• (cs)

    Interesting...could have shortened the query to:
    SELECT DISTINCT COUNT(*) FROM JFA50100  and saved some heap memory....

  • (cs)

    In the xbase database language, (x >= y and x <= y) is not the same as (x=y)! Perhaps the author of this code came from an xbase background...?

    (Mind you, in xbase you write (x==y) to get an exact string comparison, so the author of this code is being suboptimal even in the xbase world...)

  • (cs) in reply to Raymond Chen

    I'm the poster... and the guy who had to fix many problems in this project...

    Nope, most people who worked on this project were newbies; They didn't had xbase experience...  And this is a VB6 project, using SQL Server.

    Are you sure about this in xbase ? I mean, a value cannot be < and also > than another value at the same time... so it's only the = that count...

  • (cs) in reply to martinm1000
    martinm1000:
    I'm the poster... and the guy who had to fix many problems in this project...

    Nope, most people who worked on this project were newbies; They didn't had xbase experience...  And this is a VB6 project, using SQL Server.

    Are you sure about this in xbase ? I mean, a value cannot be < and also > than another value at the same time... so it's only the = that count...

    It will probably be converted to some numeric format with <= and >= instead of a fixed-string comparison (as stated...)

  • (cs)

    JFA50000 and JFA50100?  I'm sure there is a reason behind this, but if not I'm glad to see that they left 100 spots between JFA50000 and JFA50100.  That way the system can easily be expanded.  Or something.

  • (cs)

    I see the problem.... its a French system.

  • (cs) in reply to Phil Scott

    There are other tables between those 2 numbers... Actually, we do not always have control over the tables; they are from an accounting system.

  • (cs) in reply to martinm1000

    I just started typing some comment, then stopped and went back to look at the query again...and now all I can say is "wow".

    @Steve O. I don't think your suggestion works, as they still need FORMATID = gsFormatID and the BillGroupe thing equal to the input value as well.

  • (cs)

    I'd recommend using NOT <> rather than <= and >= it's much easier to read as the NOT <> gets rid of the pesky = signs altogether.

  • (cs) in reply to gmiller
    gmiller:
    I'd recommend using NOT <> rather than <= and >= it's much easier to read as the NOT <> gets rid of the pesky = signs altogether.


    Nice -- I like that one.  Alternatively, you could use:

    (NOT < x) AND (NOT > x)

    That might work quite well also.
  • (cs)

    Am I really going to be the first one to point out that you've made a bit of a WTF with this:

    that endlessly confusing equals ("=") operator
    which should probably have been "==" ?

  • (cs) in reply to hostile17

    "<font face="Verdana">Am I really going to be the first one to point out that you've made a bit of a WTF...</font>"
    No, you are just the first one confusing SQL equals sign with C (and alike) equals sign.

  • (cs)

    The a<=b and a>=b conditions are just a way to mess with the db engine. WTF, no more, no less.
    Besides that the snipped shows a lot of ugliness in its own. Like:
    But that is not all. I see:

    Inconsistency: GetSingleValueLong returns a boolean, the long value is returned with a parameter. But in GetRecordCount the result seems to be returned directly from the function.
    Implicit type conversions: assuming bOnlyOneCopy is boolean: bOnlyOneCopy = Trim$... but I blame the language for this one.
    Global variables to hold the connection object: assuming that hungarian notation is right. I loathe this.
    Client side count.

  • (cs)

    I'm not sure we've spotted the real WTF...

    It doesn't really seem to be a French system, it looks like Frenglish (Franglais pour les francophones).

    This makes for about 4 languages in just this little snippet: English, French, B.A.S.I.C. and S.Q.L. (Throw in some hungarian notation for spice)


    If GetSingleValueLong...bad things...
    Is glLangID byRef? Does the return value even matter?

    "Con" in French means stupid; is gobjCon in Hung-frenglish-> Global Object Stupid?

    bOnlyOneCopy... please be only (err is it minus?) one.

    I dunno what assParams is, but don't the functions with "$" at the end modify the string they operate on?

    A classic situation : It might run now, but it is unsupportable.

    I suggest finding out what it is supposed to do and writing new code to do just that.

    (Free as in beer, not speech)

  • (cs)

    I think what Raymond was getting at is that = and == are different in xbase languages... e.g "FAT" = "FATTER" returns true, because the smaller string is identical to the equal-length portion of the longer string. "FAT" == "FATTER" is false, as is "FATTER" = "FAT".
    Even so, I don't think you could excuse something like this! ;)

  • (cs)

    OMFG! [8-|]

  • (cs)

    Obviously gsBillGroup and gsFormatId are functions that return different value on each call. But why no bind variables in the SQL?

  • (cs) in reply to Steve O.
    Steve O.:
    Interesting...could have shortened the query to:
    SELECT DISTINCT COUNT(*) FROM JFA50100  and saved some heap memory....


    Unintentional WTF there, methinks. Something more like SELECT COUNT(DISTINCT Bill_Groupe) but even that's not right because you'd want DISTINCT Bill_Groupe, FormatId, CopyCode, which you can't do.

  • (cs) in reply to Rob

    LOL, you are correct Rob, wrote that before first coffee...however he could have just done:
    SELECT COUNT(*) FROM JFA50100 GROUP BY Bill_Groupe, FormatId, CopyCode
     and get the record count he wanted.

  • (cs) in reply to Steve O.
    Steve O.:
    LOL, you are correct Rob, wrote that before first coffee...however he could have just done:
    SELECT COUNT(*) FROM JFA50100 GROUP BY Bill_Groupe, FormatId, CopyCode
     and get the record count he wanted.


    Actually, no he couldn't -- that would not return the same results.  the correct way is simply to use a derived table by surrounding his current SQL statement with

    "SELECT COUNT(*) FROM (" & currentSQL & " ) A"

    However, we all know the best way is just to use a stored procedure.
  • (cs)

    I'm a little surprised no one has mentioned this particular WTF part:

    <font size="2">Select Case glLangID
           Case LANGUAGE_ID_FRENCH, LANGUAGE_ID_ENGLISH
          
           Case Else
             glLangID = LANGUAGE_ID_FRENCH
    End Select
    </font>

    I mean what's the point of even having this case statement?  It's a completely retarded way to implement a default value for gLangID.

    --The Dan

  • (cs) in reply to TheDan666

    TheDan666 :
    Just for the evil...

    I didn't mention it, but that why I was wondering : Is glLangID byRef?

    I'm not sure it does nothing, if the system is one language, but the language to use isn't English or French, it will be French after that case...

  • (cs) in reply to Loz

    Nope... they are global strings to the application !

  • (cs)

    WTF. Just use = , plain and simple.

    [H]

  • Dog Breakfast (unregistered)

    I'm not 100% sure of this, but I recall maintaining some systems (that really should have had nullable=false). They were using a similar structure of query to get results that either = or were null. Yes it would have been much clearer to do an = value or is null search, but the dba/project lead didn't like that. Horray for Gov't!

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