THE DIARY OF A GEEK IN OXFORDSHIRE


Solving the World's problems with common sense and a flamethrower.

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Dear @DEVELOPERLUSER . . .

Yep. That looks like a developer.

Dear $DEVELOPERLUSER

Firstly, my congratulations. It's been quite some time since anyone managed to incur The Wrath Of Dungeekin in the office - recently my vitriol has been reserved purely for politicians. However, you have managed it in fine style. Well done.

I remember a day when developers had some degree of Clue about computing in general. Your recent inputs have made it clear, however, that your knowledge of the wide world of Information Technology is limited to banging your forehead repeatedly against your keyboard and hoping the resultant random bollocks compiles. However, in the spirit of intra-office collaboration and in the sure knowledge that you won't understand a word, allow me to offer a small spot of enlightenment.

the Ping command is a blunt instrument. Unfortunately not one I can use on you, but a blunt instrument nonetheless.

An intermittent increase in ping response from 20ms to 40ms between two servers, across a VPN, between two sites 210 miles apart does NOT constitute a fault report, you C-spewing cretin. Especially when said increase in ping response does not coincide with any loss of connectivity.

There's no actual problem here, you programming prick. Nothing. You're asking us to 'troubleshoot' 0.02 seconds difference about once every 55 minutes like it's the End of Days. Can we expect The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse to have a little trot through the server room? Is Lucifer himself going to cast us into an eternity of Dantean agony for the mortal sin of slight latency? I think not. We are Networks. We understand such things.

I know it's hard for you to comprehend, but this isn't Star Trek. Your code doesn't travel from point A to B at Warp Factor 9. Try connecting via VPN from a Windows server in Australia to a London datacentre if you want to see latency. And they're not fucking complaining.

So despite your protestations, I am not going to investigate further, because it's pretty difficult to diagnose a transient issue with a set of potential causes that are pretty much infinite. I don't care if you want me to. I don't give a flying fuck at a rolling doughnut if you have emailed your manager, who is to technical knowledge what Paris Hilton is to cold fusion.

Go and read a fucking manual, or better still suck on a power cable. It would take a pretty screwed-up system to timeout in 2/100ths of a second (unless it was coded to do so, in which case I'd blame YOU and have even more justification to kill you in interesting ways). Instead, allow me to make a recommendation on your next course of action. I'll put it in code, and so you have some chance of understanding it I'll make my instructions basic*.

10 POKE yourself in the eye repeatedly
20 SET yourself on fire.
30 GOTO hell, luser.

Stick that in your array and debug it.

Dungeekin

*BASIC - geddit? FankyaverymuchI'mhereallweekdon'tforgettotipyourserver.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Gadzooks, I had flashbacks to my trusty Sinclair ZX80 at the end.

As ever, Dungeekin, you never fail to make me laugh.

Ted Treen said...

So you've now encountered the widespread 'PICNIC virus...

For non-IT people, PICNIC = Problem In Chair Not In Computer...

Obnoxio The Clown said...

I've shat more useful things out my arsehole than the average developer.