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If you're just going to sit there doing nothing, at least do nothing correctly

devblogs.microsoft.com

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Re: If you're just going to sit there doing nothing, at least do nothing correctly

#301

Post by weinzierl »

morsch wrote: post #69
Arainach wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you "doubt" it, please provide a specific example of what you believe is inaccurate in the document rendering.

As it happens, we just had this discussion regarding a Word document from 1990: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39357709

Quote from the article:

"Converting this document from its original format was a bit of a victory for open source software. And a lesson in how hard document preservation is."

So, opening this document was hard and that it finally worked was not because of Microsoft's alleged famous backwards compatibility- which is a myth in my book.

Re: If you're just going to sit there doing nothing, at least do nothing correctly

#302

Post by greatgib »

vikingerik wrote: post #125
greatgib wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the Microsoft way to do things, this is why their products like Windows are so crappy, full of bugs, unexpected behaviors and a big dump of shit of legacy behaviors expected on top of a lot other legacy behaviors on top of another 1989 legacy behavior that every forgot.

Much of the crappy legacy behavior that Microsoft maintains is the fault of other applications, not themselves. The classic one is the error code for the file open function. Early DOS would return error codes of only 3, 4, 5, and no more. DOS programs would actually just indirect-jump using the error number as an index into a lookup table of addresses. When Microsoft tried to add any error codes (say 6), the program…

No, it's not. Like what is described in the original post, it is they spirit. For example for the case with the printer and the xbox, they could have an explicit obvious error for the application. Then it is the task of the application dev to validate its application for target it will run on. If it is does not work, it does not work. Otherwise, you will still have dozens of bugs and unexpected behaviors, so a crappy application.

And new app developers will have to build upon that. Imagine the next app developer, you have to take into account that a platform pretends to support printers when it is not the case. So you will do things like: if there is a printer api but i don't see a printer available (/connected), pretend that we can't print and don't show the button... and so on...

If you have doubts about that, you can read the history of the openxml format: https://ooxmlisdefectivebydesign.blogspot.com/2007/08/micros...

Re: If you're just going to sit there doing nothing, at least do nothing correctly

#303

Post by calamari4065 »

pjmlp wrote: post #273
heyoni wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is great and all until you completely ignored the fact that wine exists and went on to call user space design questions by Microsoft “trivial”. I could also start listing ways that the Linux kernel maintains backwards compatibility with not just software but hardware that’s decades old but the list would get too long. No one is complaining that Microsoft has too much backward compatibility, it’s their utter disr…

Linux kernel on its own doesn't run software.

Do you have an actual argument or are you really committing to "nuh-uh"

Re: If you're just going to sit there doing nothing, at least do nothing correctly

#304

Post by lhamil64 »

dwattttt wrote: post #259
lhamil64 wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also took issue with the Xbox example, and I think it's a context issue. When I read it, I interpreted it as an API for new apps/games to use. In that case, they should be testing on an actual Xbox before shipping! And why would the app be trying to print in the first place if it's designed to run on an Xbox? But I suspect the situation this is being designed for is existing PC apps being ported to an Xbox. OK, in…

Just to add further context; this isn't apps being ported to an Xbox, they notionally need no porting; the Xbox is a "Windows" system. The only actor in this scenario is the platform developer figuring out how an existing API should behave if called in a context the authors very much didn't expect (who expects their Windows app to be run on an Xbox?)

I guess I'm confused then. Is the expectation that you can just run any Windows app on an Xbox, unmodified? I would think you'd have to at least change the UI

Re: If you're just going to sit there doing nothing, at least do nothing correctly

#305

Post by tremon »

pjmlp wrote: post #281
heyoni wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it comes with drivers supporting very old hardware, hence the inclusion.

That alone still doesn't run applications.

application /= software. You're moving the (extremely ill-defined) goalposts. Next you'll be arguing that device drivers or the Linux VFS layer aren't "software".

Re: If you're just going to sit there doing nothing, at least do nothing correctly

#306

Post by resoluteteeth »

chrisjj wrote: post #300
trealira wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The idea is to accommodate apps that just didn't handle the exception, or handled the exception by crashing, probably because they only tested the app on a PC, where printing was always available. > Well, the wrong thing to do is to have the printing functions throw a Not­Supported­Exception. The app that the user installed on the Xbox was probably tested primarily, if not exclusively, on a PC, where printing is alwa…

> probably because they only tested the app on a PC If they made an app only for PC, why would they test it on Xbox?? If they wanted their app to run on Xbox, why would they not make an Xbox version, and test it there?? RC's scenario is taking an app made for only Windows PC and running it on Xbox. I wonder if he has found even one example which permits this in the licence.

> RC's scenario is taking an app made for only Windows PC and running it on Xbox. I wonder if he has found even one example which permits this in the licence.

I don't know what program he would be talking about, but I think if Raymond Chen is writing about something, it's usually because it is a real problem that was encountered, even if he's writing about it as if it was hypothetical to avoid naming the software in question.

He generally avoids naming non-Microsoft software he's found bugs in.

Re: If you're just going to sit there doing nothing, at least do nothing correctly

#307

Post by pjmlp »

tremon wrote: post #305
pjmlp wrote: post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That alone still doesn't run applications.

application /= software. You're moving the (extremely ill-defined) goalposts. Next you'll be arguing that device drivers or the Linux VFS layer aren't "software".

The goal hasn't moved, we are talking about ABI compatibility for a full operating system across multiple decades and generations of operating systems releases, without requiring building those applications from source.

Not a kernel booting directly into an application doing straight syscalls.

Re: If you're just going to sit there doing nothing, at least do nothing correctly

#308

Post by sirspacey »

filleduchaos wrote: post #203
sirspacey wrote: post #187

I missing what the magic is here. This seems like a long way to go for “we know that this device is an Xbox and Xbox doesn’t support printing, let’s tell the user” Only it doesn’t tell the user. It leads them down a path implying implementation is possible. On the other hand, I now know why so many issues I’ve troubleshooted on MS products end in tears and complete confusion as to why they wouldn’t just say “this is…

> This seems like a long way to go for “we know that this device is an Xbox and Xbox doesn’t support printing, let’s tell the user” You're missing the fact that Xbox can run apps developed for (desktop) Windows, and that the scenario in the article is about the platform end user relationship and does not involve the app developer at all.

Ok, appreciate the insight.

Doesn’t the platform: 1. Know that is a windows app 2. Know that it is Xbox

So it could override the “print” request with a user appropriate notification?

Re: If you're just going to sit there doing nothing, at least do nothing correctly

#309

Post by badsectoracula »

yungporko wrote: post #263
kentonv wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but you'd be more frustrated if your app just crashed. If the app is not prepared for printing not being supported, and printing just throws an exception, the app probably just crashes. That's bad. If the app is prepared for printing not being supported, it should be calling the explicit API to check if printing is supported, and then not displaying the UI for printing if it isn't. The article is not about thes…

these aren't the only two options. first of all, i certainly wouldn't be more frustrated if the app just crashed, but how about just letting the user know that the xbox can't print? why does everybody seem to think that's out of the question?

> but how about just letting the user know that the xbox can't print? why does everybody seem to think that's out of the question?

Because the situation described is about an application that was made for PC (which supports printing) and a user is trying to run it on an Xbox (which doesn't support printing) with the developer never even imagining someone will try to run the program on an Xbox in the first place. You can't implement a message about an error you don't even know will happen.

Re: If you're just going to sit there doing nothing, at least do nothing correctly

#310

Post by User3456335 »

WalterBright wrote: post #150
maerF0x0 wrote: post #91

I've learned this as "swallowing errors" and IMO it's a poor practice. Not only does it not solve the issue at hand (you cannot print on an xbox), but it actively hides how broken the software is, which makes bug discovery and testing much harder. This is one thing I like about Go's panic. You're mostly not supposed to use it or recover from it at run time. It serves as a great vehicle to blare loud sirens at testing…

It has irked me for decades that when the internet connection fails, all you get is a message that it failed. But what failed? 1. the software on your computer 2. the computer's hardware 3. the ethernet cable or wifi 4. the switch 5. the router 6. the cable modem 7. the internet cable to your house 8. the ISP 9. the remote system you're trying to connect to Nothing has improved for decades.

You're making the assumption that it is all caused by hardware or software malfunction in the sending of an IP packet to the target server. However the first step is usually a DNS lookup. A list would look more like this:

1. DNS lookup fails because the DNS server address configured at the computer OR router is incorrect 2. DNS lookup fails because the configured DNS server is down 3. DNS lookup fails because some firewall is blocking requests to it 4. DNS lookup fails because the network was congested 5. DNS lookup fails because of interference in the Wifi channel from other Wifi networks 6. Etc. Etc.

So indeed, usually when the network is down you only get "DNS lookup failed". Because the actual reason may be complicated. Of course, usually it is due to your computer not being connected to a router so usually the error message hints at that (in layperson's terms: not connected to the internet). So that's why browsers hint at it being your connection, i.e. ethernet or wifi.

But there is no way to make sure. All we know is that DNS seems to fail. The reason it fails could be any part of its configuration which is spread out across physical systems and software components.

The best we can say: probably your ethernet/wifi connection. If we trust that none of the other components are failing then it must be your connection that is failing.

It's like trying to find out what's wrong in 1+2+32+4=10. Sure, it seems like the 32 should be a 3. But maybe the 10 should be a 39. There is no way to tell anymore. All we can do is make an educated guess.

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