• (cs)

    Seeing as the car park error message is shown on the way out, it might be that the world is missing a font somewhere. Check around people.

    Also inb4 comment goes hereeeee

  • (cs)

    The forum search one doesn't seem like much of a WTF.

    You're only allowed to search once every five seconds. If you try to do it more often than that, you're penalized by being blocked from searching for 100 seconds. A bit extreme, perhaps, but not inconsistent.

    Lots of things do this with logins — after x failed logins, you're barred from trying to login until y seconds have gone by, with y often being proportional to x in some way.

  • (cs)

    Thrid?

    Also, it worries me a lot when places dealing with finances can't get a computer system working right. "String not found" could just as easily have been "Money all gone"...

  • Anon (unregistered)

    TRWTF is why is Michael Knight looking for a car park - I thought his car was smart enough to do that for itself...

  • I <3 MFD (unregistered)

    Comment Goes HEEEEERRRRRRREEEEEEEEEE

  • Larry (unregistered)

    Websites that scold me for normal innocent behavior (searching twice...) make me want to show them how much a full featured browser can do with their silly rules. Just get the "ReloadEvery" Firefox extension and reload their lame search page every 5 seconds for a month or two.

    (That's also an excellent defense against the arrogant sites that think they have to log you out after 5 minutes of "inactivity". I've managed to stay logged in for more than a week at a time -- hooray!)

  • (cs)

    COMMENT GOES HEREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

  • Alan (unregistered)

    The Tesco one may not be a WTF...

    "Any 2 for ...." promotions typically include more than one product, there may have been other multipacks of crisps costing more than £1.27

  • Adam Won (unregistered) in reply to tin
    tin:
    "String not found" could just as easily have been "Money all gone"...
    Soooo true! I helped beta test a banking site once that we'll call "Allnite B@nking". (Replacing the "a" with an "@" made it supercoolnewwavewebsavvyexciting!!!)

    After seeing all the many many ways money could evaporate on that site, the testers all ended up calling it "Allnite Bonking".

  • Mike B. (unregistered)

    Was Michael Knight driving a black Trans-Am with a red "Cylon" light on the front?

  • Ed McMahon (unregistered)

    HEREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE'S JOHNNY!

  • Velko (unregistered)

    You are not allowed to park font libs there.

  • Napoleon (unregistered)

    The Tesco one isn't really a WTF. There were more kinds of crisps that were on the offer that could have given a saving if the different kinds were mixed. Putting "Walkers 6 pack crisps 2 for £2.50 unless the total cost is less than £2.50 in which case it'll just be the normal cost" would probably not fit on the label.

  • m0ffx (unregistered)
    "While looking for a car park I was presented with this strange error message," writes Michael Knight.

    Since that photo is evidently taken in a car park, why the heck was Michael looking for one? Did he not realise he'd already found what he sought?

  • (cs)

    Instructor Matthaus, how do I clear the text from the screen? Mr. Matthaus? Where did he go?

  • aa (unregistered)

    COMMENT NOT FOUND

  • RBoy (unregistered) in reply to Napoleon
    Napoleon:
    The Tesco one isn't really a WTF. There were more kinds of crisps that were on the offer that could have given a saving if the different kinds were mixed. Putting "Walkers 6 pack crisps 2 for £2.50 unless the total cost is less than £2.50 in which case it'll just be the normal cost" would probably not fit on the label.

    Wait, what?

  • Ben Jammin (unregistered) in reply to Adam Won

    Yeah... troubleshooting... that's what they were doing all night at the "Allnite"

  • Kaelten (unregistered) in reply to Napoleon
    Napoleon:
    The Tesco one isn't really a WTF. There were more kinds of crisps that were on the offer that could have given a saving if the different kinds were mixed. Putting "Walkers 6 pack crisps 2 for £2.50 unless the total cost is less than £2.50 in which case it'll just be the normal cost" would probably not fit on the label.

    2 for <=£2.50 :D

  • rd (unregistered) in reply to Someone You Know
    Someone You Know:
    The forum search one doesn't seem like much of a WTF.

    You're only allowed to search once every five seconds. If you try to do it more often than that, you're penalized by being blocked from searching for 100 seconds...

    Yeah, but Dom M. swore he only clicked search twice. I challenge him to provide his written oath which has been witnessed and notarized.

  • Ed McMahon (unregistered) in reply to Kaelten
    Kaelten:
    2 for <=£2.50
    Oh, damn, that looks like math! Better not try that with dollars or you'll scare most of the customers away.
  • (cs) in reply to Larry
    Larry:
    Websites that scold me for normal innocent behavior (searching twice...) make me want to show them how much a full featured browser can do with their silly rules. Just get the "ReloadEvery" Firefox extension and reload their lame search page every 5 seconds for a month or two.

    I was a member of a large, privately owned forum which had a huge database, and whose server was getting disproportionately crushed by search requests. They couldn't afford a better server, so they instituted such a limit.

    Hopefully they weren't being helped along by a genius like you who thinks it's justice to piss in peoples' swimming pools.

  • Larry (unregistered) in reply to PeriSoft
    PeriSoft:
    Larry:
    Websites that scold me for normal innocent behavior (searching twice...) make me want to show them how much a full featured browser can do with their silly rules. Just get the "ReloadEvery" Firefox extension and reload their lame search page every 5 seconds for a month or two.

    I was a member of a large, privately owned forum which had a huge database, and whose server was getting disproportionately crushed by search requests. They couldn't afford a better server, so they instituted such a limit.

    Hopefully they weren't being helped along by a genius like you who thinks it's justice to piss in peoples' swimming pools.

    Don't piss in mine and I won't piss in yours. Simple enough, no?

  • Beavis (unregistered) in reply to Larry

    The Internet. Serious Business.

    Course, nothing says "Stop" like an IP ban.

    Won't stop most saavy people, but it does get the point across.

  • (cs) in reply to I <3 MFD
    I <3 MFD:
    Comment Goes HEEEEERRRRRRREEEEEEEEEE

    I can't believe it took until the fifth comment to get that!

  • (cs) in reply to Larry
    Larry:
    PeriSoft:
    Hopefully they weren't being helped along by a genius like you who thinks it's justice to piss in peoples' swimming pools.
    Don't piss in mine and I won't piss in yours. Simple enough, no?
    If they can have no smoking areas in restaurants, why not a no pissing area in a pool?
  • AndyL (unregistered)

    Always make sure to lock your doors when you're in parking garages.

    It was nice of the garage to advertise for him, but that poor schmuck is never going to see that font again.

  • (cs)

    The Tesco pic reminds me of a story: a produce stand beside a country road had a sign that said, "Pecans $1 per sack, or all you want $5". Customer stops in and carries one sack of pecans to the checkout stand.

    "Do you want any more?" asks the checker.

    "No," says the customer.

    "That'll be five dollars," says the checker.

  • (cs) in reply to Larry
    Larry:
    PeriSoft:
    Larry:
    Websites that scold me for normal innocent behavior (searching twice...) make me want to show them how much a full featured browser can do with their silly rules. Just get the "ReloadEvery" Firefox extension and reload their lame search page every 5 seconds for a month or two.

    I was a member of a large, privately owned forum which had a huge database, and whose server was getting disproportionately crushed by search requests. They couldn't afford a better server, so they instituted such a limit.

    Hopefully they weren't being helped along by a genius like you who thinks it's justice to piss in peoples' swimming pools.

    Don't piss in mine and I won't piss in yours. Simple enough, no?
    Really? So if I have a pool in my yard, and let the neigborhood kids use it, but I tell them to get out of the pool for a minute every five, you feel that restriction is equivalent to me coming over and pissing in your pool?

  • (cs) in reply to tin
    tin:
    Thrid?

    Also, it worries me a lot when places dealing with finances can't get a computer system working right. "String not found" could just as easily have been "Money all gone"...

    Obviously you've been reveiwing my bank account.

  • Fast Eddie (unregistered) in reply to Bappi
    Bappi:
    Larry:
    PeriSoft:
    Larry:
    Websites that scold me for normal innocent behavior (searching twice...) make me want to show them how much a full featured browser can do with their silly rules. Just get the "ReloadEvery" Firefox extension and reload their lame search page every 5 seconds for a month or two.

    I was a member of a large, privately owned forum which had a huge database, and whose server was getting disproportionately crushed by search requests. They couldn't afford a better server, so they instituted such a limit.

    Hopefully they weren't being helped along by a genius like you who thinks it's justice to piss in peoples' swimming pools.

    Don't piss in mine and I won't piss in yours. Simple enough, no?
    Really? So if I have a pool in my yard, and let the neigborhood kids use it, but I tell them to get out of the pool for a minute every five, you feel that restriction is equivalent to me coming over and pissing in your pool?
    He is just happy that he could get a Firefox extension to work...prolly took most of the night, especially with his mom yelling down to get to bed every 5 minutes.

  • SR (unregistered) in reply to Adam Won
    Adam Won:
    Soooo true! I helped beta test a banking site once that we'll call "Allnite B@nking". (Replacing the "a" with an "@" made it supercoolnewwavewebsavvyexciting!!!)

    After seeing all the many many ways money could evaporate on that site, the testers all ended up calling it "Allnite Bonking".

    My test report would be along the lines of: it's spelt "All night banking". Fix that one then I'll look at the rest. Hanging's too good!

    appellatio

  • (cs) in reply to Larry
    Larry:
    Websites that scold me for normal innocent behavior (searching twice...)

    In 5 seconds? Searching twice in 5 seconds is normal behavior?

    Larry:
    Just get the "ReloadEvery" Firefox extension and reload their lame search page every 5 seconds for a month or two.

    Wait, what?

    First of all, it will just increase your 'you must wait x seconds' time every time you do that and return a static page, thereby not hurting their server, and effectively removing your ability to search their site for the next 100 months.

    Second, if it DID hurt their business, then it's a Denial of Service attack, which I believe is a felony, with PRISON TIME.

    Allow me to remind you that access to websites is a privilege. You (or more likely, your parents) pay money for that privilege. Privileges can be given, and taken away. No website (with the possible exception of government sites) is under any obligation to specifically serve you. Whether they want you to search every 5 seconds or 50 seconds or 5 times per day is their prerogative. If you don't like it, then go somewhere else.

    Many websites have monitoring utilities to detect and track malicious usage. If you ever do this to any of my sites, I will report you to your ISP and block access at the router.

  • Herby (unregistered) in reply to Larry
    Larry:
    Websites that scold me for normal innocent behavior (searching twice...) make me want to show them how much a full featured browser can do with their silly rules. Just get the "ReloadEvery" Firefox extension and reload their lame search page every 5 seconds for a month or two.

    (That's also an excellent defense against the arrogant sites that think they have to log you out after 5 minutes of "inactivity". I've managed to stay logged in for more than a week at a time -- hooray!)

    But...

    There is sometimes a reason. I don't want my online banking session to be active "forever". They nicely have a 10 minute timeout (which I consider reasonable). I think it is for something like "security". I could be wrong now, but I don't think so......

  • Justus (unregistered) in reply to nocturnal
    nocturnal:
    Larry:
    Websites that scold me for normal innocent behavior (searching twice...)

    In 5 seconds? Searching twice in 5 seconds is normal behavior?

    Five seconds is maybe not too big a deal, but many forums set the search limit higher than that. It can be quite irritating when you search for something that gets no results, then change your query and try again. Oops, too fast! Now you get to wait...

    What's the volume of search traffic required to overload these sites, anyways? One would think it would need to be pretty high, but then again I don't want to overestimate the technical competence of PHP forum developers.

  • similis (unregistered) in reply to Larry
    Larry:
    Websites that scold me for normal innocent behavior (searching twice...) make me want to show them how much a full featured browser can do with their silly rules. Just get the "ReloadEvery" Firefox extension and reload their lame search page every 5 seconds for a month or two.
    TRWTF is that you need an extension for that!
  • vereor funeor (unregistered) in reply to Pol
    Pol:
    I <3 MFD:
    Comment Goes HEEEEERRRRRRREEEEEEEEEE

    I can't believe it took until the fifth comment to get that!

    First!

  • (cs)

    The Font Lib is the new General Motors vehicle, and you can't park it here.

  • (cs) in reply to Alan

    Is that that price for a single package on the left or is it for "price per pound" type of thing?

  • OldCoder (unregistered) in reply to Herby
    Herby:
    There is sometimes a reason. I don't want my online banking session to be active "forever". They nicely have a 10 minute timeout (which I consider reasonable). I think it is for something like "security". I could be wrong now, but I don't think so......

    Eh? security...banking...does not compute.

  • Noah (unregistered)

    Now we know what happend to the character "Doug" from the MTV comedy "The State" (circa 1994). He grew up to become a TV caption author.

    Go here and look for "Doug": http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_State_(TV_series)

    Well, gotta go. I'm outta herreeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.

  • Worf (unregistered)
    nocturnal:
    Larry:
    Websites that scold me for normal innocent behavior (searching twice...)

    In 5 seconds? Searching twice in 5 seconds is normal behavior?

    What if you hit enter twice? Say you're typing, and your browser helpfully has an autocomplete? Hit enter the first time may apply the autocomplete, and enter the second may do the search. But sometimes, hitting enter the first time submits the form (especially if the autocomplete selection is just a touch slow), so the second enter re-submits the form again, thus causing 2 searches in under 5 seconds.

    Or, maybe you clicked submit but was slightly off, and clicked again, without realizing the first submit actually worked?

    (The solution would be a hidden field containing a serial number, and once submitted, would prevent the same form from being submitted again. Make serial numbers expire in a short time (say, 5 minutes) and you should be good.)

    Mike B.:
    Was Michael Knight driving a black Trans-Am with a red "Cylon" light on the front?

    dons fire suit

    Or for non-purists, a black transforming Ford Mustang that turns into other Ford vehicles as well. (KR 2008/2009).

  • undefined (unregistered) in reply to Larry

    Just get the "ReloadEvery" Firefox extensio

    In Opera Browser this funcionality is built-in. You need only right-click on the page and select Reload Every menu item. FireFox is WTF.

  • AshG (unregistered)

    I will post a comment here every 5 seconds.

  • undefined (unregistered) in reply to Worf

    The solution would be a hidden field containing a serial number, and once submitted, would prevent the same form from being submitted again. Make serial numbers expire in a short time (say, 5 minutes) and you should be good.

    The real solution of the interface problem is to disable submit button via javascript after pressing.

  • AshG (unregistered)

    I will post a comment here every 5 seconds.

    Oops... Took me longer than 5 seconds...

  • (cs) in reply to Mike B.
    Mike B.:
    Was Michael Knight driving a black Trans-Am with a red "Cylon" light on the front?
    I remember Kitt once telling somebody why he was so smart: "I have over a million K."
  • titter.com (unregistered)

    TRWTF™ is PHP web forums that struggle with search queries.

  • (cs)

    Jeez, I thought the 100 second limit would have been unintentional with the supposition that nobody would reasonably click search twice in five seconds, but then I saw all the angry admin replies here.

    Penalizing users would be somewhat reasonable if the mere act of requesting a search used a significant amount of resources. But when you're displaying the page saying they're searching too quickly, you've already stopped the action which placed such a load on the system.

    I know, people these days seem to have a sense of entitlement, but these people need to know that you can't just demand your users perform load balancing for you automatically, and not to take it personally if load peaks at certain times. If you don't like it, you can take your services and offer them to another group of people.

  • (cs) in reply to nocturnal
    nocturnal:
    Larry:
    Websites that scold me for normal innocent behavior (searching twice...)

    In 5 seconds? Searching twice in 5 seconds is normal behavior?

    Sure.

    1. Search "WTD"
    2. Get 0 results
    3. Notice your mistake
    4. Search "WTF"

    That could easily happen within 5 seconds. It's not the most common case, but I wouldn't call it abnormal. Slapping them and telling them to come back in 2 minutes after that seem unreasonable.

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