Aggregator

Eddie's company hired a Highly Paid Consultant to help them retool their systems for a major upgrade. Of course, the HPC needed more and more time, and the project ran later and later and ended up wildly over budget, so the HPC had to be released, and Eddie inherited the code.

What followed was a massive crunch to try and hit absolutely hard delivery dates. Management didn't want their team "rewriting" the expensive code they'd already paid for, they just wanted "quick fixes" to get it live. Obviously, the HPC's code must be better than theirs, right?

After release, a problem appeared in one of their sales related reports. The point-of-sale report was meant to deliver a report about which items were available at any given retail outlet, in addition to sales figures. Because their business dealt in a high volume of seasonal items, every quarter the list of items was expected to change regularly.

The users weren't seeing the new items appear in the report. This didn't make very much sense- it was a report. The data was in the database. The report was driven by a view, also in the database, which clearly was returning the correct values? So the bug must be in the code which generated the report…

If POSItemDesc = "Large Sign" Then grdResults.Columns.FromKey("FColumn12").Header.Caption = "Large Sign" End If If POSItemDesc = "Small Sign" Then grdResults.Columns.FromKey("FColumn12").Header.Caption = "Small Sign" End If If POSItemDesc = "2x2 Hanging Sign" Then grdResults.Columns.FromKey("FColumn12").Header.Caption = "2x2 Hanging Sign" End If If POSItemDesc = "1x1 Sign" Then grdResults.Columns.FromKey("FColumn12").Header.Caption = "1x1 Sign" End If '.........Snipping more of these........ If POSItemDesc = "Light Thief" Then grdResults.Columns.FromKey("FColumn12").Header.Caption = "Light Thief" End If If POSItemDesc = "Door Strike" Then grdResults.Columns.FromKey("FColumn12").Header.Caption = "Door Strike" End If

First, it's worth noting that inside of the results grid display item, the HPC named the field FColumn12, which is such a wonderfully self documenting name, I'm surprised we aren't all using that everywhere. But the more obvious problem is that the list of possible items is hard-coded into the report; items which don't fit one of these if statements don't get displayed.

At no point, did the person writing this see the pattern of "I check if a field equals a string, and then set another field equal to that string," and say, "maybe there's a better way?" At no point, in the testing process, did anyone try this report with a new item?

It was easy enough for Eddie to change the name of the column in the results grid, and replace all this code with a simpler: grdResults.Columns.FromKey("POSItem").Header.Caption = POSItemDesc, which also had the benefit of actually working, but we're all left puzzling over why this happened in the first place. It's not like the HPC was getting paid per line of code. Right? Right?

Of course not- no HPC would willingly be paid based on any metric that has an objective standard, even if the metric is dumb.

[Advertisement] ProGet’s got you covered with security and access controls on your NuGet feeds. Learn more.

Broadway's biggest stars came together on Sunday night in New York City to celebrate all things theater at the 78th Annual Tony Awards.

Dani Dyer has shared pictures from her honeymoon with fans following her wedding to footballer husband Jarrod Bowen last weekend.

Met officers believed they'd just shot dead a failed al-Qaeda suicide bomber, Hussain Osman. But alarm bells started ringing when the suspect was looked at more closely...

Follow along to DailyMail.com's live blog for all the latest updates on the violent clashes in the City of Angels.

EXCLUSIVE Over the past two months, scores of areas across the UK have seen unauthorised camps spring up in isolated fields, prized green belts and protected national parks

Celine Dion sent fans into a frenzy as she made a surprise appearance at Coldplay's Las Vegas concert over the weekend amid her ongoing health battle with stiff-person syndrome.

Oprah Winfrey looked thinner than ever backstage at the 78th Annual Tony Awards, which were held at Radio City Music Hall in Midtown Manhattan on Sunday.

Popular 'Call Her Daddy' podcast host Alex Cooper claims she was sexually harassed during her time playing soccer at Boston University a decade earlier. The culprit: Her female coach.

Cynthia Erivo drew a mixed reaction as she hosted the 2025 Tony Awards on Sunday-delivering a performance that fans called both electrifying and cringeworthy. 

Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter had Bill & Ted fans buzzing as they reunited on the red carpet at the 78th Annual Tony Awards at Radio City Music Hall on Sunday.

Find out if families in your area will benefit from Free School Meals

Mark Fanta remembers Andrew Cunanan as attention-seeking, boastful, and obsessed with wealth and social status. But a serial killer?

"Replanting forests can help cool the planet even more than some scientists once believed, especially in the tropics," according to a recent announcement from the University of California, Riverside. In a new modeling study published in Communications Earth & Environment, researchers at the University of California, Riverside, showed that restoring forests to their preindustrial extent could lower global average temperatures by 0.34 degrees Celsius. That is roughly one-quarter of the warming the Earth has already experienced. The study is based on an increase in tree area of about 12 million square kilometers, which is 135% of the area of the United States, and similar to estimates of the global tree restoration potential of 1 trillion trees. It is believed the planet has lost nearly half of its trees (about 3 trillion) since the onset of industrialized society. The Washington Post noted that the researchers factored in how tree emissions interacted with molecules in the atmosphere, "encouraging cloud production, reflecting sunlight and cooling Earth's surface." In a news release, the researchers acknowledge that full reforestation is not feasible... "Reforestation is not a silver bullet," Bob Allen, a professor of climatology at the University of California at Riverside and the paper's lead author, said in a news release. "It's a powerful strategy, but it has to be paired with serious emissions reductions."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Extraordinary vision captured the moment rioters set fire to the Waymos and celebrated the carnage by dancing on the roof of cars, revolting against Trump's crackdown on immigrants.

This first responder group has been serving the East of England Ambulance Service since February 2002.

What started as a way to fund his motocross hobby has now become a thriving enterprise for Corben Johnson, 16.

The reserve remains very in touch with its past

Officers and paramedics rushed to the scene on Nevin Road in New Moston, Oldham, on Sunday with a large police cordon now in place.

Helen Flanagan put on a busty display as she partied in Ibiza with Wayne Lineker and Dean Gaffney, The Corrie star, 34, showed off her ample assets in a black bikini top.