• Iggy (unregistered)

    i know the correct content of the working script:

    do some incredible stuff > /dev/null 2>&1 #suprress any errors echo "successfully finished"

    see, script is working without errors

  • Zathras (unregistered)

    He should've modified the script so that it said "Failed" upon completion.

  • (cs)

    The TWTF is that Jeremy didn't crack open Ross's script prior to testing at the customers site. Instead he just blindly assumed that what Ross had given him was correct.

  • Miriam (unregistered)

    TRWTF is Scriptzilla!

    Nice story, though.

  • Anonymous (unregistered)

    On Error Resume Next Do Post Comment Frist Until Exist Comment Frist

  • Mark (unregistered)

    The real WTF here is the code running through the godzilla image in the layout...

  • faoileag (unregistered)

    Long Story short:

    Boss provides script. Script barely works. Jeremy tells Boss script has issues. Boss tells Jeremy not to rewrite from scratch but to modify existing script. Jeremy rewrites from scratch. Jeremy's than short-circuits boss' script with rewrite.

    This is taking as much licence out of "modify" as is humanly possible.

    Let's just hope for Jeremy that his rewrite doesn't break anything. "You acted against my direct order" can easily mean Jeremy is forced to look for other employment opportunities.

    Something he should perhaps do anyway, but still.

  • facilisi (unregistered) in reply to faoileag
    faoileag:
    Let's just hope for Jeremy that his rewrite doesn't break anything. "You acted against my direct order" can easily mean Jeremy is forced to look for other employment opportunities.
    It's OK, he just has to make sure his version of the script prints "successful" at the end.
  • gleemonk (unregistered)

    This comment would be longer but one of my interns rewrote it for conciseness.

    Success.

  • Smug Unix User (unregistered)

    Making intermittent script work does his boss a disservice. Allowing others to fail gives them valuable experience. From a risk management stand point changing a script against a direct order increases his liability.

  • Ziplodocus (unregistered)

    If the script was as broken as it sounds, I'm not sure the difference between modifying and re writing...

  • (cs) in reply to Iggy
    Iggy:
    i know the correct content of the working script:

    do some incredible stuff > /dev/null 2>&1 echo "successfully finished"

    see, script is working without errors

    FTFY

    Programmers of Ross' caliber are above the need for comments.

  • Miriam (unregistered) in reply to Mark
    Mark:
    The real WTF here is the code running through the godzilla image in the layout...
    That's not a WTF. That's widescreen/fullscreen-optimized layouting.
  • faoileag (unregistered) in reply to Miriam
    Miriam:
    Mark:
    The real WTF here is the code running through the godzilla image in the layout...
    That's not a WTF. That's widescreen/fullscreen-optimized layouting.
    Widescreen/fullscreen-optimized layouting is TRWTF.
  • Snowman25 (unregistered) in reply to Anonymous
    Anonymous:
    On Error Resume Next Do Post Comment Frist Until Exist Comment Frist
    VisualBasic is slow that you came in 5th.
  • Hi there! (unregistered) in reply to Smug Unix User
    Smug Unix User:
    Making intermittent script work does his boss a disservice. Allowing others to fail gives them valuable experience. From a risk management stand point changing a script against a direct order increases his liability.

    You are assuming the boss is allowed to fail...and are assuming the end customers are allowed to have problems...

  • Chris P. Peterson (unregistered)

    Idiot 1: It says "successfully finished" so it works. Idiot 2: Dude, it compiles so it has to work.

    I'm betting Idiot 1 and Idiot 2 are the same person.

  • (cs) in reply to faoileag
    faoileag:
    Miriam:
    Mark:
    The real WTF here is the code running through the godzilla image in the layout...
    That's not a WTF. That's widescreen/fullscreen-optimized layouting.
    Widescreen/fullscreen-optimized layouting is TRWTF.

    "layouting". yeah, that's the ticket.

    http://postimg.org/image/5ci738zqh/

    this is responsive design of the WTF variety.

  • Dale (unregistered)
    “It printed ‘successful’! It wouldn’t have done that if it didn’t work!”

    Oddly, my boss never take's my code's word for it.

  • neminem (unregistered) in reply to Smug Unix User
    Smug Unix User:
    Making intermittent script work does his boss a disservice. Allowing others to fail gives them valuable experience. From a risk management stand point changing a script against a direct order increases his liability.
    From a "keeping your job" standpoint, do you think a boss that reality-challenged would accept "yeah, I messed up, I'll fix it now" when clients start yelling that his script is taking 3 weeks to run, after which everything is broken because ids aren't unique? Or do you think he would have blamed it on his employees and fired them anyway?

    If I had to choose, I would definitely prefer to be fired for doing a good job, than for failing to fix somebody else's bad job and getting blamed for it. At least that way, in the meantime, I'm not inflicting my own pain on all my clients as well.

  • Versus (unregistered)

    The TL;DR:

    "A man wrote a crappy script. Another man fixed the script and ran it successfully. The end."

  • (cs) in reply to Versus
    Versus:
    The TL;DR:

    "A man wrote a crappy script. Another man fixed the script and ran it successfully. The end."

    "A man wrote a crappy script. Brown-nose pretended to fix the script but instead bypassed it and ran his own version himself, believing his crap was better. The end."

  • (cs)

    Reminds me of a "security through obscurity" hack I did long long ago (in an operating system far away...).
    The setting: a multi-user Unix system.

    I had a text file I wanted to keep safe from prying eyes, so I gave it the name "calc_resids.o" and threw 50 lines of some random object file binary code at the top and bottom of my file. That way, even if some snoop decided to peek at what was obviously :-) a compiled hunk of code, running 'head' or 'tail' wouldn't give the game away.

    I'm sure nobody noticed or cared.

  • Anachronda (unregistered) in reply to faoileag
    faoileag:
    Long Story short: This is taking as much licence out of "modify" as is humanly possible.

    Happens all the time. When I was going to college, the school could get funding for renovations but not for building new buildings. So they would "renovate" an old one by knocking down all but one wall, and building a new building around it.

  • foo AKA fooo (unregistered)

    Frist!

    See, it says frist! It wouldn't have done that it if wasn't frist!

  • (cs)

    This is when you insist that your oh-so-confident boss put in writing that you shall use his script, and that he is the sole author.

  • foo AKA fooo (unregistered) in reply to cellocgw
    cellocgw:
    Reminds me of a "security through obscurity" hack I did long long ago (in an operating system far away...). The setting: a multi-user Unix system.

    I had a text file I wanted to keep safe from prying eyes, so I gave it the name "calc_resids.o" and threw 50 lines of some random object file binary code at the top and bottom of my file. That way, even if some snoop decided to peek at what was obviously :-) a compiled hunk of code, running 'head' or 'tail' wouldn't give the game away.

    I'm sure nobody noticed or cared.

    You think they couldn't make heads or tails of your obfuscation?

  • (cs) 
    IF(1=0)
BEGIN
   -- Ross' code
END
ELSE
BEGIN
   -- Jeremy's code
END
  • (cs)

    ok, similar WTF.

    We had a schema change that required data to be migrated, so wrote a script for it. Customers take upgrades on their own schedule, so it falls on our support team to run the migration script ahead of each customer's upgrade. After one such upgrade had been completed...

    Support: I upgraded and all the forum posts are gone! Me: Sounds like you forgot to run the migration script? Support: No, I ran it! Me: Sounds like it broke. Did you get any errors? Support: No, it ran without errors. Me: Ok, this is a head scratcher. Is there any chance you kept a log of the console output you did get? Support: here you go:

    c:\foo>migrate.exe
USAGE: migrate.exe customerId [--minDate=date --maxDate=date]
 customerId: (Required) The ID for the customer who needs to be migrated
 --minDate: 
 --maxDate: (Optional) specify a certain date range to run over.  By default all dates are covered.

    Fix: add the word "ERROR" before the word "USAGE"

  • Yuri (unregistered) in reply to cellocgw
    cellocgw:
    Reminds me of a "security through obscurity" hack I did long long ago (in an operating system far away...). The setting: a multi-user Unix system.

    I had a text file I wanted to keep safe from prying eyes, so I gave it the name "calc_resids.o" and threw 50 lines of some random object file binary code at the top and bottom of my file. That way, even if some snoop decided to peek at what was obviously :-) a compiled hunk of code, running 'head' or 'tail' wouldn't give the game away.

    I'm sure nobody noticed or cared.

    Dunno if that solves problems, because thick people just use cat and might catch someting intresting and you risk less thick people doing a strings on it, seeing that there's interesting stuff there and then digging deeper

  • hanke (unregistered) in reply to Yuri
    Yuri:
    cellocgw:
    Reminds me of a "security through obscurity" hack I did long long ago (in an operating system far away...). The setting: a multi-user Unix system.

    I had a text file I wanted to keep safe from prying eyes, so I gave it the name "calc_resids.o" and threw 50 lines of some random object file binary code at the top and bottom of my file. That way, even if some snoop decided to peek at what was obviously :-) a compiled hunk of code, running 'head' or 'tail' wouldn't give the game away.

    I'm sure nobody noticed or cared.

    Dunno if that solves problems, because thick people just use cat and might catch someting intresting and you risk less thick people doing a strings on it, seeing that there's interesting stuff there and then digging deeper
    and strings will still give them garbage to sort through - they'd have to watch carefully to seenything interesting....

  • Funkadelic (unregistered)

    As so often, TRWTF is why the article doesn't mention the point where he decided that he wasn't going to work for this jerk anymore and start looking for a new job.

    Unless of course he'd spent years working for him and this is all he knew which is of course a major WTF on his part if that's the case.

  • Doctor_of_Ineptitude (unregistered) in reply to Funkadelic
    Funkadelic:
    As so often, TRWTF is why the article doesn't mention the point where he decided that he wasn't going to work for this jerk anymore and start looking for a new job.

    Unless of course he'd spent years working for him and this is all he knew which is of course a major WTF on his part if that's the case.

    To be fair, the article never states that the boss was a jerk. It merely states that he is incompetent. From the story though, it seems he knows it and is not a jerk about it. Maybe he is a good boss to work for, and the company pays enough and has enough benefits to not contemplating leaving.

  • (cs) in reply to foo AKA fooo
    foo AKA fooo:
    You think they couldn't make heads or tails of your obfuscation?
    +1
  • Dirk (unregistered) in reply to Matt Westwood
    Matt Westwood:
    Versus:
    The TL;DR:

    "A man wrote a crappy script. Another man fixed the script and ran it successfully. The end."

    "A man wrote a crappy script. Brown-nose pretended to fix the script but instead bypassed it and ran his own version himself, believing his crap was better. The end."

    I'm willing to bet you've been at your job for more than 5 years and all the tallent is long since gone!

  • (cs)

    "Nothing's wrong with it! Dude, it prints successful."

  • Worf (unregistered)

    Hrm. Successful has 10 letters in it. You could use it as a progress indicator!

    at 10%, you print S, 20% u, 30% c, 40% another c, ...

    then at the end you print l and you have Successful!

  • Reductio Ad Ridiculousum (unregistered) in reply to Worf
    Worf:
    Hrm. Successful has 10 letters in it. You could use it as a progress indicator!

    at 10%, you print S, 20% u, 30% c, 40% another c, ...

    then at the end you print l and you have Successful!

    If at first you don't succeed, keep on sucking 'til you do suck seed.

  • . (unregistered) in reply to cellocgw

    That kind of hiding works as long as no one searches.

    head calc_resids.o -n51

    tail calc_resids.o -n51

    strings calc_resids.o

    grep -inR ./ -e "zoophil"

  • np (unregistered) in reply to cellocgw
    cellocgw:
    Reminds me of a "security through obscurity" hack I did long long ago (in an operating system far away...). The setting: a multi-user Unix system.

    I had a text file I wanted to keep safe from prying eyes, so I gave it the name "calc_resids.o" and threw 50 lines of some random object file binary code at the top and bottom of my file. That way, even if some snoop decided to peek at what was obviously :-) a compiled hunk of code, running 'head' or 'tail' wouldn't give the game away.

    I'm sure nobody noticed or cared.

    Probably no one cared. But just for another layer of false security, you could do a rot13 on it. Or just pipe the data through gzip. With a simple script you can encode/decode it easily.

    Instead, I just put everything in my public_html with +r, so I could access it via the webs. Even google indexed it at some point. But I still doubt anyone even noticed it...

  • Walking by (unregistered)

    The real WTF is "fixing" scripts like that. Jeremy is an employee, and he is expected to follow Ross's orders. Now Jeremy did all the work but Ross is credited for it. If anything goes wrong however, Jeremy will be blamed for it and fired. Isn't it better to do what is expected and run Ross's script? This would expose Ross's incompetence to everyone, and ultimate Jeremy would be tasked with writing a new script - this time "legally" and with everyone knowing it was Jeremy. Jeremy would be recognized as a competent person, eventually probably getting a raise etc. Don't cover your bosses' asses, guys. Let them fail.

  • Essex Kitten (unregistered) in reply to Reductio Ad Ridiculousum
    Reductio Ad Ridiculousum:
    Worf:
    Hrm. Successful has 10 letters in it. You could use it as a progress indicator!

    at 10%, you print S, 20% u, 30% c, 40% another c, ...

    then at the end you print l and you have Successful!

    If at first you don't succeed, keep on sucking 'til you do suck seed.

    Or until you suck Sid, if you're speaking in an Eastern European, Latin, or Slavic accent :)

  • Essex Kitten (unregistered) in reply to Walking by

    user="Walking by"]The real WTF is "fixing" scripts like that. Jeremy is an employee, and he is expected to follow Ross's orders. Now Jeremy did all the work but Ross is credited for it. If anything goes wrong however, Jeremy will be blamed for it and fired. Isn't it better to do what is expected and run Ross's script? This would expose Ross's incompetence to everyone, and ultimate Jeremy would be tasked with writing a new script - this time "legally" and with everyone knowing it was Jeremy. Jeremy would be recognized as a competent person, eventually probably getting a raise etc. Don't cover your bosses' asses, guys. Let them fail.[/quote]

    Don't do that if it's obvious it would put the company on litigation row unless your boss gives you the order in writing. CYA works both ways. If you've informed your boss unequivocally that the software is going to bring the world economy down to its knees and he still insists on running it, present him with a form that describes your concerns and a field at the bottom where he is to write "Just fucking do it!" then date and sign it in triplicate (a copy for you, a copy for him, a copy his boss, HR, or the share holders).

  • Smithg642 (unregistered) in reply to Iggy

    I am so grateful for your blog article.Really thank you! Fantastic. ddeddcdeeegdbbfe

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