• (cs)

    Unless Darrell's stocks were primarily in cosmetics companies, I think you mean Rogue Trader.

    Fixed! -ed.

  • LordOfThePigs (unregistered)

    And the sad conclusion is: If you want a good pay, try to look nice.

  • John Noble (unregistered)

    How could they see his activity by simply turning on the monitor?

    RDP locks the screen at the console - you don't get to see it.

    You telling me this company used VNC or Dameware? And had a security policy so lax that it allowed a workstation to be logged on at the console even though the user was at home?

    Nah.

  • corey (unregistered)

    Maybe he should use some of that $7,000 to take some English lessons to learn how to spell Exception. Or maybe he spent it already to get a custom compiler where writing the "new" keyword when instantiating exceptions is optional.

  • (cs) in reply to corey
    corey:
    Maybe he should use some of that $7,000 to take some English lessons to learn how to spell Exception. Or maybe he spent it already to get a custom compiler where writing the "new" keyword when instantiating exceptions is optional.

    Alternatively...

    protected Exception CustomerNotFoundException() {
   return new CustomerNotFoundException("Gotcha");
}
  • (cs)

    So they used a source control system that requires checking out? This is 2008, folks.

  • (cs) in reply to John Noble
    John Noble:
    How could they see his activity by simply turning on the monitor?

    RDP locks the screen at the console - you don't get to see it.

    You telling me this company used VNC or Dameware? And had a security policy so lax that it allowed a workstation to be logged on at the console even though the user was at home?

    Nah.

    It's not that big a WTF if they're in a secure area. Somewhat lame, but not vastly so. Of course, it's possible that Darrell also couldn't cope with anything that's actually locked down properly. (And we wouldn't have the ultimate WTF if had been done right; that was a fun end to the story.)

  • Oleg (unregistered)

    This story feels like a product of somebody's imagination. Why would a guy need to remotely connect to some computer that apparently is accessible by anybody to do stock trading? WTF indeed.

  • (cs) in reply to gabba
    gabba:
    So they used a source control system that requires checking out? This is 2008, folks.
    Some people seem to insist on such things. You try to tell them they're being stupid, but they just insist that it is utterly horrible that someone might possibly change something on which they are working and go into panic mode. If they happen to be managers, you're stuck. If you're not deeply experienced yourself, you might even put up with such stuff rather than taking it as a good sign to get that resumé out again...
  • Haha (unregistered) in reply to gabba
    gabba:
    So they used a source control system that requires checking out? This is 2008, folks.

    cvs and svn require "checking out" - wtf do you think cvs co/svn co stand for.

    now what you're trying to blabber on about is the fact that he locked the files after checking them out

  • AVF (unregistered)

    A much more useful change to the code would have been to correct the type in "Excepetion".

  • SomeCoder (unregistered) in reply to gabba
    gabba:
    So they used a source control system that requires checking out? This is 2008, folks.

    I'd agree but every Microsoft-technology-based company I've ever worked for used SourceSafe. So it's probably a safe bet that if they were using C#/.NET, they probably were using SourceSafe for better or for (mostly) worse.

  • AVF (unregistered) in reply to AVF

    I can't believe I just made a typo in the word "typo".

  • (cs) in reply to LordOfThePigs
    LordOfThePigs:
    And the sad conclusion is: If you want a good pay, try to look nice.

    Not especially.

    Look reasonable. You don't have to look like a model.

    My current day job as a senior software engineer for a managed care provider, I interviewed in a simple black button-up shirt, khakis and black Oxfords. No tie. Nailed it, and I'm in the 80th percentile for my role according to the most recent IEEE salary data. Oh, and I might mention, I barely have an AAS, no BS or MS here.

    More important than looking like an expensive douchebag is to simply know your stuff without being an arrogant prick -- or at least, minimize the prickishness. Be confident, be easygoing.

  • (cs)
    Darrell was different than the other developers

    it's different FROM (aaarggh... pet hate... could not help self..)

  • Man 987876980 (unregistered) in reply to SomeCoder
    SomeCoder:
    gabba:
    So they used a source control system that requires checking out? This is 2008, folks.

    I'd agree but every Microsoft-technology-based company I've ever worked for used SourceSafe. So it's probably a safe bet that if they were using C#/.NET, they probably were using SourceSafe for better or for (mostly) worse.

    Remember that the well-respected Perforce source control software works in a similar way.

  • Brady Kelly (unregistered)

    "remoting in to an on-site workstation -- a perk which none of the other contractors received."

    Since when is slogging through Remote Dekstop or VNC a perk? Now, connection to the VPN and working on a workstation at home could be considered a perk.

  • Leo (unregistered)

    I'd take Sourcesafe any day, with its checkout and locking and everything else, over ClearCase, which is what they use at my current job.

  • Brian (unregistered)

    Minus points for not being able to spell "Exception"

  • Mister Bee (unregistered)

    I call "Shenanigans!" on this one.

    I'll forgive the badly spelled code examples (which reeks of "being-made-up"), but not the trading bit, why trade over a connection when you can merely trade using the PC you're already on? Makes no sense to me.

    If people are going to insist on making up stories, at least have the protagonist doing something a bit more interesting, like booking a hooker via punternet.com or cybering some random 18/f/California via ICQ...

    catchpa: quis

  • (cs) in reply to Man 987876980
    Man 987876980:
    SomeCoder:
    gabba:
    So they used a source control system that requires checking out? This is 2008, folks.

    I'd agree but every Microsoft-technology-based company I've ever worked for used SourceSafe. So it's probably a safe bet that if they were using C#/.NET, they probably were using SourceSafe for better or for (mostly) worse.

    Remember that the well-respected Perforce source control software works in a similar way.

    Ummm ... no it doesn't.

    The interesting thing about Visual SourceSafe, of course, is that it should never have entered the real world at all -- it was just an in-house hack. I believe that Microsoft themselves have now banned the stupid thing, which just leaves an awful lot of WTF companies out there looking even more stupid.

  • Neil (unregistered) in reply to LordOfThePigs

    Knew a guy just like this. Acted like an all-knowing authority on anything and everything, but secretly knew nothing.

    When doing a code review with a colleague (who coded in Pascal/Delphi), Mr X proclaimed that the code was terrible and that it wasnt going to be a good review. When asked by my colleague to elaborate, he was told "I dont know why its bad - I dont understand Delphi, I'm a Java programmer".

  • (cs) in reply to A Nonny Mouse
    A Nonny Mouse:
    Darrell was different than the other developers

    it's different FROM (aaarggh... pet hate... could not help self..)

    "Different than" is harmless. Save your grammar hate for "different to". Ugh.

  • (cs)

    The real WTF is that Darrell was using the internet on his office machine remotely, rather than locally on his own machine.

  • Mike Dimmick (unregistered) in reply to gabba

    Some developers just aren't comfortable with merging (and if you use SourceUnSafe, it's no surprise, since that tool does automatic-merge-on-checkin and there's no other way to do an automatic merge).

    We use SourceGear's Vault. Whether you need to check out or not, whether files retrieved by 'Get' are writeable, whether checking out is exclusive or not, and whether auto-committing of add/move/delete operations is enabled, are all separately configurable. There are also two big buttons on the 'Concurrent Development Style' page of the Options tab that read:

    • Check Out/Edit/Check In (VSS Style)
    • Edit/Merge/Commit (CVS Style)

    VSS Style is the default, as Vault tries to be an easy upgrade from VSS. I'm happy with merging so I hit the CVS Style button. It only causes problems when another developer using VSS Style has made an exclusive checkout, so I have to ask them to check in before I do (and I have to merge my changes with theirs). If I could check in when they had the file checked out they'd then have to merge my changes which is what they're trying to avoid.

    Our company generally has only one or two developers working on the same codebase - typically only one developer on a project, as we're a contract software house - so it's very rare that there are conflicts. In that case Edit/Merge/Commit speeds things up massively.

    Unfortunately older versions of Visual Studio don't really understand Edit/Merge/Commit. VS2005 and 2008 are extensible and Vault 4.x now replaces the built-in source control features with its own, if you have the "Visual Studio Enhanced Client" selected. For older versions I tend to avoid 'integrated source control'.

  • Ozymandias (unregistered) in reply to gabba
    gabba:
    So they used a source control system that requires checking out? This is 2008, folks.

    It is indeed 2008, and cvs/svn are the most common source control systems in the real world.

  • Teh Irish Gril Riot (unregistered)

    VSS? Forgetaboutit.

    TFS!

  • bla (unregistered) in reply to Ozymandias
    Ozymandias:
    gabba:
    So they used a source control system that requires checking out? This is 2008, folks.

    It is indeed 2008, and cvs/svn are the most common source control systems in the real world.

    I think he refers to something like MKS (shudder), where checkout actually locks a member, so that no one else can modify it w/o branching. The equivalent of svn co is called "resynchronize" in MKS.

    P.S.: Did I mention that MKS sucks?

  • (cs) in reply to Ozymandias
    It is indeed 2008, and cvs/svn are the most common source control systems in the real world.

    They might be, but all companies do not live in the real world.

    In ClearCase, checkout means an entirely different thing than in SVN. What SVN calls checking out is "creating a view" here. And so on... I've submitted a story about the WTFiness of this wonderful source control, let's wait and see if it ever gets published.

  • Schnapple (unregistered) in reply to Leo
    Leo:
    I'd take Sourcesafe any day, with its checkout and locking and everything else, over ClearCase, which is what they use at my current job.

    AMEN.

  • (cs) in reply to real_aardvark
    real_aardvark:
    I believe that Microsoft themselves have now banned the stupid thing, which just leaves an awful lot of WTF companies out there looking even more stupid.
    I don't know about banning it, but I'm sure everyone at MS has been using Team Foundation System since about late 2004.
  • ChiefCrazyTalk (unregistered) in reply to joutsa
    joutsa:
    It is indeed 2008, and cvs/svn are the most common source control systems in the real world.

    They might be, but all companies do not live in the real world.

    In ClearCase, checkout means an entirely different thing than in SVN. What SVN calls checking out is "creating a view" here. And so on... I've submitted a story about the WTFiness of this wonderful source control, let's wait and see if it ever gets published.

    Exactly. Some of us work for Microsoft.

  • (cs)

    Look Sharp > C Sharp

  • Anon (unregistered)

    if (null.Equals(customer))

  • joe (unregistered) in reply to SomeCoder

    Oddly enough every MS based technology company I have worked for used Subversion.......

  • (cs)

    Sigh, and just when I was hoping that the overly-paid nicely-dressed consultant would not be the overly-paid nicely-dressed consultant in this story (after reading the first two paragraphs) my disappointment went high. It even looked like he would become the protagonist in the story...

  • Calli Arcale (unregistered) in reply to Schnapple

    I dunno; I've used both Sourcesafe and ClearCase, and I much prefer the latter. That said, ClearCase can be very annoying to use if it has been set up unwisely, which I have certainly seen. It is entirely possible that your animosity towards ClearCase is largely due to a crummy setup and branching strategy. (Of course, Rational's documentation shares significant culpability; many important functions are well documented in a place you'd never look, and they don't really have any real advice for deploying it in an effective manner, making the deployment appear deceptively simple. You really have to have a good strategy in mind before you start using it, which means it puts a significant burden on whoever is administering it and writing your processes.)

  • (cs)

    The real WTF is that the company trusted this guy to the point where they let him work alone right off the bat (off site, yet!) and stopped everyone else from doing anything.

    I don't care how excellent someone's skills are - if they're brand new to the application and the company, they need to communicate with the other developers until everyone gets an idea of what's going on. You don't just give some guy the keys to the kingdom and let him disappear to do whatever he feels like.

    Trust, then verify.

  • (cs)

    "Darrell opened up an IE window ... "

    wtf indeed!

  • (cs) in reply to real_aardvark
    real_aardvark:
    Man 987876980:
    Remember that the well-respected Perforce source control software works in a similar way.
    Ummm ... no it doesn't.

    The interesting thing about Visual SourceSafe, of course, is that it should never have entered the real world at all -- it was just an in-house hack. I believe that Microsoft themselves have now banned the stupid thing, which just leaves an awful lot of WTF companies out there looking even more stupid.

    The more interesting thing about SourceSafe is that it's acquired product, from another company. And while its "database" consists of a horribly obscure set of files, it's easy to (partially or fully) back up and (partially or fully) restore or merge to a different "database". Of course, because it's file based (not server-client), just like every other versioning system until recently, there is no much enforceable fine-grained permission, other than file based security.

    And it's absolutely adequate. Don't get me started about P4 with its horrible "personal workspace" concept. There, sharing a file between projects is such a mess. Any changes in the "workspace" structure have to be explicitly propagated to other users' workspaces. While in VSS, all changes are instantly visible to all clients. And no, you cannot share a single "workspace" spec among clients. P4Win client is such a horrible piece of shit. Fortunately, P4V is reasonable good. Even then, getting a list of labels on a particular project is quite an exercise, while in VSS it's trivial. And try to get project history with labels. In P4, such concept doesn't exist.

  • ChiefCrazyTalk (unregistered) in reply to FredSaw
    FredSaw:
    real_aardvark:
    I believe that Microsoft themselves have now banned the stupid thing, which just leaves an awful lot of WTF companies out there looking even more stupid.
    I don't know about banning it, but I'm sure everyone at MS has been using Team Foundation System since about late 2004.
    Hmm our team at MSFT does not use TFS (yet, will be migrating soon)
  • (cs) in reply to ChiefCrazyTalk
    ChiefCrazyTalk:
    FredSaw:
    real_aardvark:
    I believe that Microsoft themselves have now banned the stupid thing, which just leaves an awful lot of WTF companies out there looking even more stupid.
    I don't know about banning it, but I'm sure everyone at MS has been using Team Foundation System since about late 2004.
    Hmm our team at MSFT does not use TFS (yet, will be migrating soon)

    Still on good ol' SourceDepot? My old team recently moved of SourceDepot, and that hideous build system based of old NTBuild...

  • (cs) in reply to Grovesy

    Anyone comde across Serena Dimmensions?? now that it is a really crappy tool for source control...

  • (cs) in reply to AMerrickanGirl
    AMerrickanGirl:
    The real WTF is that the company trusted this guy to the point where they let him work alone right off the bat (off site, yet!) and stopped everyone else from doing anything.

    I don't care how excellent someone's skills are - if they're brand new to the application and the company, they need to communicate with the other developers until everyone gets an idea of what's going on. You don't just give some guy the keys to the kingdom and let him disappear to do whatever he feels like.

    Trust, then verify.

    You hit the nail on the head. However, I'd rephrase that as:

    Verify, then trust.

  • fountainier (unregistered)
    I'd agree but every Microsoft-technology-based company I've ever worked for used SourceSafe. So it's probably a safe bet that if they were using C#/.NET, they probably were using SourceSafe for better or for (mostly) worse.
    Except Microsoft itself...
  • (cs) in reply to Brady Kelly
    Brady Kelly:
    "remoting in to an on-site workstation -- a perk which none of the other contractors received."

    Since when is slogging through Remote Dekstop or VNC a perk? Now, connection to the VPN and working on a workstation at home could be considered a perk.

    Huh? I've never had any problems using RDP to access my work computer from home. The alternative (opening files over a slow-ass internet connection), having to deal with a different configuration on my home computer, having to make sure that all the software I need is installed on my home computer, is far, far worse. Unless your internet connection is incredibly shitty or you're doing a lot of high-end design work in Photoshop or something, then RDP shouldn't give you any problems.

  • (cs) in reply to fountainier
    fountainier:
    I'd agree but every Microsoft-technology-based company I've ever worked for used SourceSafe. So it's probably a safe bet that if they were using C#/.NET, they probably were using SourceSafe for better or for (mostly) worse.
    Except Microsoft itself...

    I found it used to be the case that every MS-tech-based company used to use VSS (in the late 90's, early 00's).. Though I haven't seen it since around for a while(as a Contractor working for Consultancy firms I can be onto anything up to 3 projects a year.

    I did see it one project last year for a couple of weeks before being replaced with SVN, but that was the first time in 6 years...

  • (cs) in reply to Calli Arcale
    Calli Arcale:
    I dunno; I've used both Sourcesafe and ClearCase, and I much prefer the latter. That said, ClearCase can be very annoying to use if it has been set up unwisely, which I have certainly seen. It is entirely possible that your animosity towards ClearCase is largely due to a crummy setup and branching strategy. (Of course

    I know, half of the pain is because of our setup. However, it should be counted against CC that it enables and even encourages those idiotic setups. Also, no amount of strategy and processes can fix the lack of atomic commits, lack of semi-automatic merge when many people are editing different parts of same file, lack of control over updating dynamic views, network dependency when using dynamic views, breaking when dynamic IP changes, slowness, need for explicit checkouts, etc...

    BTW, I have used SourceSafe too and I believe it is by far the worst version control in existence.

  • (cs) in reply to Zylon
    Zylon:
    A Nonny Mouse:
    Darrell was different than the other developers

    it's different FROM (aaarggh... pet hate... could not help self..)

    "Different than" is harmless. Save your grammar hate for "different to". Ugh.

    Err, no. You can't be "more different" than something. But you can be different to something, or from it.

    Anyway, leave me to my grammar hate, sometimes it's all I have going on in my day :)

  • Andrew (unregistered) in reply to A Nonny Mouse
    A Nonny Mouse:
    Darrell was different than the other developers

    it's different FROM (aaarggh... pet hate... could not help self..)

    British Commonweath countries use different to. So, there's really not much standardisation.

    CAPTCA: dolor, as in pain in the ass English!

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