Category Archives: Uncategorized

When API Documentation Is So Bad that It’s Good

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Web Method
data.postData

Description
Post some data to another piece of data (i.e., “data data”), which will be related to some other data. You know…the other data. You’re not confused with all this ambiguity, are you?
Notes: In order to be less confusing, we will now refer to the other data as “Smegma Lite”. If you are posting data related to Smegma Lite, please notice that there are other related parameters which are not mentioned here. Learn more in the “Smegma Lite: Why Do I Need to Read a Fucking Manual About This Mundane Concept” guide.

Request URL
http[s]://ima.weiner.com/carlosdanger/data.postData

Parameters

Required Level Name Type Description
Required DataType string The type of the data. (Honestly, if you actually needed that, you’re better off sticking a handgun up your ass and pulling the trigger.)
Required Data string You need this, too? And you survived after my last instruction? Okay, now put the gun to your head.
Mostly Required DataId string It identifies the data. On a side note, if it’s empty, the default value is assumed to blank. What does that mean? Who the hell knows. Maybe it wipes out the entire database. Do I look like I care? I’m writing these docs while I’m huffing paint.
Sometimes Required SubmitterID Int It may or may not be required…I’ll get back to you later on that. If it’s not specified, the default value is 590091134. (Upside down, that does not spell “Hell Boobs”, it spells “He’ll Boo BS”. You’re so immature. I just don’t get you anymore.)
Optional guestName string If the submitter is a guest user, then this field is Required…which means it isn’t Optional…hmmm…
Quasi-Optional guestAlias string But if the submitter is a guest user and the guest name is only one word, then this field is Required and the guestName field should be omitted…which means it isn’t Optional and it isn’t Required.
Superposition-Optional guestNameAlias string If the submitter is a guest user and the guest name is both one word and more than one word at the same time, use this field. This isn’t confusing yet, is it? Because it’s pretty simple stuff, moron.
Required for Some Data and Not for Data that Isn’t Some Data dataSynopsis string If your user account allows a synopsis for data and if your data is related to Smegma Lite and if your guestName comes to a Scrabble score of 50 and if you blew the bridge on Wednesday, then you are allowed to post graphic pornography to your account. As for the ‘dataSynopsis’ parameter, you can always use it. That’s a given. Duh.

—–

…and if you think that any documentation resembling this format passes as adequate, you should be deemed a pariah and removed from society by being banished to the new edition of the show Naked and Afraid, which will take place in a nearby asteroid belt.

Peter Bolton is the author of Blowing the Bridge: A Software Story and has also been known to be a grumpy bastard on occasion.

Ideas for Anti-Tech Startups

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1.) Candy Crusher – A NFC-enabled mobile app which, when used near a person playing Candy Crush, takes remote control of the target’s phone and annoyingly broadcasts to all in the target’s contacts list:
“I would read right now if I weren’t an illiterate, stupid fuck that hasn’t figured out how to use headphones. Please knuckle my loins when you next see me.”

2.) AutoStalker – An Internet bot that can be set to different modes, surreptitiously dissuading your friends from posting to social networks. Frustrated with friends who inundate Facebook with pictures of their children? Simply set AutoStalker to “PedoBear” mode, and after compromising your target’s account and those of its friends, it will generate random creepy comments about kids’ buttocks and post them to your target’s wall. Sayonara, kid pics!

3.) DroneZapper – A thirty foot Tesla Coil that will extinguish the life of any snooping drone or quadrocopter. With every purchase comes:
a.) Metallic mail suits for all family and pets (since death is guaranteed by not wearing one)
b.) A lifetime supply of hair gel in order to combat the neverending battle between static charges and style

4.) RingDumbs – A mobile phone app which will listen for certain ringtones and immediately respond to them. For example, in the case of the whistling ringtone of Samsung, the phone will supply a small charge to an embedded portion of the phone, which in turn will ignite a small packet of C4 and kill everyone within a few meters, including the offender. (You might die in the process, but you’ll have the honor of blowing the bridge.)

Snowden’s Last Performance Review

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Employee Name: Edward Snowden
Department: NSA Operations Center
Immediate Supervisor: Yuri Nater
Date of Review: April 1st, 2013

O – Outstanding
L – Like a gangsta mofo
S – Surpasses expectations
E – Exceeds expectations
M – Meets expectations
N – Needs improvement
T – Tends toward crapola
U – Unsatisfactory
Y – Yeasty

Technical Support for Monitoring Operations = S
———-
Attendance and Punctuality = T
———-
Expertise in IT Security Practices = O
———-
Eager to Help Fellow Employees with Password Issues = L
———-
Communicates with Peers Regularly = E
———-
Refrains from Having Journalist Friends = N
———-

General Comments: Ed performs his role with enthusiasm. As a standup employee, he volunteers his time with staff by offering to backup their personal drives on a regular basis, without incurring overtime or other costs to the agency. He is well known and loved by others for his quirky sense of humor and his generosity. For example, his candy jar of free keychain flash drives keeps everyone productive and in good spirits. He even provided some homebrew “palware” (how creative!) on each flash drive, in order to help us with our daily tasks! Ed is an asset, and we should consider getting some people under him as quickly as possible.

Room for Improvement: Ed does need to spend less time talking on the phone, especially with his domestic partner Glenn about planning vacations. (Hong Kong might be a fun town, but if you’re planning a party for weeks, there better be some real dragons dancing around.)

Employee Comments: I will divulge your Orwellian monitoring to the world at large, and any confidence held by people regarding your principled position will be shaken to its core. You will pay for your treachery through the loss of wealth and international trust, and even though you will likely not learn your lesson (and I am likely just blowing the bridge), I will have the satisfaction of knowing that it was due to me and that you were unable to stop me.

Supervisor Comments: That Ed! Such a kidder! Man, his stuff is totally priceless.

The Pros and Cons of Agile Methods

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1.) Pair Programming

Pros – It encourages better practices of development, decreases bug occurrence, and ensures redundancy in working knowledge of software.
Cons – It either gets in the way of your personal downtime activities, like searching for nude pics of Alexandra Daddario…or it leads to an oddly intimate relationship between you and your PP partner.

2.) Use Cases

Pros – It propels developers and stakeholders to predict and plan for various scenarios of your software’s usage.
Cons – It empowers morons to participate in the process. “So, what if a feminist Eskimo were insulted by the phallic nature of the igloo in your button’s image? And if a luddite or Amish person wanted to use the software, could we make the computer run on the churning of butter?”

3.) Scrum Meetings

Pros – Developers and their boss avoid any surprising obstacles or misses of expectations by having regular daily discussions about their current progress.
Cons – Since some people don’t relate the word “scrum” with “brief”, an expected fifteen-minute conversation becomes an hour-long dissertation from Bob about how the Illuminati are running the company and about how he blew the bridge last year. Every. Single. Day.

4.) Cross-Functional Teams

Pros – Developers with different areas of expertise work alongside in order to better understand the issues faced by different departments and in order to create more innovative solutions.
Cons – Sometimes, the “powers-that-be” don’t seem to understand how to properly form a cross-functional team. “Why am I in the same room as the maintenance guy and the building’s bomb-sniffing dog?”

5.) Planning Poker

Pros– During a Scrum session, the usage of cards (instead of vocal answers) will create a more accurate estimation of time required for tasks, since the vocal answers of one could influence others’ estimates.
Cons – Its implementation increases the chance of a violent gambling ring among your software developers, which then naturally leads to the formation of mob families in your department. Productivity will naturally decrease when your developers start missing fingers.

6.) Timeboxing

Pros – By creating a physical visual chart that tracks your project’s progress instead of a hard timeline, you can get a more accurate picture of the current status and impending direction of your work.
Cons – Sometimes timeboxes can become a bit ‘crowded’. “Can we knock out this wall here? I’m going to need a bit more room…I also need somewhere to put this pallet of sticky notes…”

7.) Story-Driven Modeling

Pros – Developers and users get together in order to create detailed usage scenarios for the software, which then reveals new requirements and possible issues when further developing and/or enhancing the software.
Cons – Sometimes pairing certain developers and users can be counter-productive, especially if they develop and chronicle a relationship outside of work. “So, Peter orders a box of condoms by clicking on the ‘Purchase’ button, and then Mary hits the ‘Agree’ button in order to book the hotel room, and then [Insert Explicit Actions Here], followed by [Insert Explicit Image Here].”

8.) Test-Driven Development

Pros – By requiring developers to create tests for their functions before they implement them fully, it helps to ensure that the results are kept in the forefront of the developers’ minds.
Cons – For your more ‘special’ developers, this development style could then be mistakenly combined with their recursive practices, resulting in an infinite spiral where a testing harness is created for unit tests that gauge results from another testing harness…until they piss off the system, are absorbed into the circuitry, and must fight alongside an even older Jeff Bridges against the Uber APU in order to save humanity.

Peter Bolton is the author of Blowing the Bridge: A Software Story and has also been known to be a grumpy bastard on occasion.

8 Indications that You Need to Guillotine Your CTO

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1.) Your deployment environment is nothing but Windows servers, your entire framework depends on .NET, and your entire programming team only knows C#…but he doesn’t understand why you fight him when it comes to replacing all of your desktops with Mac Pros.

2.) You inform him that your team has donated personal hours of work in order to complete an ancillary project that will save the company millions of dollars…and in response, he nods approvingly and then asks “Who are you again?” Then he digs out his cellphone, laughs, and shows you a picture of his dog wearing sunglasses and a tutu.

3.) When you’re in a meeting with him and stakeholders in your project, he reacts to any of the stakeholders’ complaints/issues by shaking his head, rolling his eyes, and covertly pointing at you…especially if you’ve blown the bridge.

4.) When he speaks to your projects’ stakeholders, he overestimates his ability to connect with them. For example, if they happen to be black, he will punctuate his comments with “…girlfriend!” and horizontally oscillate his head like an upset guest on the Jerry Springer show.

5.) When he asks you to help tune his slow PC, you find that his desktop’s Recycle folder contains nothing but files with suspicious names like “shesquirts.stuxnetworm.mpeg.exe”.

6.) When talking with him about how a certain piece of software resembles Lotus, he responds with a look of confusion…though he is eager to admit how Lotus was his favorite nightclub back in the day.

7.) When you report that your network latency has increased tenfold, he optimistically asks if that is good news.

8.) He has eight screens on his desktop which supposedly show realtime information from eight different subsystems…but when you scrutinize the setup from a distance, you realize that it’s just an enlarged game of Tetris.

Peter Bolton is the author of Blowing the Bridge: A Software Story and has also been known to be a grumpy bastard on occasion.

When LinkedIn Poachers Miss the Mark

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1.) Dear Mr. Smith,

I’m an all-pro recruiter from a billion dollar hedge fund. I have an ASP.NET position open in our company, and even though your resume mentions a bunch of nerd stuff that I don’t understand, it all looks pretty nerdy, so I figure that you’re probably a good fit. Blah, blah, blah…let’s get to the point. The question is: are you in the game? Hit me up if you’re ready to work with some real men and make it rain on some bitches. Hit me up if you have a pair. Of balls!

                            — Ivanto Takuklozoff

2.) Dear Mrs. Johnson,

On your profile, it mentions that you enjoy playing puzzle games on your Android phone as a hobby. Based on that, you seem to be the perfect fit for a position as an Android app architect. You seem well qualified to lead two coding teams in Shanghai and Kiev. We will talk about your salary after you forward your highest scores for Angry Birds and Candy Crush.

                            — Zhiyat Fobraynz

3.) Dear Mr. Torvalds,

Based on your profile, you seem to be fairly proficient in Linux. I see that your first name is Linus. I love that character from the Snoopy cartoons! (Linux sounds so much like Linus. Does anyone mix that up and call you by that name?) In any case, I have a C++ position open that has your name all over it. Have you ever worked on an OS? Specifically, in the part of the OS called ‘the colonel’? If you’d like to hear about it, give me a call.

                            — Heywood Jablome

4.) Dear Ms. Jackson,

Boy, are you ever lucky! I’m a recruiter with a financial analysis firm called Pyramid, and we are currently looking for a contractor to fill a temporary position on a busy project. We are prepared to give you a 10K payment for the job and bonuses for exemplary, punctual work. Of course, you will have to relocate since our operation is based on the moon, but we are prepared to partially compensate you for moving expenses. Even though the estimated time for the project is 3 days, your expected duration of the project is only for 7 hours and 18 minutes, since we can only send a finite amount of oxygen with you. Your 10K will be paid posthumously to a Paypal account in our new cryptocurrency called PyramidCoin*. Any interest?

                            — Anita Jakoff

* (1 Indian rupee = 1000000 PyramidCoins)

5.) Hey,

I see that you work on the 7th floor of Acme Inc. Guess what? I’m the boss on the 8th floor! I do my own recruiting, without the help of HR. I also see that you work for Bob. Guess what? Bob is a gigantic douchebag! Am I right? Come work for me on the 8th floor, and you’ll never have to face Bob again. We’ll make that asshole eat his own hat for lunch. Plus, we party hard up here. Sometimes with each others’ bodies…just sayin’. It’s an option.

                            — Ollie Tsumpoo

6.) Greetings Mr. Jones,

A mutual friend/recruiter of ours gave me your name. He said that you were currently bored with your current position and that you were looking for more of a challenge. I think that I might have something for you. At Pipedream Inc., we have a position that offers you an unique chance, one to assist in the development of the new interplanetary iteration of the Internet. The bad news is that you’ll have to work for half of your current salary, declare bankruptcy, foreclose on your home, leave your family, and change your gender (so that the company can benefit from some tax breaks). So, there are a couple of minuses. On the plus side, you will be paid in a new hot cryptocurrency called PyramidCoin and some options*. Call me to learn more.

                            — Yura Bagadikz

* There is a 100% chance that they will be worthless when we will likely go bankrupt.

7.) Hi Mr. Williams,

I’m a recruiter in a boutique recruiting firm which is small in stature but tall in power. You can tell that we’re cool and retro since we quote from the movie Krull. Plus, we actually know a ton about techie stuff! Like, Java is to Javascript like dingleberries are to berries. Am I right? And whoever chooses an IDE over a command line is lame. Right? And don’t get me started about Unicode! So, if you’re super nerdy cool, you can trust us to represent you. Because we’re just like you! Really! Whaddup, my geeker! Geeker, please!

                            — Maya Tayntswetz

8.) Good Morning Ms. Brown,

Given your extensive knowledge as an electrical engineer at such a young age, we were interested in contacting you about a unique opportunity for your career. Here at the Pyongyang Energy Company #12, we have unique puzzles which await to challenge you. Here is what we have to offer:

a.) PEC #12 is a hot energy startup which challenges the world’s ideas (and some of its political agreements)
b.) PEC #12 is located in a super secret unicorn lair
c.) PEC #12 offers the comfort of never having to leave Pyongyang for the rest of your life
d.) PEC #12 provides recreational entertainment in Pyongyang Reeducation Camp #12, which is located next door
e.) PEC #12 has special programs/incentives for young women like yourself, offering paid maternity leave once our beloved CEO Kim Jong Un has blessed you with his seed
e.) PEC #12 offers the reassurance that even if our company is destroyed by imperialist bombs, we will succeed in furthering the dreams of our beloved, sacred CEO Kim Jong Un, and in that way, we will have preserved our honor.

Please respond quickly to our inquiry! Or else!

                            — Sum Ting Wong

Peter Bolton is the author of Blowing the Bridge: A Software Story and has also been known to be a grumpy bastard on occasion.

10 Lessons from 10 Years in Corporate IT

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1.)  Never concede that an employee’s value to the company deserves a hefty increase in salary (as in 25% or higher).  Instead, it is better to wait for the employee to quit, suffer from their absence for months or perhaps years, and then hire them back at twice their original salary (plus six months of vacation).

2.) An annual review is an opportunity to showcase one’s contributions for various software projects during the past year, with the hopes that it will merit a reward. However, since management never records actionable metrics, all claims are treated as hearsay, and you have as much of a chance for a fair trial as a young girl accused of witchcraft in 17th century Salem (or 20th century Arkansas).

3.)  Management will hire vendors and consultants based on:
     a.) honesty and accuracy when it comes to performance metrics and project status.
     b.) proficiency in knowledge of utilized platforms and efficiency in implementations.
     c.) the level of blame and bullshit that they will swallow without choking to death.

4.) The more distant from Computer Science was your college major, the more eligible that you will be as the manager of a software project.  If you majored in gym, you’re a slam dunk.

5.)  If you don’t engage in code reviews with the antisocial programmer of your group, you’re taking a significant risk.  In the best case, he will develop code without being encumbered, and he will beat project deadlines.  In the worst case, he will start to lose his connection with humanity like Colonel Kurtz from Apocalypse Now, and after convincing the maintenance staff of being a deity, he will plot to murder the entire floor from his bamboo-covered cubicle.

6.)  Tolerance is an incredibly important aspect when managing personnel in an IT department.  If a programmer or admin says that their faith precludes them from command-line prompts and that their culture forbids the use of keyboards, you should learn to encourage acceptance within the group and leave them alone…especially since firing pernicious people can lead to punishing litigation.  Instead, it is better to passively wait for a round of layoffs, throw them into the grinder when nobody is looking, and then feign sorrowful surprise to your subordinates at your next Scrum meeting.

7.)  When you first start in IT, you will read and then curse the source from all legacy programs and system scripts.  In order to ameliorate the pain, you will begin to drink at work, and as the years pass, you will develop code through the reddish hue of seething anger and alcoholic stupor.  When you quit or perish from the bamboo spear of a nearby antisocial programmer, a nascent employee will inherit your insane gibberish, and then the cycle will begin anew.

8.)  Typically, as a manager, your assignment of allocated time for a project should be:
    a.)  2% on R&D
    b.)  2% on the original design
    c.)  25% in political strutting and squawking
    d.)  25% in throwing out the original design and debating with upper management about whether the project should exist
    e.)  20% in arguing over the scope of manpower and the cost of the budget
    f.)   15% in replacing those developers and admins who left in disgust
    g.)  10% in impromptu cage fights with HR managers
    h.)  1% on final implementation

9.) When your boss says “I need to understand this from a bird’s point of view”, it is important to take him literally.  You should skip the technical complexity of your explanation, feed him bird seeds, and then paint a bullseye on the whiteboard for him to aim and defecate upon.

10.)  In order to truly learn about the best practices and technology available, it is important to remember that failure is always an option…as long as you’re not the one doing the failing.  When someone does fail, though, it is important that you point and laugh at them. Don’t laugh too hard, though. In defeat, there is still honor in blowing the bridge.

Peter Bolton is the author of Blowing the Bridge: A Software Story and has also been known to be a grumpy bastard on occasion.

I Will Show You Fear in a Handful of Paranormal Romance

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That’s what T.S. Eliot wrote, right?  No?  No matter…speaking of wastelands, I’ve just returned from the Barnes & Noble web site, which is where I had journeyed in order to find an untapped reviewer community.  Unfortunately, in the place of a thriving town, I found a Potemkin village instead. It’s true that there are a few reviewers who are enthusiastic, but it appears that they are only enthusiastic for books which are already popular.  Plus, most of the reviewers chose for their identity to remain anonymous.  As a result, it resembles a post-apocalyptic landscape more than any online civilization.

Following another suggestion from a friend, I ventured out and examined a site called NetGalley. It’s an interesting idea. They do the work of gathering a collection of hungry reviewers through enticing deals (i.e., free books) and rewarding competitions, and as the aspiring author, you pay them a hefty sum to gain access to their throngs. In general, I like the idea. However, once again, I find that my preferred style and genre seem to work against me. After scrutinizing their catalog, I noticed the category of “humor” was not listed among them. Hmmm…yet again, I became painfully aware of how satire is becoming an anachronism in the world of contemporary literature. Then, as I traversed its more popular titles, I discovered that Goodreads was not an isolated hub in the “chick lit” category. Yet again, I scrolled through page after page of listings for erotica, romance (yes, mostly paranormal), and young adult fiction which focused on themes of ‘dystopia’. So, obviously, that site is also an ideal tool of promotion for me. Yes, I’m being facetious.

(On a side note, when I think of ‘dystopia’, I think of novels that focus on showing how mankind’s notions of progress can actually backfire and cause a loss of humanity, especially in philosophical terms. Classic examples are Brave New World and 1984. If you’re going to use the word ‘dystopia’ to describe The Hunger Games, then you’re clearly not literate, and you don’t understand the meaning of the category. It DOES show that you desperately want to elevate the intellectual status of your entertainment, but unfortunately, you’re reading a book which is only slightly more mature than the Dragon Lance series. You might as well refer to Star Wars as a ‘dystopian’ movie where Luke has a light saber instead of a bow and arrow. Of course, it’s my ‘dystopia’ where Jennifer Lawrence’s breasts remain covered throughout her movie performance.)

Which brings me to my fearful conclusion: that literature is slowly dying as multimedia gladly offers to immediately satisfy the desire for instant gratification, and it looks like books have not escaped that trend. Could a dark satire like “American Psycho” have become as popular in this particular reading landscape? I have my doubts. In any case, it proves that I will have to effectively build a rocket ship and blast off in order to rid my mouth of this particular flavor of terroir from the current terrain. There has to be an audience for my book; I just have to find the completely insane route which will deliver me to them. That should be easy…right?

The MetaReview of Amazon’s Reviewers

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So, following the advice of one of my friends, I decided to pursue the possibility of promoting my book with a little help from some of the prominent reviewers on Amazon; specifically, I started with their list of the Top 100 Reviewers. After going through the top reviewers list, I did find a few people who might be interested in my writing, and I did introduce myself to them. As of yet, none have returned my solicitations, but given that they’re probably inundated with requests, I’m not surprised. More importantly, though, I have rediscovered that a beaten track is not where I should tread. It’s a lesson learned yet again.

Of course, first and foremost, I have to commend Amazon on a great strategy and execution when it comes to their reviews and the community built around it. In fact, you could say that the Amazon reviews community has become a separate organism from the main site itself. Brilliantly, Amazon understands how to advertise itself by embracing its colorful community of reviewers, and it even acknowledges their more amusing characters. Their Vine program is another component in that strategy, in which their more popular and prolific reviewers are given a special status. This role comes with a cornucopia of perks, of which a couple are being given free product samples from companies and being prominent mentioned among Amazon’s pages. In effect, Amazon has taken the online bromide of user reviews and (with a flick of wrist) turned it into a meritocracy which serves its self-promotion engine. It’s an excellent implementation of a smart design.

Unfortunately, though, this is not a place for self-published authors, especially ones which do not follow fads or mainstream perennials. As I went through the list of their reviewers’ profiles, I noticed a few patterns which do not bode well for the brave souls who seek assistance from these modern-day patricians:

1.) Some of them do not have a listed email address. I’m assuming that the Vine program and their own pursuits are enough for them.

2.) Some of them have their own particular focus of interest. For example, some of them only review music; many only care about gadgets and electronics. Only a scant few of them only focus on books.

3.) Many of the reviewers who have actually reviewed a book only care about specific content. The family-oriented only care about children’s literature. The older, retired demographic typically only cares about biographies, history, and mysteries. The middle-aged, single crowd prefers science fiction, fantasy, and paranormal romance.

In the end, there are only a few reviewers of whom I might possibly consider ‘literate’, in the sense that they have a actual palate which appreciates a wide variety of flavors when it comes to prose. So, if you’re looking to promote a book which doesn’t satisfy a craving for something akin to a midnight snack, the reviewers of the Vine program are probably not a good crowd to turn to.

My immediate thought was that perhaps Barnes & Noble might be a better place instead, since it actually specializes in books. Alas, after taking a quick walk over the grounds of its site, it seems that route isn’t particularly encouraging, either. Even though it does have reviews, it does not anything equivalent to the ambitious Vine program. Unlike Amazon and its Vine program, there is no page which effectively serves as a pantheon of champions to which an author can turn. Plus, there are no visible email addresses on the reviewers’ pages; you can only contact them through their B&N account. So, I was disappointed, to say the least. However, after following a few clicks, I have observed that some of these reviewers are serious about opining on slews of books, which makes me think that they might actually be more literate and have weight among other literate friends. Plus, this path has very few visible footprints. It’s enticing enough to keep following it…we’ll see where this one goes as I disappear into the brush…