The Daily WTF: Curious Perversions in Information Technology

Sentinel Headline

by Lyle Seaman in Error'd on 2025-04-11

When faced with an information system lacking sufficient richness to permit its users to express all of the necessary data states, human beings will innovate. In other words, they will find creative ways to bend the system to their will, usually (but not always) inconsequentially.

In the early days of information systems, even before electronic computers, we found users choosing to insert various out-of-bounds values into data fields to represent states such as "I don't know the true value for this item" or "It is impossible accurately state the true value of this item because of faulty constraint being applied to the input mechanism" or other such notions.

13 comments - Last comment @ 2025-04-14

Mais Que Nada

by Lyle Seaman in Error'd on 2025-04-04

I never did explain the elusive off-by-one I hinted at, did I? A little meta, perhaps. It is our practice at Error'd to supply five nuggets of joy each week. But in episode previous-plus-one, you actually got six! (Or maybe, depending on how you count them, that's yet another off-by-one. I slay me.) If that doesn't tickle you enough, just wait until you hear what Dave L. brought us. Meanwhile...

"YATZP" scoffed self-styled Foo AKA F. Yet Another Time Zone P*, I guess. Not wrong. According to Herr Aka F., "German TV teletext (yes, we still have it!) botched the DST start (upper right corner). The editors realized it and posted a message stating as much, sent from the 'future' (i.e. correct) time zone."

15 comments - Last comment @ 2025-04-07

Here Comes the Sun

by Lyle Seaman in Error'd on 2025-03-28

We got an unusual rash of submissions at Error'd this week. Here are five reasonably good ones chosen not exactly at random. For those few (everyone) who didn't catch the off-by-one from last week's batch, there's the clue.

"Gotta CAPTCHA 'Em All," puns Alex G. "So do I select them all?" he wondered. I think the correct answer is null.

6 comments - Last comment @ 2025-03-28

NaN is the Loneliest Number

by Lyle Seaman in Error'd on 2025-03-21

Today we have a whole batch of category errors, picked out from the rash of submissions and a few that have been festering on the shelf. Just for fun, I threw in an ironic off-by-some meta-error. See if you can spot it.

Adam R. "I'm looking for hotel rooms for the 2026 Winter Olympics in Milan-Cortina. Most hotels haven't opened up reservations yet, except for ridiculously overprice hospitality packages. This search query found NaN facilities available, which equates to one very expensive apartment. I guess one is not a number now?"

8 comments - Last comment @ 2025-03-24

No Time Like the Present

by Lyle Seaman in Error'd on 2025-03-14

I'm not entirely sure I understand the first item today, but maybe you can help. I pulled a couple of older items from the backlog to round out this timely theme.

Rudi A. reported this Errord, chortling "Time flies when you're having fun, but it goes back when you're walking along the IJ river!" Is the point here that the walking time is quoted as 77 minutes total, but the overall travel time is less than that? I must say I don't recommend swimming the Ij in March, Rudi.

15 comments - Last comment @ 2025-03-17

Tomorrow

by Lyle Seaman in Error'd on 2025-03-07

It's only a day away!

Punctual Robert F. never procrastinates. But I think now would be a good time for a change. He worries that "I better do something quick, before my 31,295 year deadline arrives."

5 comments - Last comment @ 2025-03-07

Well Done

by Lyle Seaman in Error'd on 2025-02-28

The title of this week's column is making me hungry.

To start off our WTFreitag, Reinier B. complains "I did not specify my gender since it's completely irrelevant when ordering a skateboard for my daughter. That does not mean it is correct to address me as Dear Not specified." I wonder (sincerely) if there is a common German-language personal letter greeting for "Dear somebody of unknown gender". I don't think there is one for English. "To Whom It May Concern" is probably the best we can do.

24 comments - Last comment @ 2025-03-07

Something 'bout trains

by Lyle Seaman in Error'd on 2025-02-21

We like trains here at Error'd, and you all seem to like trains too. That must be the main reason we get so many submissions about broken information systems.

"Pass," said Jozsef . I think that train might have crashed already.

7 comments - Last comment @ 2025-02-23