[AccessD] A "Real World Example" of Piss Poor Programming Practice

Arthur Fuller artful at rogers.com
Wed Aug 20 15:42:22 CDT 2003


Write it in NotePad or NoteTab or whatever then paste the bits into the
appropriate controls. You're far too experienced to fall for this, Alan.
I've read lots of your posts and you are far from stupid.

Always assume the worst.

Arthur

-----Original Message-----
From: accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com
[mailto:accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com]On Behalf Of Lawhon, Alan C
Contractor/Morgan Research
Sent: Wednesday, August 20, 2003 3:43 PM
To: AccessD at databaseadvisors.com
Cc: 'Elam, Debbie'
Subject: [AccessD] A "Real World Example" of Piss Poor Programming
Practice


Several weeks ago the HR (Human Resources) Department in my company sent
out an email informing all of us that we had to enter our resumes into a
"new" HR database that they had developed.  We were given a deadline
(this coming Friday) for entering the data and told how important it was
to complete this task.  The HR Manager stated (in the email) that any
employee failing to meet the Friday deadline would be reported to his/her
immediate supervisor.

So I spent two hours (yesterday afternoon) entering my data only to
experience the following calamity:


-----Original Message-----
From: Lawhon, Alan C Contractor/Morgan Research
[mailto:alan.lawhon at us.army.mil]
Sent: Wednesday, August 20, 2003 9:40 AM
To: <addressee deleted to protect the guilty>
Subject: Problem With the Morgan HR Database ...


Dear HR Database Problem Fixer:

I spent a considerable amount of time yesterday afternoon loading my
resume into Morgan's new HR database.  I had completed "Step 11" of the
process, (loading Employment Information), when time ran out - I had to
vacate the building.  In accordance with the printed instructions, I
clicked the "Save & Exit" button.  The screen immediately went blank and
an error message: "HTTP 404 Termination" or "HTTP 403 error" (or some
similar wording) appeared in the upper left-hand corner of the screen.
As my heart sank, I immediately reentered the program and my worst fear
was confirmed: Not a single character of the entered data (not even the
blank spaces) was saved.  :-(((

I was VERY CAREFUL to follow the program instructions precisely and to NOT
exceed the 1,000 character limit - including spaces - in any of the fields.
(There were a few fields that I left blank as I did not know - or could not
remember - the information.)  Obviously, I will have to reenter all the data
and try again, but before I do that I have two questions.  First, have you
had similar reports (from other users) of this problem with the program?
Since I was concentrating my effort almost exclusively on the information
I was entering, I didn't click the "Save & Exit" button until the very end -
which may have been a mistake on my part.  I guess my second question is as
follows: What assurance is there that this program will function properly
and actually save entered data?

Alan C. Lawhon

--------------

I received the following response to my inquiry.

-----Original Message-----
From: Tim <a Support Tech with the Company that Developed This Kludge>
Sent: Wednesday, August 20, 2003 10:47 AM
To: Lawhon, Alan C Contractor/Morgan Research;
Subject: RE: Problem With the Morgan HR Database ...


Alan,

My apologies for your trouble, but you must click the "Save & Exit" buttons
to save each screen's data.  This is clearly posted at the top of each
screen in red, stating: "If you do not click one of the "Save" buttons your
information will not be saved."

Regarding the termination problem, the error you received indicates it was
not a problem with the software, but with your connection.  Here is a note
from our lead programmer:

"""If he had received an application error, it would have logged it to the
windows even log, sent us email, and forwarded him on to the Error.aspx form
page for further feedback.  As none of these things happened, then there was
some error that was external (and out of our hands) to the B2Secure
application.  It sounds like his internet connection dropped.

Just for reference, the session time out is set to 90 minutes.  Had he
exceeded this amount of time without clicking anything, he would have been
sent to the login page (without error) and his information would have been
lost as well."""

As for the integrity of the system functioning properly and saving data, we
have received no other complaints.

Thanks,

Tim

-------------

Following is my reply to "Tim" (and his "lead programmer" ...)

Tim:

I would be grateful if you relayed a brief message to your lead programmer.
In a well designed GUI interface, if you have not implemented a periodic
"auto backup" feature which executes seamlessly in the background, (let's
say once every ten minutes), you should design and implement a "warning"
dialogue box which displays a message to the user approximately five
minutes before any session timeout occurs.  This dialogue should inform
the user that he/she must save their work immediately.  Allowing a
session timeout to occur, with a subsequent loss of data, is indicative
of poor programming design and inadequate testing.

As for your contention that "... the system is functioning properly and
we have received no other complaints," that does not jell with what I am
hearing.

Alan C. Lawhon


Debbie Elam: I feel your pain!  :-(((




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