The Daily WTF: Curious Perversions in Information Technology

Zylon · 2012-05-15 Reply Admin

Norman Diamond:
Ralph:
The web is for distributing knowledge.
Yeah, I always wondered who allowed "ftp://" in URLs, and why.

Technically speaking (which we bloody well should be), FTP isn't "the web".

xorsyst · 2012-05-15 Reply Admin

Mathew:
Links to external websites should ALWAYS be opened in a new tab. If you don't agree you're a fucking retard that know nothing about ux.

Maybe they "should", for "normal" users, but I know that when I'm browsing, I don't want them to. If I want a new tab/window, I'll tell the browser I want one, thank you very much. I'd be perfectly happy if I could configure my browser to ignore target.

As I said in a previous post, the thing that really bugs me is when javascript it used for this in a way that means that me opening a link in a new window doesn't actually work, and I have to normal-click it instead. That's just brain dead implementation.

2012-05-15 Reply Admin

Would have liked XXX-Backside-Service even more.

2012-05-15 Reply Admin

xorsyst:
Mathew:
Links to external websites should ALWAYS be opened in a new tab. If you don't agree you're a fucking retard that know nothing about ux.

Maybe they "should", for "normal" users, but I know that when I'm browsing, I don't want them to. If I want a new tab/window, I'll tell the browser I want one, thank you very much. I'd be perfectly happy if I could configure my browser to ignore target.

As I said in a previous post, the thing that really bugs me is when javascript it used for this in a way that means that me opening a link in a new window doesn't actually work, and I have to normal-click it instead. That's just brain dead implementation.

Oviously you don't know always beforehand know whether it makes sense to open a page in a new tab. This is why the target-attribute is important. And yes, browsers should provide an option to ignore it. Just like you can disable js, images, css. Even better they should allow you to configure rules which pages to open in a new tab and which not - taking presedence over the authors target suggestion (just like user/author css).

The reason this doesn't exist yet, maybe is due that most people like having external links in new tabs.

2012-05-15 Reply Admin

Sigivald:
That is true, in its place.
But what I noted in:
Public Function Save() As Boolean
    Try
        SaveMeeting()
    Catch ex As Exception
        Throw ex
    End Try
End Function
was that the obvious explanation is that the catch block is there to let you place a breakpoint to catch it in the act, rather than being 'real' code intended to do anything useful in and of itself.

I'd love to believe that, but I doubt it somehow. Our current codebase is full of this thanks to former VB6 developers learning C# who've been lead to believe that including a try-catch counts as "error checking", even if they haven't actually done anything with it.

And, as others have pointed out, throw ex will mess up the stack trace info so even if you really needed to put a breakpoint there (instead of just breaking on exception) you ought to rethrow the original exception properly.

I have a whole slew of WTFs from the same developers that I really ought to submit at some point....

2012-05-15 Reply Admin

NMe:
Validation is not a goal in itself. There is not a single browser out there that will break upon seeing a target="_blank". Worst case scenario, a browser will ignore it. It will never break the website. It will never cause the user problems.

Validation could be a client requirement, it has been for me on a few projects. Perhaps HTML Strict is TRWTF, but it's also possible that the project was inherited with that doctype already set. Without context we can't really know if this is a WTF or not. I do know one thing, it's definitely no big deal, not like some monstrosities I've seen, like CC numbers that pass over http and are stored unencrypted in a db. Or perhaps the nice Flex "Framework" that I had to work with one time that had it's own broken way of parsing xml, even though e4x had been around for years already. When I suggested we just use e4x instead of debugging their crap, I was met with angry silence. That's months of hard work gone to waste dontchyaknow!

2012-05-15 Reply Admin

QJo:
the beholder:
How the hell someone creates a 83-parameter function and doesn't see anything wrong with that?
One can achieve only so much FAIL, FAIL, FAIL .

How the hell someone counts the parameters to an 83-parameter function and doesn't see anything wrong with that? Get back to work immediately!

You assume he's counting 83 lines by hand instead of copy and pipe the pasteboard into wc -l? You FAIL, FAIL, FAIL.

2012-05-15 Reply Admin

TheRider:
Ralph:
(Whine) But I want it to open in a new window...
Fuck you and the horse you rode in on, arrogant asshole! It is MY computer not yours!!! If I want a new window I can right click and open the link in a new window or a new tab. That's my choice not yours. Go to hell.
This definitely depends on the audience. I know plenty of people in my vicinity who don't have a CS degree, who only use computers very irregularly and who can't distinguish between entering a URL in the address line of the browser and entering a search term in the Google window that happens to be their startup site. These people also have no clue that their mouse has more than just the left button. When I tell them to right-click to open the context menu, I am regularly met with blank stares -- or prolonged, astonished silence, when on the phone. To help these people out, I regularly make within-a-homepage-links open in the same window and outside-of-the-current-homepage-links open in a new tab. They love me for that. So it's not so much that I want it to open in a new window (I, personally, couldn't care less), it is more of an ease-of-use thing.

Yes, that's right, users shouldn't have to right click. Instead, each time they select a link we should prompt them "Would you like to open a new tab for this window or replace the page you're viewing". Much more friendly for the morons.

MS made the mistake of trying to cater for idiot users, and only succeeded in creating more idiotic users.
Idiots will always find a way to make their own life inconvenient. Write GUI's for competent (not necessarily expert) users. Users will (out of necessity) either become competent or fall by the wayside. Writing GUI's to support idiots only makes a cumbersome interface for everyone else, and (if anything) turns otherwise competent users into morons.

2012-05-16 Reply Admin

AN AWESOME CODER:
oheso:
Charles:
Yup. I've done this before when we're trying to achieve XHTML 1.0 Strict doctype.

And the question is, "Why?"

OK, if you have to do it to satisfy the client, then you gotta do what you gotta do to get paid. But the requirement (opening in a new window, not XTHML compliance) is and will always be TRWTF.

Why?

Silly absolutists comments like this are TRWTF.

First off, if there's not a "client" for what you're building, then it doesn't count. Who cares about anything with your toy code, testing, validation, standards, code smells, etc. all included.

Secondly, I can name some generic cases where you "need" to open a new window. The first being ajaxified oauth where opening the oauth flow in the same window is not possible (or undesirable).

Are you absolutely sure you can't use an iframe for that ?

2012-05-16 Reply Admin

the beholder:
Zylon:
_:
You should quit trolling:
You're wrong, the feature was implemented for a reason. Sometimes (frequently) the user flow only makes sense to open as a popup or new tab. Just because you can't follow the simple flow of a website doesn't mean we should all become ludites.
Name one.
The oh-so-common "(What's this?)" links. When you're in the middle of filling out a form, the very last thing you want is to dump the current page. Popup windows are ideal for presenting, y'know, popup information.
There's another situation: when you're writing an email on Gmail and you remember you need info that's in a message somewhere in your Inbox/Sent box/whatever. Why lose your current email when you can click the nice little diagonal arrow to pop your mail out and enable you to use the other window to search for the info you want?
That said, I tend to agree with Ralph and _. These cases when _blank is a good thing are few and far between, but this option is abused whenever some idiot decides they like it.

Zylon:
Cripes, there are some genuine idiots floating around the whole internet.
FTFY.

few and far between. like every single download link. or every time you don't want to implement your own tabbing system - which is exactly what you described for gmail - and exactly what I do for webapps.

Holding a grudge against _blank just because your porn sites spammed you isn't very smart either.

2012-05-16 Reply Admin

oheso:
dogmatic:
There are many times when a stateful web app cannot be easily restored with a back click.

It's doable and it should be done. Don't pop up a new window on me because you're a lazy programmer.

I have to work every day with other peeps' screwy web apps where the back button breaks stuff, and it gives me pleasure every day to think of awful things happening to those developers. Really awful things.

You may be living in the past.

My webapps are single page and your back button is both useless and not supported.

What I mean there, is that there are much better ways to navigate than simply back and forward (that scheme only handles one path by the way), like a recent list adapted to your application for example.

IMHO, any application DIRECTLY supporting the back button is a WTF in this day and age, there is only bad consequences to that kind of stuff.

And any application supporting it INDIRECTLY is so missing the point because for the same work, one could simply put a better navigation scheme in place than ol' stupid backforward reload everything except some is cached but some is not ...

2012-05-16 Reply Admin

Zylon:
J:
This is a job for one of those little floating page elements, warning you you're about to lose all your form data. Or better yet, the information she's looking for itself should go in a little floating box, instead of opening a new window.
You know what those little floating boxes are called? "Windows".
Don't try to re-invent the tools that the OS has already given you.

Actually you have so much more control AND interaction possibilities with a popup div that using the OS windows would be the worst approach, hitting popup blockers as well.

2012-05-16 Reply Admin

Martin:
Actually there is a good reason why DB GUIDs are better. We've had a problem with Windows generating a repeating GUID about once every 20 000 times where SQL Server does not.

lol.

And this is why you shouldn't trust anyone's GUID code to be correct.

By the way, do you know if the source for SQL Server GUID uses hashes ?

Cuz if it's the case, you've got hidden collision potential ;)

Oh and, even java's GUID function is broken, so I doubt you'll find a perfect implementation in microsoft land ;)

2012-05-16 Reply Admin

Foo Bar:
If you read TDWTF via RSS, TRWTF was the bizarre indentation of the various paragraphs in this article.

You don't need to read it via RSS to see that the third

in the source should be

.

Zylon · 2012-05-16 Reply Admin

L.:
IMHO, any application DIRECTLY supporting the back button is a WTF in this day and age, there is only bad consequences to that kind of stuff.

IMHO, you're a troll and/or utterly clueless.

Do users understand the browser back button?

Also, fuck you Akismet. Let's see how much blather I have to tack on here before your incompetent heuristics decide this isn't spam.

2012-05-16 Reply Admin

Zylon:
L.:
IMHO, any application DIRECTLY supporting the back button is a WTF in this day and age, there is only bad consequences to that kind of stuff.
IMHO, you're a troll and/or utterly clueless.
Do users understand the browser back button?

Also, fuck you Akismet. Let's see how much blather I have to tack on here before your incompetent heuristics decide this isn't spam.

Interesting study, but that makes no goddamn difference. I'm talking about web applications, not websites or blogs or whatever. I'm talking about an application that has much easier ways to handle nav than back or forward.

The fact that people using the web as it is today, i.e. ever so retarded and still in dire need of back forward nav due to its mainly folder file tree design, require a back button has absolutely no relevance when you design an application.

Do you have a back button in Outlook ? calc ? notepad ?

No, there are only back buttons where it makes sense, explorer, winamp and vlc.

So quit using your failed rethoric on how websites should remain in the dark ages of folder-based html and join us in 2012, it's great here.

Zylon · 2012-05-16 Reply Admin

"Folder-based HTML"?

Hooooo boy, this thread is really bringing out the moonbats.

Callin · 2012-05-16 Reply Admin

I don't fail often.

But when I do, I FAIL FAIL FAIL FAIL FAIL FAIL FAIL FAIL!

2012-05-16 Reply Admin

Zylon:
moonbats

Fucking racist.

2012-05-16 Reply Admin

L.:
oheso:
dogmatic:
There are many times when a stateful web app cannot be easily restored with a back click.

It's doable and it should be done. Don't pop up a new window on me because you're a lazy programmer.

I have to work every day with other peeps' screwy web apps where the back button breaks stuff, and it gives me pleasure every day to think of awful things happening to those developers. Really awful things.

You may be living in the past.

My webapps are single page and your back button is both useless and not supported.

What I mean there, is that there are much better ways to navigate than simply back and forward (that scheme only handles one path by the way), like a recent list adapted to your application for example.

IMHO, any application DIRECTLY supporting the back button is a WTF in this day and age, there is only bad consequences to that kind of stuff.

And any application supporting it INDIRECTLY is so missing the point because for the same work, one could simply put a better navigation scheme in place than ol' stupid backforward reload everything except some is cached but some is not ...

Maybe I just don't get what you're saying (or maybe you a troll), but I would think supporting the back button is important irrespective of the paths you intend to support in your page - if it exists in the browser, user will (try to) use it - if you circumvent their ability to use the back button as they believe it will work then you are merely pissing off potential clients. You don't have to believe the back button is necessarily a good idea, but you have to understand that users expect certain behaviours in browsers where it's present (which I think is all of them at the mo)

2012-05-16 Reply Admin

L.:
Zylon:
L.:
IMHO, any application DIRECTLY supporting the back button is a WTF in this day and age, there is only bad consequences to that kind of stuff.
IMHO, you're a troll and/or utterly clueless.
Do users understand the browser back button?

Also, fuck you Akismet. Let's see how much blather I have to tack on here before your incompetent heuristics decide this isn't spam.
Interesting study, but that makes no goddamn difference. I'm talking about web applications, not websites or blogs or whatever. I'm talking about an application that has much easier ways to handle nav than back or forward.

The fact that people using the web as it is today, i.e. ever so retarded and still in dire need of back forward nav due to its mainly folder file tree design, require a back button has absolutely no relevance when you design an application.

Do you have a back button in Outlook ? calc ? notepad ?

No, there are only back buttons where it makes sense, explorer, winamp and vlc.

So quit using your failed rethoric on how websites should remain in the dark ages of folder-based html and join us in 2012, it's great here.

Now I'm even more confused.

"I'm not talking about Websites, I'm talking about web apps, which is why Websites shouldn't support a back button". So...Websites are old fashioned are they? I notice the likes of google, yahoo and facebook are still banking on them pretty heavily.

When they start trying to get out of them at a rate of knots, I might start to worry...

2012-05-16 Reply Admin

Fred:
L.:
Zylon:
L.:
IMHO, any application DIRECTLY supporting the back button is a WTF in this day and age, there is only bad consequences to that kind of stuff.
IMHO, you're a troll and/or utterly clueless.
Do users understand the browser back button?

Also, fuck you Akismet. Let's see how much blather I have to tack on here before your incompetent heuristics decide this isn't spam.
Interesting study, but that makes no goddamn difference. I'm talking about web applications, not websites or blogs or whatever. I'm talking about an application that has much easier ways to handle nav than back or forward.

The fact that people using the web as it is today, i.e. ever so retarded and still in dire need of back forward nav due to its mainly folder file tree design, require a back button has absolutely no relevance when you design an application.

Do you have a back button in Outlook ? calc ? notepad ?

No, there are only back buttons where it makes sense, explorer, winamp and vlc.

So quit using your failed rethoric on how websites should remain in the dark ages of folder-based html and join us in 2012, it's great here.
Now I'm even more confused.

"I'm not talking about Websites, I'm talking about web apps, which is why Websites shouldn't support a back button". So...Websites are old fashioned are they? I notice the likes of google, yahoo and facebook are still banking on them pretty heavily.

When they start trying to get out of them at a rate of knots, I might start to worry...

Trolled by a classic troll:

Say something that on the surface sounds cromulent, but with some thought implies crazy
wait
Get angry at any opposition and accuse them of being so last year

Captcha: appellatio - oh dear....I've never enjoyed fruit so much

Zylon · 2012-05-16 Reply Admin

Ladel:
Trolled by a classic troll:

Say something that on the surface sounds cromulent, but with some thought implies crazy

wait

Get angry at any opposition and accuse them of being so last year

The problem is Poe's Law, as applied to UX wonks. We may never know whether he's trolling or not. It's impossible to determine from observable data.

Fortunately, calling him an idiot is applicable either way.

2012-05-17 Reply Admin

So if you FAIL at FAILing, have you succeeded?

2012-05-17 Reply Admin

Zylon:
"Folder-based HTML"?
Hooooo boy, this thread is really bringing out the moonbats.

Yes, it's also called an URL.

Who the fuck wants every screen to have its own URL ????

The only reason people are attached to that is because in the past it was the only way, using static webpages that were files located in folders, thus the "folder-based" term referring to the directory structure of the old web.

2012-05-17 Reply Admin

Fred:
L.:
oheso:
dogmatic:
There are many times when a stateful web app cannot be easily restored with a back click.

It's doable and it should be done. Don't pop up a new window on me because you're a lazy programmer.

I have to work every day with other peeps' screwy web apps where the back button breaks stuff, and it gives me pleasure every day to think of awful things happening to those developers. Really awful things.

You may be living in the past.

My webapps are single page and your back button is both useless and not supported.

What I mean there, is that there are much better ways to navigate than simply back and forward (that scheme only handles one path by the way), like a recent list adapted to your application for example.

IMHO, any application DIRECTLY supporting the back button is a WTF in this day and age, there is only bad consequences to that kind of stuff.

And any application supporting it INDIRECTLY is so missing the point because for the same work, one could simply put a better navigation scheme in place than ol' stupid backforward reload everything except some is cached but some is not ...
Maybe I just don't get what you're saying (or maybe you a troll), but I would think supporting the back button is important irrespective of the paths you intend to support in your page - if it exists in the browser, user will (try to) use it - if you circumvent their ability to use the back button as they believe it will work then you are merely pissing off potential clients. You don't have to believe the back button is necessarily a good idea, but you have to understand that users expect certain behaviours in browsers where it's present (which I think is all of them at the mo)

No. You will press the back button if you want to go back, that's true for all users.

Now what does that mean when there's no "back" ? nothing. And it will not even cross your mind to press mouse4 because you don't want to go "back".

I am talking about APPLICATIONS, not friggin websites OR random users OR potential clients.

2012-05-17 Reply Admin

Fred:
L.:
Zylon:
L.:
IMHO, any application DIRECTLY supporting the back button is a WTF in this day and age, there is only bad consequences to that kind of stuff.
IMHO, you're a troll and/or utterly clueless.
Do users understand the browser back button?

Also, fuck you Akismet. Let's see how much blather I have to tack on here before your incompetent heuristics decide this isn't spam.
Interesting study, but that makes no goddamn difference. I'm talking about web applications, not websites or blogs or whatever. I'm talking about an application that has much easier ways to handle nav than back or forward.

The fact that people using the web as it is today, i.e. ever so retarded and still in dire need of back forward nav due to its mainly folder file tree design, require a back button has absolutely no relevance when you design an application.

Do you have a back button in Outlook ? calc ? notepad ?

No, there are only back buttons where it makes sense, explorer, winamp and vlc.

So quit using your failed rethoric on how websites should remain in the dark ages of folder-based html and join us in 2012, it's great here.
Now I'm even more confused.

"I'm not talking about Websites, I'm talking about web apps, which is why Websites shouldn't support a back button". So...Websites are old fashioned are they? I notice the likes of google, yahoo and facebook are still banking on them pretty heavily.

When they start trying to get out of them at a rate of knots, I might start to worry...

Nobody's talking about websites here.

Zylon · 2012-05-17 Reply Admin

L.:
Nobody's talking about websites here.

Everyone except you is talking about websites here.

You're just off in the corner being the spittle-spewing crazy guy.

2012-05-17 Reply Admin

L.:
Do you have a back button in Outlook ?

Yes. It's not there by default, but you can add it to the tool bar. And it'll let you navigate back through the folders you've been clicking on.

2012-05-17 Reply Admin

Keith H:
There is actually an argument for the GUID from the production DB server: in SQL newid() returns a sequential ID, so it's much better for indexing than most GUIDs (which are much more random).

Anon:
Of course, it is better. If all GUIDs are generated on the DB server, they increase monotonically (depending on type of GUID but I presume this is why it was done) and it is faster to add rows with such GUIDs if any indexes are applied to these columns (like when primary key column is a GUID). TRWTF is the programmer who sent this.

I question both of these statements. I ran the following SQL script:

DECLARE @myid uniqueidentifier, @cnt int

SET @cnt = 0

WHILE @cnt < 20 BEGIN SET @myid = NEWID() PRINT 'Value of @myid is: '+ CONVERT(varchar(255), @myid) SET @cnt = @cnt + 1 END

And got these results:

Value of @myid is: 21026332-881C-4B45-B4AB-44B7408FC5FA Value of @myid is: 0523D6C4-ABAE-4B48-B607-116CA558895A Value of @myid is: CED0DDA9-E7A7-460C-9827-C7B1C554AD20 Value of @myid is: 8D4D8151-D419-4E3E-AC41-03E308B405D9 Value of @myid is: 1A0AA5A2-D4AE-465C-B990-3DCA04B34666 Value of @myid is: 339A9289-EEC0-4ABA-B1F7-D22612FC2226 Value of @myid is: D312DE2F-FE20-4111-A22F-07B46FA6F5F1 Value of @myid is: 212C0D21-22E0-428E-A9CA-18C06EDA9FF2 Value of @myid is: 67FB1BB5-9CE5-4E41-AA3C-893F454979B9 Value of @myid is: 9B7EA234-4A61-483F-AC6A-3508E57083A6 Value of @myid is: D9ABDC99-F0E9-4A32-99FF-D91B39DED459 Value of @myid is: B9F71A1B-C538-44F5-8B99-BB52F4A7ED13 Value of @myid is: 1EBC1EF9-8920-4252-9784-E1FB20C2EB87 Value of @myid is: 0BF2BEF7-D1FB-49AC-A2CA-7C7FA2B876D6 Value of @myid is: 52BAD120-D769-4374-84BF-372FAE59B915 Value of @myid is: 7B176EB3-E043-48AC-94A1-077F98D83106 Value of @myid is: F3A73B9A-BB1F-46B0-BCEA-752FE18AD971 Value of @myid is: 471F65F4-999F-4283-9BD9-74440FC9E6D1 Value of @myid is: 0DA978A1-2264-439C-ACAB-6795FBA9CA9D Value of @myid is: B2F775DD-1DC4-4F50-855F-EB0E3AE28EE7

Can someone please explain the words "sequential" and "monotonic" as they relate to these results? Because I can't see how they do.

2012-05-18 Reply Admin

Regarding GUIDs see: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ericlippert/archive/2012/04/30/guid-guide-part-two.aspx

Addition: The shown code as a "WTF" looks like VBScript, which has no built-in GUID-class or GUID-methods, so the function shown as a "WTF" is a good idea.

2012-05-18 Reply Admin

Toettoe:
Regarding GUIDs see: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ericlippert/archive/2012/04/30/guid-guide-part-two.aspx
Addition: The shown code as a "WTF" looks like VBScript, which has no built-in GUID-class or GUID-methods, so the function shown as a "WTF" is a good idea.

That was my thought while reading the article, but a quick Google search before I posted showed a way to generate GUIDs in VBScript without the need for an external system like a database, so I declined to mention that part in my reply.

Yes, you still need to instantiate an object that is outside of the base VBScript object model, but the DLL that provides this object is part of Windows. http://blogs.technet.com/b/heyscriptingguy/archive/2005/02/21/how-can-i-create-a-guid-using-a-script.aspx

Wow. My first brush with Akismet being retarded....

2012-05-21 Reply Admin

JJ:
Keith H:
There is actually an argument for the GUID from the production DB server: in SQL newid() returns a sequential ID, so it's much better for indexing than most GUIDs (which are much more random).

Anon:
Of course, it is better. If all GUIDs are generated on the DB server, they increase monotonically (depending on type of GUID but I presume this is why it was done) and it is faster to add rows with such GUIDs if any indexes are applied to these columns (like when primary key column is a GUID). TRWTF is the programmer who sent this.

I question both of these statements. I ran the following SQL script:

DECLARE @myid uniqueidentifier, @cnt int

SET @cnt = 0

WHILE @cnt < 20 BEGIN SET @myid = NEWID() PRINT 'Value of @myid is: '+ CONVERT(varchar(255), @myid) SET @cnt = @cnt + 1 END

And got these results:

Value of @myid is: 21026332-881C-4B45-B4AB-44B7408FC5FA Value of @myid is: 0523D6C4-ABAE-4B48-B607-116CA558895A Value of @myid is: CED0DDA9-E7A7-460C-9827-C7B1C554AD20 Value of @myid is: 8D4D8151-D419-4E3E-AC41-03E308B405D9 Value of @myid is: 1A0AA5A2-D4AE-465C-B990-3DCA04B34666 Value of @myid is: 339A9289-EEC0-4ABA-B1F7-D22612FC2226 Value of @myid is: D312DE2F-FE20-4111-A22F-07B46FA6F5F1 Value of @myid is: 212C0D21-22E0-428E-A9CA-18C06EDA9FF2 Value of @myid is: 67FB1BB5-9CE5-4E41-AA3C-893F454979B9 Value of @myid is: 9B7EA234-4A61-483F-AC6A-3508E57083A6 Value of @myid is: D9ABDC99-F0E9-4A32-99FF-D91B39DED459 Value of @myid is: B9F71A1B-C538-44F5-8B99-BB52F4A7ED13 Value of @myid is: 1EBC1EF9-8920-4252-9784-E1FB20C2EB87 Value of @myid is: 0BF2BEF7-D1FB-49AC-A2CA-7C7FA2B876D6 Value of @myid is: 52BAD120-D769-4374-84BF-372FAE59B915 Value of @myid is: 7B176EB3-E043-48AC-94A1-077F98D83106 Value of @myid is: F3A73B9A-BB1F-46B0-BCEA-752FE18AD971 Value of @myid is: 471F65F4-999F-4283-9BD9-74440FC9E6D1 Value of @myid is: 0DA978A1-2264-439C-ACAB-6795FBA9CA9D Value of @myid is: B2F775DD-1DC4-4F50-855F-EB0E3AE28EE7

Can someone please explain the words "sequential" and "monotonic" as they relate to these results? Because I can't see how they do.

It's NEWSEQUENTIALID() that returns sequential GUID, not NEWID().

jasmine2501 · 2012-07-03 Reply Admin

Mr Anon:
Sigivald:
That is true, in its place.
But what I noted in:
Public Function Save() As Boolean
    Try
        SaveMeeting()
    Catch ex As Exception
        Throw ex
    End Try
End Function
was that the obvious explanation is that the catch block is there to let you place a breakpoint to catch it in the act, rather than being 'real' code intended to do anything useful in and of itself.
I'd love to believe that, but I doubt it somehow. Our current codebase is full of this thanks to former VB6 developers learning C# who've been lead to believe that including a try-catch counts as "error checking", even if they haven't actually done anything with it.
And, as others have pointed out, throw ex will mess up the stack trace info so even if you really needed to put a breakpoint there (instead of just breaking on exception) you ought to rethrow the original exception properly.

I have a whole slew of WTFs from the same developers that I really ought to submit at some point....

That is exactly how it got there.

First... this probably made the front page because I used the VS extension, and I will agree it's not a really horrible WTF.

However, it is a useless function that does nothing but push the stack. It causes a compiler warning (which the vendor says is "ok, it's just a warning, nothing important") because it can never return a value, but it does build. The SaveMeeting() function is the very next block in the code file, and it's not implementing an "ISaveAble" interface or something. All it does is push the stack, eat the exception, and return null. I don't buy the debugging argument, because you can just as easily put your breakpoint in the SaveMeeting function, or its exception handler (which does the same thing as this one... nothing).

2012-08-01 Reply Admin

Well, the content of the bh, let me see the also want to see a few times more, content directly highlighted a theme, let the subject becomes more bright, and theme and then in line with the be fond of, it is too good, I'll focus on.

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