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Admin
This one reminds me of the paper linked from one of gamedev's faqs:
http://www.apa.org/journals/features/psp7761121.pdf
That is, the path to competence is realizing how incompetent you are.
Admin
Sheesh. One would think that with 3 decades of Ethernet out there people woud finally learn.
Admin
Nope. Wrapped my mind around it... considered it... looked at the typical scene for the typical user... and came away understanding that it's unrealistic. Nuff said.
Admin
Alex is right, software should last at least fifteen years.
The USDA Forest Service has fire simulation model software that has been in development for much longer than 15 years. Possibly twice that long.
I wrote a payroll timecard processing program using qBasic 12 years ago that is still being used every week and the users still tell me that they are delighted with it. I have had to change less than 20 lines of code in the last 5 years to keep it up to date as their needs change. It has a bit of a learning curve, but it is very efficient for the user.
People keep software around and keep using it as long as they possibly can, even if it is broken.
Admin
Programming adopts the general trends of culture. Disposable items, new cars every 1-3 years, new/young == better. It doesn't have to be good, it has to look good enough to last for a year or so. The collective dream that we are living in is really a sort of a nightmare.
Admin
Or, put in redneckese, "He so dumb, he don't even know how dumb he is."
Admin
Fortunately for me my country came out of the informational dark age so recently that we have no legacy applications to maintain. Just the best and brightest--
However this article depersses me. Im just into my second year as a developer. My very first project has had its gradual passing into ver 2 and looks atleast to be functioning at some level.Im totaly blown away that I did not screw the design up so much that its still any use... and for some reason its still growing... There was one project , my second, that I knew had failed the day it went to production. It just sucked at what it was supposed to do. Now my third went to beta and Im totally worried because its the bigest thing Ive ever done and ther are already surprises... Sigh... The life of a single developer is not easy, theres no-one to tell you off when you are about to screw up. But thanks to this site I can see clearly, that there are things worse than failure...
"Worse than Failiure" does not sound as catchy as theDailyWTF but I wont have to lower my voice any more to tell my coworker to check out todays article.
Admin
Shouldn't that be Whiskey Tango Foxtrot, Oscar?
I mean really, WTFO?
Admin
I am, for one, among the moderates that do not really care about the name change. I must say, however, that my initial response was concern that the name change might've reflected some underlying change in intentions that would make the site something different from what it was in the past.
That aside, I would state that I preferred the old name for a fairly straightforward reason. When I see these bizarre mutilations of computer science and software development, my reaction is not one of cerebral distaste or value judgment; it is one of shock. I have more than once found myself staring at my computer screen, one eye wider than the other, not examining the project itself but simply trying to comprehend what would've led the individuals in question to build it the way they did.
I enjoy that experience, and I thought the old name implied a daily exclamation of shock and exasperation with which I more easily identified my response. I have a suspicion that a lot of dissention from the new name may have originated from adherence to a similar idea. Nonetheless, I will continue to enjoy the site as long as I can experience the terror of the IT world on a daily basis in small doses. And hats off to Alex for having maintained this site in such a fashion for so long, regardless of what he calls it.
Cheers!
Admin
First: If it take that much text to explain why you named the site "Worse Than Failure", it must be because there really isn't a good reason.
Second: It's all okay to consider your own applications a failure, but if the powers-that-be consider it a success, they'll make the used methods a "standard", forcing ever more applicatons to adhere to the methods and making the standard ever more "successful" with each new project finished.
Third: The author mentions (the ommission of) writing "post-mortems". This must be a true WTF in itself. Releasing a project then only accepting possitive views; no retrospection whatsoever. I would have loved to write post-mortems on some of the crap I've seen, but nobody would've read them. Even when they would have been read, the high and mighty standards commitees don't ever yield in to the whims of the people having to actually use the standards.
captcha: waffles... I could sure use some right now
Admin
"Moderator's Note: As the whole "name change" thing was disscussed at much length here, comments focusing on the renaming will be pruned. "
By which you mean, you'll allow comments that approve the new name, but censor the ones that don't right? Prove me wrong by letting this one in. The new name is lame.
Also, have you never heard the phrase "When in a hole, stop digging"? You protest too much.
Moderator's Note: Comments focusing on the name change have been pruned; comments that mention the name change and discuss something else (such as this one about deleting comments) are kept
Admin
I just have to completely disagree with all those that say that software doesn't live 15 years. Maybe a particular release of software doesn't live 15 years, but I'm fairly certain that almost all software contains some code that was written over 15 years ago. We rely on many layers of code, and we rarely have the option to re-write everything from scratch. Besides, how many people write their own OS/run-time libs/JVM/Web Server/DB engine/etc from scratch? I know that most people don't have to maintain the code for all those things, but your own code still relies on software that may be decades old.
Admin
Heh, Linux kept up with the times? People are still coding around old bad decisions and hacks made near the inception of the thing, and the coding style (along with the language and toolchain) used is still the same as way back.
Admin
Still, that's very few programs and they got anyway updated in 15 years..
Admin
By which he means stay the hell on topic for once. There's a seperate thread for bitching about the name, you don't have to comment about it everywhere else. Your post didn't even pretend to be on topic here, and note that most of the comments that have stayed are ones that gasp included on-topic discussion. I think the reason for deleting moaning comments is because the people moaning don't say anything else, they only moan.
And to keep to my own notes, an on-topic part ;-) There was a rather large application (though I guess not large by some of your standards, only about 4 thousand ELOC I think) I wrote about a year ago. It's an in-house thing used almost entirely by me, though with the intention of eventually being released at some point. I have just started on a near complete rewrite of it due to the sheer number of WTFs in the design. I'm having to fight for development time though (and do most of it in my own time) as the view seems to be, as mentioned in the article, if it "works" then we can move on. It's rather unfortunate that the software itself isn't the main focus of my project, I'd love to be in a position where there's nothing to move in to and I could devote all my time to lovingly hand-crafting the finest application of its type (or just making new and more exotic mistakes, more likely).
Admin
Admin
Yesterday I thought that changing the name of this website was a terrible idea but kept silent. Now, after reading the explanation and reading the comments, I'm convinced that this was the right step to go.
Worse than failure, yes, it absolutely summarizes my everyday work.
Admin
I'm probably not the only one that gets the irony in lecturing people about bad decisions when the name change seems to have generated a pathological response.
Learn from failure.
Admin
Or have a Fawlty Toweresque competition for a sticker.
This week's WTF - Weak Tea Flatulence
Adrian
Admin
10 Years? 15 Years? I'd really say "it depends on the system"
At one time, I developed a shrink wrap product. It continued to work - right up to the time the OS changed enough that NOTHING written with that tool worked anymore - about 7 years
There are systems where 15 years is a good benchmark. One I designed 10 years ago is going strong - with new features added all the time - and lots of other programs using the original database design
Then there are programs where I think designing for more than a short period of time is dumb. I've had to write programs where you KNOW they are going to be used for a few months, then abandoned - usually utility apps/conversion programs etc - that when their job is done, it's DONE. I can remember writting an application to support a TV special. 2 weeks to finish the project - HARD DEADLINE - aka it had to be UP, RUNNING, users trained, data ready at 11:00:00pm, when the show went LIVE - at 11:59:59 and 29 frames - that was IT, the program will NEVER be used again. Do you design that application to last 15 years? Or do you design it to work for 3 weeks, but be totally bullet proof for those 3 weeks?
Captcha: cognac - which only starts to get good after about 12 years
Admin
Admin
I wrote a similar program in assembly on the Commodore 64 back in, I guess, the 80's for my uncle's business. I was in my teens and had only gotten the computer a few months before. I knew nothing about math, much less numerical methods, so I devised some strange structures and algorithms to keep the currency calculations accurate.
My uncle used that C-64, then a C-128, along with my software and some commerical packages up until 2003. He could have quit using my program any time and used the commercial spreadsheets but "It's easy and it works, so why bother," he said?
Well, the reason he eventually had to is that his top salesman's salary + commission grew enough to overflow my calculations. If his saleman hadn't had a big month then he might well still be using the C-128 and 20 year old software.
Tom
Admin
Is it really failure?
If I'm an overworked and underpaid programmer, handed an unrealistic deadline and shifting requirements, by a manager I don't respect, at a company I know I won't be with in 6 months, have I really failed if I kludge together some crap that works well enough to keep my bosses happy, and my paycheck coming?
I'm not saying that it's right. I'm just saying it happens. Probably more than you think. Yeah from an IT production viewpoint, it's a failure, but from the veiw of an unhappy/disgruntled employee. It's complete success. He/She convinced the pointy haired boss that they got the job done on time.
Admin
From that point of view, it's always a success, unless he loses his job. Well, even Paula Bean was successfull in that respect!
Admin
Admin
I like the new name. I even understood it before this lengthy explanatory article.
CAPTCHA: tastey. Yea, I know. Just don't take a bite.
Admin
WTF, really? It used to be code examples, now it's all stories. It used to be a ton of bickering of what meant what, from which, if you were so inclined, you could google about and read whatever online documentation and books helped you better understand a particular issue. It used to be making fun of bad code, and then looking at ourselves, and realizing where we could poke fun in our own failed attempts. It was truly WTF. Now this site is quickly heading towards being "worse than failure".
Although the points you make are true. What is truly worse than failure is the inability to take every "success" with a grain of salt and to realize the vast world of improvements and knowledge that lay before every developer at every point in their career, where success is a process. And it should be-- Change is constantly happening in the programming world.
However, regardless as to the wonderful little story that you have written here that would have nicely fit in a blog (which I would read out of interest and curiosity, mind you), the site has lost its focus from being an enjoyable break from work, to becoming almost synonymous with it, a suit and tie appeal, which is not why I came here.
Don't alientate-- relate. This IS the daily wtf. change back the name foo!
Admin
In all fairness, developing a working system is, in my experience, all that customers pay for. They pay me to build something that works NOW. I do try to make everything reuseable and expandable, but the customer has no interest in paying for work that might come in use. If someone were to paint my office in gold and shower me with riches, I'd damn well deliver accordingly. /S
Admin
Imagine it's over the radio in the 40s:
Pilot: WTF???? Over.
Base: STFU!!! Over.
Pilot: Roger. Wilco. Over.
Admin
Admin
And thank you for inadvertently pointing out that VB6 is not the same as VB5 is not the same as VB4 is not etc. Now let's apply that understanding to that list of supposedly over-15 applications. The guy is still using the over-15, DOS version of Word, huh? Clue for ya: Word 2003 is not a 15 year old application. Nor is Word 95, for that matter.
Since you know neither the nature of their business nor the purpose of the software I wrote, your bet is moot. Believe what you like.Admin
Admin
If the nature of the task (or the implementation of the software) dictates that something is no longer viable after X days/months/years then that's a different matter to software that gets replaced just because it's old, the latter doesn't happen as often as one might expect.
Admin
Bad move on the name change. Reminds of someone I knew who had a web site/email list called "Party Geek" that listed events and things to do around town that week. It grew from a handful of members to several thousand. Then, one day she changed the name to "SplashMax" and wrote a long explanation about how going to partys was like creating a splash on the social scene, or some other BS. Within 6 months the site was out of business. (And, has only recently been resurected as the old Party Geek - but the loyal membership was lost, its too little too late now)
Admin
This post is not just brilliant, it's a piece of wisdom. A wisdom that I need in my CTO's work right now to convince somebody. Thank you so much! I think I will translate it into russian now to share with many soon-to-be-miserable russian programmers.
Admin
Actually the problem with the world today is lack of civility. Civility is the grease that lubricates the gears of society. You have the right to say what you want any way you want - but don't expect everyone to come flocking to your cause if you do.
Captcha: Sanitarium Fancy name for my office space...
Admin
In radio telephone procedure you never use 'Roger' and 'Wilco' together!
Roger = 'I understand'. Wilco = 'I understand and will comply'.
e.g. "Pass the Butter" you: "Roger" - (you don't pass the butter - as in 'I understand, but I'm not going to pass the butter at this time')
e.g. "Pass the Butter" you: "Wilco" - (you pass the butter)
Similarly 'Over' and 'Out' are not used together. Over = "I'm through talking for now - now its your turn to respond" Out = "I'm through talking and ending this conversation - no need to respond"
If I ever heard a pilot (or military radio operator) use the terms 'Roger Wilco' or 'Over and Out', I would be sorely tempted to lay down the smackdown.
So the correct last call by the pilot in your example should be: Pilot: Wilco Out.
Captcha: vern
Hey Vern!
Admin
Its a sobering day when you realize you suck as a programmer.
Been there done that got the t-shirt.
Failure is much more rewarding than continuing on blissfully unaware that your a bozo. As they say in Microsoft Press' book Dynamics of Software Development. "Dont flip the bozo bit".
Hi, my name is Quickdraw and I'm a bozo.
Quickdraw
Admin
I don't normally say what my CAPTCHA is, but: CAPTCHA: gotcha (To the tune^H^H^H^Hrhythm of "Ooga chaka") Captcha gotcha captcha gotcha...
Admin
15 is the age at which software starts to blossom and get interrested in interfacing with other software.
Before you know it, they'll have queue's lining up for them, waiting for the software to SOAP up. And they will reply to however requests.
A few years later the software will be so intertwined. they'll start to release lite versions all over the place, sharing code from both systems.
From there on the software just continues to be ever more used for atleast 50 years.
Finally it ends up in a maintenance department where they keep it running for atleast 10 more years until they can patch it no more.
Admin
I have to say I like "Worse Than Failure" better than WTF.
WTF only conveys exasperation (and perhaps surprise). As such, it is far too easy for others to disregard with thoughts like "well, if you had been there at the time, you would understand."
"Worse Than Failure" conveys a greater understanding of the problem, a conclusion about the solution, and (more importantly) a correct amount of disdain for the solution.
People often cannot be forced to change, but they often can be embarrassed into change. ;-)
Admin
I would bet this situation is better with programmers who use their own stuff, or who have to maintain it and respond to customer issues. Yesterday after having a horrible experience with a credit card machine I remarked that "whatever programmer did that should be fired"... but they probably don't even know that they screwed up, because they have never used their system. That is beside the point that operating the POS systems should be the job of the employees, not the customers. Next time I go to the store I'm just going to hand my card to the cashier and see what they do...
At any rate, I know that my first attempt at our company's contact pipelines was a "best guess" and way off the mark, but if I had gone on to something else and wasn't forced to use it and maintain it, I probably would think it was all good.
Admin
Ah, defense by retroactive qualification - one of the best-loved tropes of Internet rhetoric.
Alex's original claim about 15-year-old software doesn't depend on the assumption that the software remain unchanged for 15 years. If any part of a software system is 15 years old, then that part had better have been written to last 15 years.
gets() was part of stdio before C was standardized. It wasn't in the first edition, in 1971, but it was there by 1979. (See various resources on DMR's page.)
It's still around, in many, many programs written in C, almost 30 years later. And it's a problem, for every one of those programs that might be exposed to malformed input.
That few of those programs are, in their entirety, exactly the same code that they were 25+ years ago, is utterly beside the point. Litera scripta manet.
-- Michael Wojcik
Admin
When I read the article, I had to immediately think of a character called from the famous Discworld novels called "Bloody Stupid Johnson". It has been said that he is not incompenent - on the contrary, he is about as far from incompetence as pure genius is, only in the other direction.
I suggest you see the Wikipedia article here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloody_Stupid_Johnson
or just read books.
Admin
I have one system still in full swing after 18 years. Yes, it is DOS in a windows world, but it still runs the company successfully. I would upgrade it, but the business owner isn't interested because the existing system works and works well.
Admin
I still like DailyWTF name better.. as a matter of fact, changing site's name when it became so popular, is kind selfish (so what that you like new name? but you are making thousands of people to remember new name), and WTF on its own
Admin
It's a shame. Liked to old name, this one is not as good, and a name means a lot for a blog in my opinion
Admin
I totally agree with Mikademus. TheDailyWTF stands for that angry feeling that you get when you stumble over incompetent and crap software that subsequently is probably going to waste your time at some point.
"Worse than failure", is, at best, some philosophical discussion about a line that can be drawn across a bunch of examples of failures of some kind or degree. It's all very modest and nice.
Please let us know when you give up the URL. Because that would be a true WTF (the correct interpretation is left as an exercise to the reader).
Admin
Yeah, and how old do you think is Microsoft's Win32 API implementation? I'm pretty sure that there's still some leftover Win32s code present in XP, rolled into other things. And definitely a big bunch of Win95 code. So, er, it's currently some 13-14 years old. I assume that Win95 development took 2 years, which may well be optimistic.
So, I don't know where you got your "unrealistic" from, as the reality for the most popular OS around (XP, then Vista) obviously differs from your perception of it.
Heck, I'm pretty sure that there's some Win 3.x compatibility stuff in XP at least that has been developed, well, in Win 3.x days. That'll be 15 years old easy.
Admin
I like the name, and I really like the irreverence of the site. As an old geek in IT, I think the recipe for failure is complex IT, requiring masses of consultants that don't know anything about my IT infrastructure, but they somehow fool executive management into thinking they are smarter than our guys, and charge $300 per hour to tell us we're idiots.