The Daily WTF: Curious Perversions in Information Technology

chubertdev · 2014-04-08 Reply Admin

"It works too fast! Nothing was supposed to change!" "We followed your project plan. So it must be your project plan that failed."

Project management version of garbage in, garbage out. I've never been afraid to stick to my guns when I didn't have control over specs, and if anything failed, I made sure that aspect was well-known.

chubertdev · 2014-04-08 Reply Admin

faoileag, please get yourself some coffee and a speel cheker braüzer extenshun

2014-04-08 Reply Admin

"Danny spent one afternoon doing nothing but trying to arrange Victor’s desktop icons to match his old machine. "

That's TRWTF. Was it so hard to swap HDD or copy files from one to the other in case they were getting bigger HDDs as well?

CAPTCHA: decet. Title of this site is a real decet as it says it is Daily WTF and there are no WTFs on weekend when admins have supposedly more free time (no work).

2014-04-08 Reply Admin

Coyne:
We have host applications like this: Where the user knows every broken keystroke needed to use the broken application; and we can't improve anything because they would have to learn a new keystroking pattern.

Then maybe get programmer who can write better application, but one that uses same keystrokes?

Captcha: saluto (to you)

2014-04-08 Reply Admin

faoileag:
Customers are NOT always right:
faoileag:
...my long rant...

Oh, gosh, where to start! A customer getting NEW hardware and complaining about the improved speed is definitely a CUSTOMER problem! Victor needs to move on to retirement if his small brain can't even READ machine specs -- which CLEARLY indicate it is faster than the old hardware.

So, you would handle it like:

Victor: The forms are opening to fast! Customers are NOT always right: You've got new hardware. What do you expect? Victor: That you stick to the contract and change nothing! Customers are NOT always right: This is a ridiculous requirement. You take it as it is, or leave it.

Alternative 1: Victor: This is the last time your company will have been contracted by us. As for fulfilment of the current contract, our legal department will determine whether the requirements have been met.

Alternative 2: Victor: Your boss, my brother-in-law, has promised me that nothing would change. I will meet him this evening and we will discuss why you can't deliver on that promise.

The customer is always right as long as he ist paying for it.

The answer is simple, add a requirement (you do have requirements right?) that there will be a x-second pause before opening either that window or all windows to conform to the performance of older hardware. Then add a (hopefully intelligent) pause function to your code, again documenting why. Everyone is happy!

Same for font, ask him what font to use and then make it a requirement. You can document that the customer wanted a deviation from the plan, that since the plan didn't specify a font change, and the old program used the default font (and the default font changed), that using a now custom font is outside the scope of the plan.

2014-04-08 Reply Admin

emaN ruoY:
If Office 2007 was too new to trust, I suppose they remain on Windows XP after EOL because Windows 7 is also too new to trust?

No, they moved to Vista, obviously.

2014-04-08 Reply Admin

The whole Danny missed updating the installs as it was noted in the plan is bs. He asked the testers if anything was wrong during testing. They failed to give him the information that some settings had to be changed. He had no knowledge changes need to be made. The document lists "any changes" not specific changes. If the document had said "Be sure to adjust settings in these specific files." Then danny would have been at fault. But the testers never told him they had to change things until after the fact.

As for victor. Just give him an explanation he can handle. Something like "The old systems were a tea cup, the new systems are a big gulp. The new systems are bigger and hold more coffee at a time. But the coffee itself never changed. Its the same coffee. The new system can just handle more at once. Thats why the new system is faster. It can do more work than the old system. And things happen faster. The program itself never changed."

2014-04-08 Reply Admin

faoileag:
Ok, let's see. Client which is not exactly tech savvy needs an upgrade and goes to a full service provider. Now, that is exactly what a full service provider is for and yes, you work to the specifications from the client. You can try to weed out the more ridiculous requests during the negotiating phase, but if you don't succeed you will have to fulfill them. That is, somehow, your business model.
If the customer complains that his forms pop up too fast after upgrading to new hardware, you can make them pop up slower, or you can argue with the customer. If the latter happens on a regular basis, perhaps you should consider moving into another field of the industry.

As for the resulting chaos after the lotus install had been finally upgraded: entirely Danny's fault. Yes, information sharing should be a push process and not a pull process, but in an environment as weird as Victor's shop, Danny should have covered his bases nevertheless. It's his company's business to make the transition work, so it's his company's businees to make sure they have all the relevant information.

Again: if you don't like that move into another field. Customer centric work usually involves working with difficult customers. There are people who strive on that and take pride in making difficult customers happy. You need that kind of attitude, otherwise a job one step removed from customers is usually better.

No, not this time. The customer is not always right. Victor is a fucking idiot who should have been slapped after he bitched that things came up too quickly.

2014-04-08 Reply Admin

faoileag:
Customers are NOT always right:
faoileag:
...my long rant...

Oh, gosh, where to start! A customer getting NEW hardware and complaining about the improved speed is definitely a CUSTOMER problem! Victor needs to move on to retirement if his small brain can't even READ machine specs -- which CLEARLY indicate it is faster than the old hardware.

So, you would handle it like:

Victor: The forms are opening to fast! Customers are NOT always right: You've got new hardware. What do you expect? Victor: That you stick to the contract and change nothing! Customers are NOT always right: This is a ridiculous requirement. You take it as it is, or leave it.

Alternative 1: Victor: This is the last time your company will have been contracted by us. As for fulfilment of the current contract, our legal department will determine whether the requirements have been met.

Alternative 2: Victor: Your boss, my brother-in-law, has promised me that nothing would change. I will meet him this evening and we will discuss why you can't deliver on that promise.

The customer is always right as long as he ist paying for it.

NOPE. There is no way in hell that any court would find this situation as not fulfilling the requirements.

2014-04-08 Reply Admin

faoileag:
faoileag:
The customer is always right as long as he ist paying for it.
I just remebered a story I once heard about staff cars for civil servants.
The lowest rank meriting a staff car did not also merit an air conditioning system, while the rank above that did.

At one point air conditioning became standard for the chosen model from the chosen manufacturer, instead of an extra.

What to do? The lowest rank didn't merit an air conditioning system, but the model came with it... now the two ranks wouldn't be distinguishable by the assigned staff cars!

In the end the manufacturer was paid for removing the air condition from the staff cars for the lower rank.

Yeah, I know it sounds like an urban myth - I'm still trying to find traces on the web.

Any company that would be so idiotic as to do that is one that hopefully will fail miserably after they can't recruit talent.

snoofle · 2014-04-08 Reply Admin

s73v3r:
faoileag:
Customers are NOT always right:
faoileag:
...my long rant...

Oh, gosh, where to start! A customer getting NEW hardware and complaining about the improved speed is definitely a CUSTOMER problem! Victor needs to move on to retirement if his small brain can't even READ machine specs -- which CLEARLY indicate it is faster than the old hardware.

So, you would handle it like:

Victor: The forms are opening to fast! Customers are NOT always right: You've got new hardware. What do you expect? Victor: That you stick to the contract and change nothing! Customers are NOT always right: This is a ridiculous requirement. You take it as it is, or leave it.

Alternative 1: Victor: This is the last time your company will have been contracted by us. As for fulfilment of the current contract, our legal department will determine whether the requirements have been met.

Alternative 2: Victor: Your boss, my brother-in-law, has promised me that nothing would change. I will meet him this evening and we will discuss why you can't deliver on that promise.

The customer is always right as long as he ist paying for it.

NOPE. There is no way in hell that any court would find this situation as not fulfilling the requirements.

Customers like Victor are a find, and can be profitable if you know how to speak "idiot".

Victor, I ordered you a computer to match the specs of your old one, but it's your lucky day, because the vendor accidentally sent you a Ferrari by mistake; what used to take you 8 hours will now only take you 4 hours, and you can use the free time to do anything you want! I wish stuff like this would happen to me.

If he continues to complain, order the slowest econobox you can find and swap it out for him. Then you get a high powered box for next to nothing. A fool and his money were meant to be parted.

Another option is to make the swap file tiny, and pull all but one ram chip. That'll slow down any box.

chubertdev · 2014-04-08 Reply Admin

"we've switched over to this Java-based system, and now it runs as slow as the old app on our new hardware!"

aapis · 2014-04-08 Reply Admin

faoileag:
KattMan:
faoileag:
The customer is always right as long as he ist paying for it.
You know, I almost feel like you are just trolling here
I'm not.
KattMan:
1. The scenario you present is just ludicris and takes things to an extreme assuming that is the only other way to handle it.
What's wrong with a bit of hyperbole? Actually I think some of Victors "doesn't work" complaints are just embellishments added to create the right setup.
KattMan:
2. In reality, the customer is NEVER right.
That attitude usually gets you out of business as soon as someone comes along who takes the opposite stance.
Believe me, I'm the first to try to talk the customer out of ridiculous ideas (ridiculous to me, at least). Only if that fails (and escalating doesn't help either) am I willing to help the customer paint himself into a corner.

A lot more is possible than makes sense, but if whoever is paying my mortgage (rent, meals, whatever) is insisting on getting a solution that does not make sense, then so be it.

KattMan:
So back to this, the customer has needs, you have to fulfill those needs.
Full Ack. But it is arrogant to assume you know the customer's needs better than the customer himself. As I said, argue with him, bring in your expertise, but a simple "I won't fulfil those requirements of yours because they are ridiculuous and stupid" is arrogant, bossy and, unless you know the customer's problem domain extremely well, dangerous to your business.

But in this scenario they told you what they want you to do, you did it their way, and they complained anyways. This is known as a "no-win scenario", to borrow a phrase from Star Trek.

herby · 2014-04-08 Reply Admin

If a customer says "That you stick to the contract and change nothing!" I would suggest that you give them back their old hardware/software.

Sorry, an upgrade IS a change. Like it or not!

2014-04-08 Reply Admin

DonRobo:
bluesman:
A 4-week stretch of 60-hour work weeks is supposed to impress me? Man, that's almost like a holiday.
Oh man, you really must suck at your job.

Big time!

Coyne · 2014-04-08 Reply Admin

Tux "Tuxedo" Penguin:
Coyne:
We have host applications like this: Where the user knows every broken keystroke needed to use the broken application; and we can't improve anything because they would have to learn a new keystroking pattern.

Then maybe get programmer who can write better application, but one that uses same keystrokes?

Captcha: saluto (to you)

Sure. So long as the programmer can write the keystrokes to correctly emulate the existing bugs.

2014-04-08 Reply Admin

snoofle:
If he continues to complain, order the slowest econobox you can find and swap it out for him. Then you get a high powered box for next to nothing. A fool and his money were meant to be parted.
Another option is to make the swap file tiny, and pull all but one ram chip. That'll slow down any box.

You're on the right (BOFH) track. You should also be underclocking the CPU. Then, you charge hefty amounts for incremental upgrades to keep the application running as slowly as it had been as additional load on the system increases.

Or, put the old hardware in the new box and pocket the new hardware.

captcha: letatio - felatio from a French woman

2014-04-08 Reply Admin

My grandfather had this happen. He worked for Westinghouse as an electrical engineer. Most of the time he took mileage as opposed to a company car as one less car in the driveway and he could basically buy a new car every 2.5 - 3 years with the reimbursement. Well one year in the early 70's he chose the company car for the sole reason it was one of the first general motors cars to come with AC standard on every unit. Well after he got the car he found out they had ordered custom build units sans air conditioning. He turned it in about a year later and went back to mileage reimbursement.

Jochen · 2014-04-09 Reply Admin

faoileag:
Ok, let's see. Client which is not exactly tech savvy needs an upgrade and goes to a full service provider. Now, that is exactly what a full service provider is for and yes, you work to the specifications from the client. You can try to weed out the more ridiculous requests during the negotiating phase, but if you don't succeed you will have to fulfill them. That is, somehow, your business model.
If the customer complains that his forms pop up too fast after upgrading to new hardware, you can make them pop up slower, or you can argue with the customer. If the latter happens on a regular basis, perhaps you should consider moving into another field of the industry.

As for the resulting chaos after the lotus install had been finally upgraded: entirely Danny's fault. Yes, information sharing should be a push process and not a pull process, but in an environment as weird as Victor's shop, Danny should have covered his bases nevertheless. It's his company's business to make the transition work, so it's his company's businees to make sure they have all the relevant information.

Again: if you don't like that move into another field. Customer centric work usually involves working with difficult customers. There are people who strive on that and take pride in making difficult customers happy. You need that kind of attitude, otherwise a job one step removed from customers is usually better.

He did ask them. He planned a meeting and asked if everything was in order for the upgrade.

“Well, I just want to make sure we’re being extra safe,” Danny said. “So, you guys are happy with the test environment we set up? Everything works- custom databases, templates and views?”
“Yes,” the first developer said.

“So there were no problems?”

“Yes,” the second developer said. “There were no problems.”

“So you all agree that I should start the uprgade after business hours today?”

“Yes,” the developers said.

Seems to me the developers tend to forget important information.

2014-04-09 Reply Admin

ratchet freak:
TRWTF is Danny not calling a meeting and changing the "exactly" requirement to "as is now with possible improved performance and different layout and hardware"

He couldn't. That meeting wasn't in the plan

2014-04-09 Reply Admin

EuroGuy:
Why would they upgrade if everything was supposed to stay the same?

Are you sure you know what site you're reading?

This isn't the Disney critics channel.

2014-04-09 Reply Admin

Coyne:
We have host applications like this: Where the user knows every broken keystroke needed to use the broken application; and we can't improve anything because they would have to learn a new keystroking pattern.

Tell me about it.

I just tried to re-purpose one key from a seldom-used function to an often used function which doesn't have a keypress at the moment - improve everybody's lives.

Everyone agrees it's a good idea, but noooooo, one of the customers has "got used to" the old keypress (and couldn't possibly learn a new one even though he hardly ever uses it and the new key for his function is displayed in three separate places).

Medinoc · 2014-04-09 Reply Admin

n_slash_a:
faoileag:
<cut quotes>
So, you would handle it like:

Victor: The forms are opening to fast! Customers are NOT always right: You've got new hardware. What do you expect? Victor: That you stick to the contract and change nothing! Customers are NOT always right: This is a ridiculous requirement. You take it as it is, or leave it.

Alternative 1: Victor: This is the last time your company will have been contracted by us. As for fulfilment of the current contract, our legal department will determine whether the requirements have been met.

Alternative 2: Victor: Your boss, my brother-in-law, has promised me that nothing would change. I will meet him this evening and we will discuss why you can't deliver on that promise.

The customer is always right as long as he ist paying for it.
The answer is simple, add a requirement (you do have requirements right?) that there will be a x-second pause before opening either that window or all windows to conform to the performance of older hardware. Then add a (hopefully intelligent) pause function to your code, again documenting why. Everyone is happy!

Same for font, ask him what font to use and then make it a requirement. You can document that the customer wanted a deviation from the plan, that since the plan didn't specify a font change, and the old program used the default font (and the default font changed), that using a now custom font is outside the scope of the plan.

This is incompatible with Victor's "no software changes" requirement.

2014-04-09 Reply Admin

If customer is ALWAYS right, then how come if you go to your bank and demand that they give you all their money you probably end up in jail?

2014-04-09 Reply Admin

bluesman:
A 4-week stretch of 60-hour work weeks is supposed to impress me? Man, that's almost like a holiday.

Then, you're doing it wrong.

That's lost revenue for your employer. Whether you get paid or not.

The contract wasn't priced right. And you have a productivity problem. Burnout leads to mistakes. I'd hate to see your code.

HardwareGeek · 2014-04-09 Reply Admin

s73v3r:
faoileag:
I just remebered a story I once heard about staff cars for civil servants.
Any company that would be so idiotic as to do that is one that hopefully will fail miserably after they can't recruit talent.

Civil servant == government, not company. Success or failure is irrelevant. The workers don't care because it is almost impossible to fire them, and the people have come to expect failure from their government.

chubertdev · 2014-04-09 Reply Admin

Jibble:
Coyne:
We have host applications like this: Where the user knows every broken keystroke needed to use the broken application; and we can't improve anything because they would have to learn a new keystroking pattern.

Tell me about it.

I just tried to re-purpose one key from a seldom-used function to an often used function which doesn't have a keypress at the moment - improve everybody's lives.

Everyone agrees it's a good idea, but noooooo, one of the customers has "got used to" the old keypress (and couldn't possibly learn a new one even though he hardly ever uses it and the new key for his function is displayed in three separate places).

Easy, make the purpose of the key user-specific. Nothing too fancy, such as a custom setup, just have it use the common function for everyone except that one user.

2014-04-09 Reply Admin

faoileag:
Customers are NOT always right:
faoileag:
...my long rant...

Oh, gosh, where to start! A customer getting NEW hardware and complaining about the improved speed is definitely a CUSTOMER problem! Victor needs to move on to retirement if his small brain can't even READ machine specs -- which CLEARLY indicate it is faster than the old hardware.

So, you would handle it like:

Victor: The forms are opening to fast! Customers are NOT always right: You've got new hardware. What do you expect? Victor: That you stick to the contract and change nothing! Customers are NOT always right: This is a ridiculous requirement. You take it as it is, or leave it.

Alternative 1: Victor: This is the last time your company will have been contracted by us. As for fulfilment of the current contract, our legal department will determine whether the requirements have been met.

Alternative 2: Victor: Your boss, my brother-in-law, has promised me that nothing would change. I will meet him this evening and we will discuss why you can't deliver on that promise.

The customer is always right as long as he ist paying for it.

Been in the service industry - both in computers and elsewhere - for over 40 years. the customer is NOT always right. You have to treat the customer as if they are right. However, if the demanding person on the customer side is giving conflicting messages ( new hardware versus it should work same as before ) you need to sort this out, not just say "yes sir". That is why it is called account management.

2014-04-09 Reply Admin

Valued Service:
bluesman:
A 4-week stretch of 60-hour work weeks is supposed to impress me? Man, that's almost like a holiday.

Then, you're doing it wrong.

That's lost revenue for your employer. Whether you get paid or not.

The contract wasn't priced right. And you have a productivity problem. Burnout leads to mistakes. I'd hate to see your code.

Hmmm, Irony is probably not my strong point since nobody gets it.

Anyway, I'm my own boss and I can tell you: owning a small company is hard work. Not only coding but all that comes with it. More than 40 h/w that's for sure.

As for the quality of my work, well I'm probably not the best programmer in the world, but I've got a lot of experience and many happy customers.

chubertdev · 2014-04-09 Reply Admin

bluesman:
Valued Service:
bluesman:
A 4-week stretch of 60-hour work weeks is supposed to impress me? Man, that's almost like a holiday.

Then, you're doing it wrong.

That's lost revenue for your employer. Whether you get paid or not.

The contract wasn't priced right. And you have a productivity problem. Burnout leads to mistakes. I'd hate to see your code.

Hmmm, Irony is probably not my strong point since nobody gets it.

Anyway, I'm my own boss and I can tell you: owning a small company is hard work. Not only coding but all that comes with it. More than 40 h/w that's for sure.

As for the quality of my work, well I'm probably not the best programmer in the world, but I've got a lot of experience and many happy customers.

sounds like you need to improve at hiring good help, and delegating, then.

2014-04-09 Reply Admin

faoileag:
faoileag:
The customer is always right as long as he ist paying for it.
I just remebered a story I once heard about staff cars for civil servants. The lowest rank meriting a staff car did not also merit an air conditioning system, while the rank above that did.

Perfectly normal for the civil service.

Some I've encountered:

Only managers are allowed a window in their office. If a pleb uses that office, the window is boarded. On the other hand if the office happens to be in the basement, then a window is installed. No view, but hey, a window.

Same applies for doors, they're for managers only.

A manager & a pleb are to share an office. Only managers can have carpeted floors, so the carpet is ripped up on the plebs side.

These stories are endless...

2014-04-09 Reply Admin

Coyne:
We have host applications like this: Where the user knows every broken keystroke needed to use the broken application; and we can't improve anything because they would have to learn a new keystroking pattern.

Relevant XKCD: https://xkcd.com/1172/

2014-04-10 Reply Admin

Man, this was great to read. :D I am probably to young to have ever seriously worked with Lotus and more of, have an opinion about it, but the entire process and the Victor guy... Had one of those before... :D

2014-04-15 Reply Admin

I disagree to pandering to a) unrealistic requests (eg pop ups are too fast) b) non-IT dictated project plans - especially those not reviewed and agreed upon.

We have too many tasks to complete in an efficient and risk-adverse fashion to waste time and effort on immaterial requirements such as different icon locations on a desktop.

The time and effort that went into that should have gone into project and change management. Thus the 'changes' to the test system could have been identified and migrated to production.

2014-04-21 Reply Admin

I had two clients like this last year. On several phone calls I had other people listening in whose jaws stayed on the floor.

We did absolutely everything possible and yet they were never happy. I was glad the day they fired us.

Nursing the Plan Along

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