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Type in the exact number of machines to proceed

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Re: Type in the exact number of machines to proceed

#2

Post by dgritsko »

Similar idea as GitHub's "type the exact name of this repository if you want to delete it" confirmation dialog. Maybe that's really what you want to do, but in case that's not actually what you meant to do, having a few extra hoops to jump through seems like a good idea.

Re: Type in the exact number of machines to proceed

#3

Post by xamuel »

I wish it were possible for similar prompts to appear before all sorts of policy-makers and bureaucrats. "It appears you are about to institute a policy which will require 400 million patients to sign an additional waiver every time they visit a clinic, this will waste a total of 354,921 human hours within the next year alone. Please type 354,921 to proceed."

Re: Type in the exact number of machines to proceed

#4

Post by educationcto »

Terraform prints out the number of resources changed and at least requires a "yes" to proceed. Not quite as onerous as described but at least prevents some type of fat-fingering. Basically all changes with Terraform are risky as they usually involved bringing up and down infrastructure.

   Terraform will perform the following actions:

  # google_compute_instance.vm_instance will be created
  + resource "google_compute_instance" "vm_instance" {
  + ... 
 
   Plan: 2 to add, 0 to change, 0 to destroy.

   Do you want to perform these actions?
    Terraform will perform the actions described above.
    Only 'yes' will be accepted to approve.

   Enter a value: yes

Re: Type in the exact number of machines to proceed

#5

Post by jackhack »

xamuel wrote: post #3

I wish it were possible for similar prompts to appear before all sorts of policy-makers and bureaucrats. "It appears you are about to institute a policy which will require 400 million patients to sign an additional waiver every time they visit a clinic, this will waste a total of 354,921 human hours within the next year alone. Please type 354,921 to proceed."

closely related: the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995

https://digital.gov/resources/paperwork-reduction-act-44-u-s...

it requires the office of management and business to calculate the impact of records-keeping requirements impact on time and privacy, among other things.

I do not believe it has resulted in a reduced recordskeeping burden. For the most part I simply see an estimate of how long it will take to complete my tax forms and permits, on the form itself. Perhaps others have different views.

Re: Type in the exact number of machines to proceed

#6

Post by jancsika »

It would be neat to print out an esoteric error that gets a single result in Google, where the "forum" in the result has a rando answer about using a certain esoteric flag.

Then you search the logs to see who is trying the command with the esoteric flag and "fix the glitch with payroll" for those employees.

Re: Type in the exact number of machines to proceed

#7

Post by JoeAltmaier »

Makes it harder to nest that command inside a script - you have to parse out the number and paste it back? Or do I misunderstand - should it still prompt the user in the middle of the process when that step arrives? That would be problematical if it were included in a web page or whatever.

Re: Type in the exact number of machines to proceed

#8

Post by csmattryder »

I've seen this called "pointing and calling" [1], Japan's train drivers use the technique to force themselves to perform actions and take notice of the current environment.

I personally took it to heart, it's a good system for forcing a cache miss in the brain - make sure you're on "database production" or "database localhost" etc.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pointing_and_calling

Re: Type in the exact number of machines to proceed

#9

Post by ccakes »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #7

Makes it harder to nest that command inside a script - you have to parse out the number and paste it back? Or do I misunderstand - should it still prompt the user in the middle of the process when that step arrives? That would be problematical if it were included in a web page or whatever.

The very point of this is to make it difficult to do what you’re describing.

If the tool could potentially touch a large number of machine, even if you’re super sure you got it right you should still prompt the user

Re: Type in the exact number of machines to proceed

#10

Post by larrik »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #7

Makes it harder to nest that command inside a script - you have to parse out the number and paste it back? Or do I misunderstand - should it still prompt the user in the middle of the process when that step arrives? That would be problematical if it were included in a web page or whatever.

I believe this would be as part of the script you are writing, not the scripts you are calling.
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