Practical Web Programming

Friday, December 07, 2007

Top 25 Explanations by Programmers...

...When their programs don't work.

1. Strange...
2. I've never heard about that.
3. It did work yesterday.
4. Well, the program needs some fixing.
5. How is this possible?
6. The machine seems to be broken.
7. Has the operating system been updated?
8. The user has made an error again.
9. There is something wrong in your test data.
10. I have not touched that module!
11. Yes yes, it will be ready in time.
12. You must have the wrong executable.
13. Oh, it's just a feature.
14. I'm almost ready.
15. Of course, I just have to do these small fixes.
16. It will be done in no time at all.
17. It's just some unlucky coincidense.
18. I can't test everything!
19. THIS can't do THAT.
20. Didn't I fix it already?
21. It's already there, but it has not been tested.
22. It works, but it's not been tested.
23. Somebody must have changed my code.
24. There must be a virus in the application software.
25. Even though it does not work, how does it feel?

I think I'm guilty of some of this. (^_^)

See also:
10 Type Of Girls in the IT World
Drawbacks of being a programmer

18 comments:

Anonymous said...

26. It works on my machine!

Anonymous said...

I think I would find more instances of #1, #2 and #5 in my forum posts than I'd care to admit. :D

Joel Badinas said...

#3 it my favorite. (^_^)

Anonymous said...

You list these as if they're never actually true. :P

Fedmich said...

Guilty...

I sometimes say #1 and then immediately fixing it.
soon after, most clients don't mind it anymore. All that matters is how fast you fix the problems that arises anyway.

Cheers

Anonymous said...

@Daniel F. Martins
Absolutely, "Works for me" should even be #1!

Unknown said...

if you're a web dev., you say this a lot of times:
"oh shit!, but in firefox works..."

Joel Badinas said...

teo,

always.

Anonymous said...

what did you do wrong that made it break?

Anonymous said...

"It's more complicated"
and
"It's hard to explain..."

Anonymous said...

The best for me is: "26. It works on my machine!"

Anonymous said...

Indeed.. when I test the application programmers made, I hear that all the time #26 ^_~

Bijay Rungta (rungss) said...

I think I'm guilty of most of these.

Anonymous said...

How is this possible ? ? ?
THIS can't do THAT ! ! !

Anonymous said...

#3 for sure!!!!

Anonymous said...

Awesome... sounds so familiar... I'm sure never from myself. ;)

Anonymous said...

I am guilty of these too, well done the list is accurate.

Anonymous said...

My favorite is the ever popular, ID-10-T error (idiot at the keyboard).

Just make sure you spell it out as ID, 10, T Error.

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