the testers' short date format was spot on!

I think that's supposed to be like "Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo" being a grammatically correct sentence.

Not only are all the resources missing, this is Resource Missing 6.1!

Guess they've had a lot of training in missing resources through versions 1.0-6.0

bahahahaha resource missing! That massive description for the simple user error is just overwhelming

RayMarron:

Changing it to use FormatDateTime('hh:nn:ss', TimeLeft) would fix it for everybody.

I don't know how those nanoseconds are usefull. For me, putting them where one'd expect minutes is quite confusing... Truncating them to 2 digits even more :)

Comment Missing Comment Missing Comment Missing Comment Missing Comment Missing Comment Missing Comment Missing Comment Missing Comment Missing Comment Missing

Maybe it's encoded Binary.

Missing = 0
Resource = 1

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The exact comment WTF discovered is: Resource missing

This comment was discovered by WTF in the comment thread contained in the WTF article you have read from the WTF Web Site.

bkendig:

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The exact comment WTF discovered is: Resource missing

This comment was discovered by WTF in the comment thread contained in the WTF article you have read from the WTF Web Site.

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Has anyone seen the resource?

I'm just lookin' for the resource.

where's that confounded resource?

AI0867:

maybe, but counting from 12 to 11 (through 1-10) makes a whole lot less sense.

First time I was supposed to have some IRC meeting with a couple people living in the US and canada, I showed up 12 hours late due to that. (you should have seen the rant I posted on the forums later on)

I missed my first college exam because I got the AM/PMness wrong, and I've grown up with it.

KattMan:

I can understand text and buttons missing as those could be read from resource files but the directory names? Those should be read straight from disk.

Not if they're "My Documents", "Network Neighborhood", "Desktop" etc.

T $:

I think the second one is ok. [...] I'm just wondering how it's all supposed to fit on a single screen.

It's only 737 pixels tall - it'll fit on a 1024x768 screen with room to spare.

AI0867:

maybe, but counting from 12 to 11 (through 1-10) makes a whole lot less sense.

Logically, yeah, but does it really make less sense than 1234567890?

I'll take the verbose and fully informative dialog over oracles' any day!

An error was encountered performing the requested operation:
ORA-00936: missing expression
*Cause:
*Action:
Error at Line:1 Column:28

at leaste they'll give me a line and column number...but their error messages are just so vague.

Random832:

T $:

I think the second one is ok. [...] I'm just wondering how it's all supposed to fit on a single screen.

It's only 737 pixels tall - it'll fit on a 1024x768 screen with room to spare.

The default look for the start menu in XP is ~32 pixels tall, which brings it to effectively needing 769 pixels height. I think the classic look is slightly shorter, but not much.

Granted, I suspect most developers run with rather higher resolution.

Strider:

I'll take the verbose and fully informative dialog over oracles' any day!

An error was encountered performing the requested operation:
ORA-00936: missing expression
*Cause:
*Action:
Error at Line:1 Column:28

at leaste they'll give me a line and column number...but their error messages are just so vague.

My company develops a plugin for one particular program, which I will call "It". It sets up a default Windows (structured) exception handler that displays a totally useless error; for instance, if a plugin does a null-pointer dereference, it will display a dialog that says "EACCESS", but with no other indication.

This means that if you're trying to develop a plugin, and have a JIT debugger registered, It will capture the exception before it propagates to the default Windows handler which triggers the debugger. Apparently this caused the people working on the plugin a lot of annoyance because they have to attach a debugger to It before the problem occurs and capture the first chance exception notification instead of using the JIT debugging support.

It appears that all work and no Resource makes Jack a dull boy. It appears that all work and no Resource makes Jack a dull boy. It appears that all work and no Resource makes Jack a dull boy. It appears that all work and no Resource makes Jack a dull boy. It appears that all work and no Resource makes Jack a dull boy. It appears that all work and no Resource makes Jack a dull boy. It appears that all work and no Resource makes Jack a dull boy. It appears that all work and no Resource makes Jack a dull boy. It appears that all work and no Resource makes Jack a dull boy.

Mcoder:

RayMarron:

Changing it to use FormatDateTime('hh:nn:ss', TimeLeft) would fix it for everybody.

I don't know how those nanoseconds are usefull. For me, putting them where one'd expect minutes is quite confusing... Truncating them to 2 digits even more :)

The first parameter shown in FormatDateTime is quite right; 'nn' will give minutes - 'mm' will give months ;)

resource missing resource missing resource missing resource missing resource missing resource missing resource missing resource missing resource missing. resource missing resource missing resource missing resource missing, resource missing, resource missing resource missing resource missing resource missing...

*er. ahem.*

the last one looks like failed internationalization from hell. The language conversion file, er, resource is probably missing...

T $:

snoofle:

Personally, I prefer to make error messages as descriptive as possible, since at the point of failure, the author KNOWS what happened, but the poor user probably won't(even if it's a different developer). But even *I* am in awe of that second one!

I think the second one is ok. It's got paragraphs, some carriage returns separating paragraphs, some indentation. I'm just wondering how it's all supposed to fit on a single screen.

That belongs in a HELP file, though.

The best WTF about "Resource missing" is that the progress bar on the bottom of the window still says "Progress," not "Resource missing." It's the only thing on the whole interface that doesn't say "Resource missing."

brewbuck:

The best WTF about "Resource missing" is that the progress bar on the bottom of the window still says "Progress," not "Resource missing." It's the only thing on the whole interface that doesn't say "Resource missing."

Or even better yet...the only other value not missing...the version number!

This error message is too damn verbose! It's the most pedantic error message I have ever seen. I would worry about the developer: manic depression on an upswing?; cocaine problem?; perhaps being passive-aggressive?

It's just way over the top, and should be in the simplest terms. Not terms for an idiot - but tell me in one sentence, what happened, and if I can do anything about it.

The damn thing made my eyes bleed - and unless I have access to run scripts, I shouldn't be seeing this info as a user. In fact, I'd say that the developer who did this was too damn lazy, and couldn't fix the issues with his batch query menu, and just punted with this 'baffle them with bullshit' msg box.

All I can imagine is, that this msg box comes from an in-house utility, and is being used by managers. Otherwise, this is about the most disgusting screen cap in the history of the world. I am not impressed at all.

Frank Stimpleton:

This error message is too damn verbose! It's the most pedantic error message I have ever seen. I would worry about the developer: manic depression on an upswing?; cocaine problem?; perhaps being passive-aggressive?

It's just way over the top, and should be in the simplest terms. Not terms for an idiot - but tell me in one sentence, what happened, and if I can do anything about it.

The damn thing made my eyes bleed - and unless I have access to run scripts, I shouldn't be seeing this info as a user. In fact, I'd say that the developer who did this was too damn lazy, and couldn't fix the issues with his batch query menu, and just punted with this 'baffle them with bullshit' msg box.

All I can imagine is, that this msg box comes from an in-house utility, and is being used by managers. Otherwise, this is about the most disgusting screen cap in the history of the world. I am not impressed at all.

One thing that is a possibility for the error message (that I don't see anyone considering) is maybe the real error message is actually really short. Maybe from that error message, you can click something like "MORE INFO" to get all this stuff popping up.

Frank Stimpleton:

This error message is too damn verbose! It's the most pedantic error message I have ever seen. I would worry about the developer: manic depression on an upswing?; cocaine problem?; perhaps being passive-aggressive?

It's just way over the top, and should be in the simplest terms. Not terms for an idiot - but tell me in one sentence, what happened, and if I can do anything about it.

The damn thing made my eyes bleed - and unless I have access to run scripts, I shouldn't be seeing this info as a user. In fact, I'd say that the developer who did this was too damn lazy, and couldn't fix the issues with his batch query menu, and just punted with this 'baffle them with bullshit' msg box.

All I can imagine is, that this msg box comes from an in-house utility, and is being used by managers. Otherwise, this is about the most disgusting screen cap in the history of the world. I am not impressed at all.

Quite frankly, I'm against people who give vent to their loquacity by means of extraneous bombastic circumlocution.

Now that's progress!

(I mean the increase in quality or quantity as time moves on, not that, ehm, lovable ol' database system)

... Mr. Lumbergh told me to talk to Payroll and then Payroll, they told me to talk to Mr. Lumbergh, and I still haven't gotten my paycheck and they stole my resource and they told me to move my desk to Storage Room B ... I told him, if I don't get my resource, I'm going to have to get my resource back because it is my resource. It's my resource, it's been mine for a very long time. And if ... if they take my resource ... I will, I will set this building on fire...

Is it just me, or does the Together error remind anyone else of Doug Zongker's famous paper in the Annals of Improbable Research titled Chicken chicken chicken: chicken chicken?

bkendig:

... Mr. Lumbergh told me to talk to Payroll and then Payroll, they told me to talk to Mr. Lumbergh, and I still haven't gotten my paycheck and they stole my resource and they told me to move my desk to Storage Room B ... I told him, if I don't get my resource, I'm going to have to get my resource back because it is my resource. It's my resource, it's been mine for a very long time. And if ... if they take my resource ... I will, I will set this building on fire...

That's the last straw...

Paul:

Mcoder:

RayMarron:

Changing it to use FormatDateTime('hh:nn:ss', TimeLeft) would fix it for everybody.

I don't know how those nanoseconds are usefull. For me, putting them where one'd expect minutes is quite confusing... Truncating them to 2 digits even more :)

The first parameter shown in FormatDateTime is quite right; 'nn' will give minutes - 'mm' will give months ;)

Ah, yes, the messed-up "almost standard" of M$ date formats.

In one format (the one used here), it's "nn" minutes "mm" months. In another (.NET uses this one) it's "mm" minutes "MM" months. In another (Excel/VBA), it's case-insensitive, context-dependent (if the nearest symbol is "hh" or "ss", it's minutes, if it's "yy" or "dd", it's months) Another context-dependency is 12/24 hours (it's 12 if there's "am/pm" present somewhere else in the string, 24 otherwise) - whereas with the .NET format it's "HH" for 24, "hh" for 12, and "tt" for am/pm. I'm not sure how the one you're using distinguishes 12/24.

Ben:

Car gone! Car gone!

So take the cdr.

EvanED:

AI0867:

maybe, but counting from 12 to 11 (through 1-10) makes a whole lot less sense.

First time I was supposed to have some IRC meeting with a couple people living in the US and canada, I showed up 12 hours late due to that. (you should have seen the rant I posted on the forums later on)

I missed my first college exam because I got the AM/PMness wrong, and I've grown up with it.

That's what happens when you show up high.