• nelsonl (unregistered) in reply to DaveK
    Hear that?

    That was the sound of WAMU's very funny joke going clear over all your heads. They must have gone to some trouble to customize their banner ad specially for this site; bet they're wondering why they bothered now.

    (How likely do you really think it is that the banner ad is dynamically generated by issuing an SQL query and blindly rendering the result into a GIF/JPG? Individually for every separate time it is served up by the ad network? What kind of query could you even do when it's a random request for a banner ad from some unknown client out on the internet? It's not like it's giving you a customised quotation based on all that personal career and financial information that you haven't entered into the non-existent form that you didn't have to submit before it served you up the ad, is it?)

    Acutely it is possible. Dynamic image generation in PHP is very simple. And how do you know that what goes into null isnt a random word? As for the database hit - it could of been a simple array of words.

  • (cs) in reply to nelsonl
    nelsonl:
    Hear that?

    That was the sound of WAMU's very funny joke going clear over all your heads. They must have gone to some trouble to customize their banner ad specially for this site; bet they're wondering why they bothered now.

    (How likely do you really think it is that the banner ad is dynamically generated by issuing an SQL query and blindly rendering the result into a GIF/JPG? Individually for every separate time it is served up by the ad network? What kind of query could you even do when it's a random request for a banner ad from some unknown client out on the internet? It's not like it's giving you a customised quotation based on all that personal career and financial information that you haven't entered into the non-existent form that you didn't have to submit before it served you up the ad, is it?)

    Acutely it is possible. Dynamic image generation in PHP is very simple. And how do you know that what goes into null isnt a random word? As for the database hit - it could of been a simple array of words.

    I remember a while back, there was a news story about how an American fighter had accidentally dropped its payload on a friendly embassy near a conflict zone. It was really a pretty bad scene all around. One blog commenter insisted that there was no chance that it was an accident: "Believe me. These people do not make mistakes."

    Yeah, he was talking about the military. Yeah, I laughed too.

  • revenant (unregistered)

    Now, if something happens to the child, gov't will have to withdraw all existing pennies from circulation and label new ones with "keep away from children" warning. Or, better, print a "penny user's manual" where that will be written in 10 languages.

  • Jinks (unregistered)

    I really don't see a WTF in the 'don't use the browser buttons'. Rather I see a trend. It seems many sites that process financial transactions really panic that you may hit Back (some even Forward??) while they're processing.

    Many (especially Govt, it seems) forms prefer that you use their custom-built navigation aids rather than the browsers, not to mention a lot of on-line learning (the type that is identical at every company, yet cleverly (seemelessly, even) says the correct company name (and even CEO in a couple of cases) to convince you that this training is purely for your company....).

    I suppose the Govt ones shouldn't surprise me - I recently filled in a Govt form to indicate the birth of a child. It seemed the form got confused when I entered a date before MY birthday in a (stupid) field asking date of commencement on a postal address, then asked whether my 10 day old child had ever been out of the country for more than 13 weeks...

    (not surprisingly, the Govt later sent us a letter, addressed to my wifes maiden name, stating that they need all the informartion we had entered online (I suppose it saves their forms actually doing anything). When we rang to query it, they told us we should go to our nearest Govt Office (in a different state - according to them). When we pointed out we no longer live in the state they suggested (which they must know since they sent the letter to the correct address), they got really confused and said that their records show otherwise)

    Getting back on track - while I think internal navigation buttons that HAVE to be used instead of browser ones are STUPID, I think they occur far too often to be a WTF....

    Not long before we have browser within browser within browser....

  • mgb (unregistered)

    It looks to me like Windows is just about to lay a beatin on Playlife. And rightly so.

  • DaveS (unregistered)

    OPAC apps are frequently used on kiosks, through a web browser in kiosk mode, so the browser's own nav buttons wouldn't be available.

    It's not quite a full WTF to find one online in a normal browser, though yeah, it probably shouldn't hiccup when it happens.

    (I'd be more concerned that the code isn't Internet-hardened in general...)

  • (cs) in reply to Jinks
    Jinks:
    I really don't see a WTF in the 'don't use the browser buttons'. Rather I see a trend. It seems many sites that process financial transactions really panic that you may hit Back (some even Forward??) while they're processing.

    There is a huge difference between "don't hit your back button while we process your request" versus "hitting your back button navigates away from the site, instead of going tot he previous page you were just on like it should."

  • Jinks (unregistered) in reply to chrismcb
    chrismcb:
    Jinks:
    I really don't see a WTF in the 'don't use the browser buttons'. Rather I see a trend. It seems many sites that process financial transactions really panic that you may hit Back (some even Forward??) while they're processing.

    There is a huge difference between "don't hit your back button while we process your request" versus "hitting your back button navigates away from the site, instead of going tot he previous page you were just on like it should."

    (Perhaps I'm missing something....)

    I'm not sure there's any suggestion that this is the case in the actual wtf - It suggests that navigational buttons are provided and should be used instead (and the comment suggests that using the browser buttons may cause some problem), but it doesn't suggest that the browsers navigational buttons direct you away from the site - how many online apps do this (apparently thinking they can somehow stop the user changing input once they've entered it).

    Either way, this may be with the financial Apps, but certainly not with a lot of the ones I mention in the following paragraph - try online applications for government departments. Many surveys seem to do this too...

    Anyways, I still don't really see that such a trend makes for a WTF. If it were an exceptional case, then it would be a WTF. I don't think it is. I think it's a new trend that is appearing.

  • csm (unregistered) in reply to revenant
    revenant:
    Now, if something happens to the child, gov't will have to withdraw all existing pennies from circulation and label new ones with "keep away from children" warning. Or, better, print a "penny user's manual" where that will be written in 10 languages.

    Whenever I think of the parents demanding that a government step in and enact laws to protect their children in this fashion, I imagine a government-issued tattoo on the forehead of the offending parent that reads "Not suitable for children". People without common sense shouldn't have children. I would prefer that they didn't ruin it for the rest of us by making my rear power windows in my car only go down halfway when I'm trying to moon someone or knock over a mailbox with a baseball bat. </rant>

  • convicted felon (unregistered) in reply to csm
    csm:
    I would prefer that they didn't ruin it for the rest of us by making my rear power windows in my car only go down halfway when I'm trying to moon someone or knock over a mailbox with a baseball bat. </rant>

    This is my kind of guy. With hookers, and beer.

  • (cs) in reply to Jinks
    Jinks:
    Either way, this may be with the financial Apps, but certainly not with a lot of the ones I mention in the following paragraph - try online applications for government departments. Many surveys seem to do this too...

    Anyways, I still don't really see that such a trend makes for a WTF. If it were an exceptional case, then it would be a WTF. I don't think it is. I think it's a new trend that is appearing.

    Just because a lot of people are doing it, doesn't make it right. Breaking the paradigm because you can't figure out how to make it work, is just lazy programming. You are right, if someone introduces a new paradigm and it catches on, and everyone uses it. But is everyone really using the same thing? Or is everyone just offering their own navigation buttons.

    and yes I got the impression from the WTF, the back button didn't do what you would expect it to do. That is it didn't go to the previous page, instead it navigate to the previous navigation point, which most likely was to the previous site you were on.

  • Anonymous OG Mac Gamer (unregistered)

    re: the oni dialog--"blam" has a very long history as a bungie catchphrase. don't be surprised if other errors cause it to say "your mom" or "dink". (the only question is where in halo they're hidden....)

  • Glow-in-the-dark (unregistered) in reply to Mike
    Mike:
    Surely waiting a day or two after the child swallows the penny removes all possibility of it still being an emergency, and therefore should exclude a visit to an emergency room?

    According to Googles first definition, an emergency is "a sudden unforeseen crisis (usually involving danger) that requires immediate action", so that must exclude people who hang about for a couple of days doing nothing except sift through child-poo?

    Nope. When the penny goes in (so to speak) it's not an emergency. A bit like when a nut-allergic kid eats peanuts without you noticing (if you keep then alive that long there comes a point where, thankfully, the child itself learns that this is a bad idea). When the adverse reaction starts, THEN you have an emergency. In the nut allergy case you'll know pretty damn soon and depending on the type of reaction you're racing with death, in the case of the penny you may have some time.

    Having said that, I would have lugged said kid straight to emergency after reading that text anyway. In the UK, A&E will take about that long anyway unless it's bleeding obvious you're talking about a crisis (the nut allergy would go straight through which is the best indication you really HAVE a crisis). Where I live now they wouldn't mess around either, but the chances of the child eating a penny there are remote as they have a different currency :-).

  • Glow-in-the-dark (unregistered) in reply to SenTree
    SenTree:
    MetalPig:
    Meanwhile, we're still waiting for the penny to come out.
    Still no change then ? (Sorry, someone had to say it.)

    LOL. Awesome, thanks :-)

  • Jarett (unregistered)

    Null% APY? Sign me up!

  • LucusLoC (unregistered) in reply to Mr G
    Mr G:
    PseudoBovine:
    A dime is worth ten cents, but has the same value as ten pennies.
    And it's a coin that, for some strange reason, doesn't actually tell you how much it's worth.

    it does

    from wiki:

    The term dime comes from old French "di(s)me"[1], meaning "tithe" or "tenth part," from the Latin decima [pars]. This term appeared on early pattern coins, but was not used on any dimes until 1837

  • (cs)

    Is the null% fixed or variable interest rate? That's where I'm confused...

  • (cs)

    savings < /dev/null;

    ?

  • Anon (unregistered) in reply to LucusLoC
    LucusLoC:
    Mr G:
    PseudoBovine:
    A dime is worth ten cents, but has the same value as ten pennies.
    And it's a coin that, for some strange reason, doesn't actually tell you how much it's worth.

    it does

    from wiki:

    The term dime comes from old French "di(s)me"[1], meaning "tithe" or "tenth part," from the Latin decima [pars]. This term appeared on early pattern coins, but was not used on any dimes until 1837

    Oh right, so you just need to be an expert of old French to understand it.

  • James (unregistered)

    Check out my library's website (hclibrary.org) and you'll see this is not an uncommon problem. You can't deep-link any content, and in fact you can't even open multiple catalog hits in separate tabs/windows, for the same reason that using the back/forward buttons don't work. Some people don't know how to write a good web app, but write them anyway...

  • Random832 (unregistered) in reply to Anon
    Anon:
    LucusLoC:
    Mr G:
    PseudoBovine:
    A dime is worth ten cents, but has the same value as ten pennies.
    And it's a coin that, for some strange reason, doesn't actually tell you how much it's worth.

    it does

    from wiki:

    The term dime comes from old French "di(s)me"[1], meaning "tithe" or "tenth part," from the Latin decima [pars]. This term appeared on early pattern coins, but was not used on any dimes until 1837

    Oh right, so you just need to be an expert of old French to understand it.

    Originally, a dime was to have been a unit of currency along with the dollar and the cent.

  • (cs) in reply to nelsonl
    nelsonl:
    DaveK:
    (How likely do you really think it is that the banner ad is dynamically generated by issuing an SQL query and blindly rendering the result into a GIF/JPG? Individually for every separate time it is served up by the ad network? What kind of query could you even do when it's a random request for a banner ad from some unknown client out on the internet? It's not like it's giving you a customised quotation based on all that personal career and financial information that you haven't entered into the non-existent form that you didn't have to submit before it served you up the ad, is it?)

    Acutely it is possible.

    OK, stop right there. You didn't actually read my post before you replied to it, did you? I never said anything about it not being possible. I said it was unlikely, and that's for a very different reason: not because it would be in the least bit impossible, nor even any more than trivially difficult, but because it would be pointless effort with no reward. You're arguing with something I didn't say.

    nelsonl:
    Dynamic image generation in PHP is very simple.
    You're still arguing with something I didn't say.
    nelsonl:
    And how do you know that what goes into null isnt a random word?
    That's still something I didn't say, but I can't tell whether you're arguing with it or not because your sentence is so badly written as to be unparseable gibberish. WTF does it mean for something to "go into null"?
    nelsonl:
    As for the database hit - it could of been a simple array of words.
    More gibberish. What database hit? What array of words?

    TRWTF is your failed attempt to talk sense. Maybe you'd like to have another go at stringing together a bunch of words into a coherent sentence that expresses your thoughts, if indeed you have any?

  • Michael Fulker (unregistered) in reply to Vollhorst
    Vollhorst:
    sugarfree:
    How on earth did they manage to react and hit prnt-scrn in faster than a second??
    You see it when it is at 60 seconds, wait till it is about 2 seconds, then hit the print-button.
    That bubble was the very first warning, and I indeed had enough reflexes to hit prntscrn before it went away.

    (It's from MIT's Kerberos, if anyone wants to know)

  • (cs) in reply to Addison
    Addison:
    Grrr:
    Web sites that scold me for using my browser's BACK button are a sure sign that some programmer (and his manager, most likely) need to be taken out behind the barn and whipped until they promise to accept salvation.

    Careful where you place blame. Us programmers write some of the most retarded code because the analysts (or managers) tell us to, not because we get some sick thrill out of it. Though sometimes we get a sick thrill out of it too.

    Yep, a project I came across at work has a method of "disabling" the browser back/forward button by not writing to the history object by having a header section that acts as a routing operator that looks at what is set in the session["nextPage"] and does a location.replace(). EVERY link and button is setup to set that session variable to the page it connects to, then the page is refreshed via javascript location.replace('').

    So the PMs wanted that functionality for the project I was working on. I told them (well more like I whined and cried) that will require a grand rewiring of the website and make the website extremely hard to maintain. Eventually they agreed, yay, sniff sniff.

  • (cs) in reply to vt_mruhlin
    vt_mruhlin:
    Addison:
    Grrr:
    Web sites that scold me for using my browser's BACK button are a sure sign that some programmer (and his manager, most likely) need to be taken out behind the barn and whipped until they promise to accept salvation.

    Careful where you place blame. Us programmers write some of the most retarded code because the analysts (or managers) tell us to, not because we get some sick thrill out of it. Though sometimes we get a sick thrill out of it too.

    PMs don't understand that making everything "look AJAXy" often breaks the hell out of the back button.

    The browser's back button works just fine on GMail -- and it's one of the most AJAXy (is that even a word?) sites I can think of. I think it's done using selectors (the stuff that comes after the # in the URL which specifies a location in the page). It can be done.

  • D C Ross (unregistered)

    The WaMu ad isn't broken, they just ran out of money.

    So it's not your fault.

    Would you like to buy a pencil?

  • Scott (unregistered)

    "Super charge your savings with null% APY"

    That's what happens when the bank goes under...

  • noname (unregistered)

    OPAC makes my brain hurt.

    The Oni one is old.

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