• (nodebb)

    So in addition to true, false, and file used to exist, we have another enum: success and success message.

  • my name (unregistered)

    if($first) { echo "first"; } else { //echo "dammit"; echo "first"; }

  • Industrial Automation Engineer (unregistered)

    Frist! Success!

  • Grumpy Old Fart (unregistered)

    This is the result of having a developer handed this support ticket five minutes before 5 PM on Friday afternoon.

  • Hal (unregistered)

    Its all about perceptions right. Nobody wants to use something that always looks like its failing. So just fail but quietly.

  • Anon E. Mouse (unregistered)

    TRFTW is that the IF...ELSE is un-necessary, just replace it by the single line...

  • Anon E. Mouse (unregistered) in reply to Grumpy Old Fart

    Actually we can't remember what the ticket said, that was three ticketing systems ago and we decided not to bring over old tickets as most of them were still open and junk.

    It probably said "don't give the users so many save error messages" which this IS a success per requirements.

  • IPGuru (unregistered) in reply to Grumpy Old Fart

    Or possibly assigned the task 5 minutes after being told his job is being outsourced

  • (nodebb)

    No one had really dug into it, because having the end user do double data entry didn’t bother anyone but the end user.

    I just died a little inside

  • my name is missing (unregistered)

    I worked at a place where "the business" complained that IT took too long to deliver things because they did testing, so the solution was to deliver software with no testing. Then they complained the software did not work.

  • Guest (unregistered)

    Well, the error message is a little misleading if the user could retry immediately and the content would save. When is 'later' anyway? It would be interesting to figure out why the error was occurring; that it would succeed immediately after is a hint that a smart programmer could code around it.

  • (nodebb) in reply to Guest

    If I had a dime for every error message that said there was a problem and to try again later, I'd have a big pile of foreign coins.

    Heck, sometimes trying again later really does work.

  • (nodebb)

    Back in 1984 I was working for our overseas distributor IT&T in Paris for 6 weeks. Went to one customer's site where they were so happy about our "automatic reboot" feature that rebooted the box every day at midnight. I noticed that they didn't have the Decwriter console turned on so I flipped it on as I left, knowing what I would see the next day. Sure enough, the customer was suddenly upset because the box had abended and rebooted at midnight. One of the modules would gather statistics at midnight, but the module had somehow escaped into release without being tested, and it blew up. The feature they were so pleased with was a bug, and now they were upset. Fortunately, I had the fix for the problem in the tape I hand carried to Europe. They did wind up putting in a request for an auto-reload feature.

  • WTFGuy (unregistered)

    The "best" fix for this situation is to change the spelling on one of the two success messages and close the ticket. Then wait to see how long it takes for the end user to tumble to the fact that "This listing has successfully been saved!" means success and "This listing has been successfully saved!" means it's time to type it in again and submits a new ticket about that.

    What? That'll probably make the ticket go away until after "Dan" has been fired or downsized. Let the next guy fix it.

  • Tim (unregistered) in reply to my name is missing

    I suspect that the business simply complained that IT took too long to deliver things, not that they took too long because of testing. Then some numpty in IT suggested that the users might want to try the software untested.

  • van Dartel (unregistered) in reply to Anon E. Mouse

    The exclamation mark at the end of the message(s) is the true WTF. It's like the providers are flabbergasted or in deep awe that they managed to accomplish something (or nothing).

  • (nodebb)

    How come it I work for that company - but we use C# instead of PHP...?

  • (nodebb) in reply to my name is missing

    Could be worse. I worked at a place where the developers took too long to develop, which didn't leave the testers enough time to test but did leave the testers enough time to prove that what had been built didn't work (in any sense - not only did it not meet requirements, it didn't actually do what the developers claimed it was doing). The software would always get implemented anyway, over the combined objections of the BAs, testers and users. The business areas' shared document containing instructions for how to fix/work around the defects was somewhat longer than the official system documentation.

  • Grunthos the Flatulent (unregistered) in reply to Paddles

    Sounds like the crazy place I worked (which followed Waterfall) and testing usually started after it had been delivered but that wasn't so bad because the developers would complain about the requirements and just "write what they thought it should do", the BA's would then write the requirements after development so it matched what was due to be delivered and the testers would test against those requirements which obviously would always pass. It was only when the end user complained that it didn't function as they wanted that "bugs" (sorry feature requests) would be generated.... I stayed less than 6 months

  • jay (unregistered)

    I was once told by my boss to remove an error message I was displaying when an operation failed, because "It's just confusing to the users." So, umm, better to let them think it worked then to get a failure message that they don't understand.

  • jay (unregistered) in reply to my name is missing

    "I worked at a place where "the business" complained that IT took too long to deliver things because they did testing, so the solution was to deliver software with no testing. Then they complained the software did not work." What's the point of testing? The users will tell us if it doesn't work.

  • jay (unregistered) in reply to van Dartel

    "The exclamation mark at the end of the message(s) is the true WTF. It's like the providers are flabbergasted or in deep awe that they managed to accomplish something (or nothing)." As I always say whenever one of my company's products works: Wow! Almost like a real computer!

  • Encore Spod (unregistered)

    I worked alongside someone developing a machine, the machine had numbered error conditions "ERROR 15" means -There is something wrong with <SPECIFIC PART OF MACHINE>. During development, there was something wrong with <SPECIFIC PART OF MACHINE>, the big boss tells the guy "I don't want to see anymore ERROR 15!". Of course what the boss means is "fix <SPECIFIC PART OF MACHINE>", what the guy hears is "If I get rid of ERROR 15 the boss will stop shouting at me." He decides that ERROR 15 can /probably/ only happen if a certain battery runs low, so he changes "ERROR 15" to "CHANGE BATTERY".

  • Simon (unregistered) in reply to Encore Spod

    That's not an error message, it's a diagnostic message (and should probably be "CHECK BATTERY"). That's only helpful if there's enough space on the display - and it may well be better to have a cryptic number that can be looked up in a manual (like my dishwasher does). I imagine if users see "ERROR 15" regularly, they'll learn what to check first.

Leave a comment on “Constant Success”

Log In or post as a guest

Replying to comment #:

Log Out

« Return to Article