Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

People with names that break computers

bbc.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 288 posts

Re: People with names that break computers

#121

Post by Zenst »

WHen I started programing (mainframes) in the early 80's I came across an odd instance in which my name messed things up. All printouts had 3 letter as a banner that were used to identify who to hand them too once burst up from the line printer. Popped onto a trolley in which they would be shipped up to us programmers. Now alas I only had a first and surname and in part due to bureaucracy had to add a middle letter as PG was not acceptable for some unknown reason of standards that was in play. SO I added an X for PXG and then spent several years explaining to anybody new that my middle name was not Xavior.

Equally during my training we were coding a script upon a GCOS 8 machine and had to copy current edit file to a new file and on the system (asterix)SRC was used to reference that file.

Now one person doing the exercise thought they would cheat, looked at mine, then another chap and concluded I'd copied his and he would be clever and not make the same mistake. Turns out the other chap he was checked was with the initials SRC and whilst neither of us had copied anybodies this cunning chap ended up with (asterix)MTW. Sadly this chap went on to the systems division and too this day, still bewildered how and who he sucked up too for that position with such talents.

So names are and always will be amusing at times, in more ways than breaking a system as well.

Re: People with names that break computers

#122

Post by twic »

Grishnakh wrote: post #91
phillc73 wrote: post #79

I have a close friend who lives in rural Ireland. That's not in a town, but on a small farm in a general area of about 15-20 other small farms. His address is just the name of the general area and the county. The Irish postal system is clever enough to know that the person with this name, in that general area lives in that house. In fact, he probably still isn't even really classified by his name, rather as the husba…

Ireland is like that throughout the whole country, except maybe Dublin. It's worked for them for ages; there's been articles written about wackily-addressed mail being sent to people in Ireland and arriving to the correct destination. (I remember one that was just a long description going something like "the lad who..."). The problem is if someone in Ireland tries to order something from a company in another country,…

> if you need to verify the address, there's APIs you can subscribe to in different countries to check address correctness

If you do this, just bear in mind that the APIs aren't always correct, either. While working on a project that used data from the Royal Mail's Postcode Address File recently, we found a couple of people on the team whose addresses weren't in it.

And then there's my friend whose flat has an address, but where that address has been stolen by a neighbour with a more prominent front door, effectively leaving my friend addressless.

Re: People with names that break computers

#123

Post by rconti »

rcthompson wrote: post #105
mabbo wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A friend in university had the last name "des Trois Maisons", or "Of the three houses" (if I'm remembering it correctly). I can only imagine the number of computer systems that just die on that. Not one space, but two ! Come to think of it, I bet he reads this comments. Hi [name withheld]! Seriously, what a great last name.

You might want to edit your comment to avoid giving out your friend's first and last names.

Or at least to provide sensationalistic information about the billions in gold he has stored at his house.

Re: People with names that break computers

#124

Post by david-given »

bagels wrote: post #101
HoopleHead wrote: post #62

It doesn't even have to be an "edge case", as stated in the article. My first name has a single accented vowel and breaks tons of online forms. What annoys me is not so much having to re-enter my name with the unaccented version of the vowel, it's when the form throws up an error message saying "Enter a Valid Name" [or suchlike]. I find that insulting. At least make your error text put the blame where it belongs: "So…

I once sent a package to Curaçao. I bought postage online from USPS. The package was delivered to Australia, as my local post office showed me on a printout, and lost forever. The best I can figure out it, it was because I dared to use the accented 'ç' character in the country's name, and their computers were not able to handle this.

US immigration thinks I live in a city called Z?rich.

Re: People with names that break computers

#125

Post by mabbo »

rcthompson wrote: post #105
mabbo wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A friend in university had the last name "des Trois Maisons", or "Of the three houses" (if I'm remembering it correctly). I can only imagine the number of computer systems that just die on that. Not one space, but two ! Come to think of it, I bet he reads this comments. Hi [name withheld]! Seriously, what a great last name.

You might want to edit your comment to avoid giving out your friend's first and last names.

Ehh, valid point. Edited, thanks for pointing it out.

Re: People with names that break computers

#126

Post by Symbiote »

sevensor wrote: post #39

I received a Dutch surname as a second middle name. I can never use it -- the "Van" alone is enough to break things. But even without "Van", having two middle names usually does not compute. I've seen people who lack middle names entirely have the opposite problem and insert the middle initial "X" just to satisfy the system.

Assuming you're American, that shows that American norms are no longer even the same as in Britain.

No middle name isn't uncommon, perhaps one in five people. One middle name is most common.

A second middle name isn't at all unusual. Having three suggests an aristocrat — not common, but certainly understood.

I remember a Christian friend choosing his second middle name, which I thought was weird: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation#Confirmation_name

Re: People with names that break computers

#127

Post by kstrauser »

joshstrange wrote: post #110
kstrauser wrote: post #92

I wasn't able to buy tickets once because "your name cannot include numbers, special characters, or the words 'select', 'drop', or 'user'". I (don't really) apologize for having a name containing one of the magic words your programmers aren't competent enough not to care about. -- In the 90s, I worked for an ISP. Our very first customer was "Joe Test". We had well-meaning customer service people delete his account a…

So.... Change your first name. It's called your legal name for a reason. Can you get away with your nickname in a number of systems? Sure, but when you run into issues you really don't have anyone to blame but yourself. Your complaint boils down to "I want to abuse the legal name system and everything should just work for me" > And yet, so many institutions are incapable of handling the situation and insist on callin…

> False, you may not consider that your first name but it IS your legal name and at the end of the day that's really the only thing that matters.

See, this is one of the misunderstandings from the article. Don't feel bad: many people make this mistake.

But it is a mistake.

Your legal name is the one you conduct business with. In my case, I conduct all business using my middle name. The fact that I was born with it doesn't make it any more valid than if it were a childhood nickname I'd kept around all my life. What matters is that it's the primary key I've been using to legitimately represent myself. I'm not a lawyer, but my lawyer is and I'm more inclined to side with his advice than yours here.

Re: People with names that break computers

#128

Post by twic »

roywiggins wrote: post #107
jakub_g wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is his nationality, out of curiosity? Or was he born with name and surname? BTW Just found this list, pretty short. Is it common in some societies still to have just one name? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_legally_mononymous_p...

Indonesia's the most well-known example.

The other famous one is Burma - U Thant, third Secretary-General of the United Nations, was actually just called Thant, but nobody could handle that in 1961, so they stuck the Burmese version of 'Mr' on the front to make something they could recognise as a name.

Re: People with names that break computers

#130

Post by twic »

parennoob wrote: post #56
stygiansonic wrote: post #26

My favourite "real world fails to fit the model we've come up with" is Carmel-by-the-Sea, which has many streets that have no addresses: " To this day, there are still no addresses, parking meters or street lights, and no sidewalks outside of Carmel's downtown commercial area. Those seeking directions receive hints such as “fifth house on the east side of Torres Street, green trim, driftwood fence” or by the legendar…

> My favourite "real world fails to fit the model we've come up with" is Carmel-by-the-Sea, which has many streets that have no addresses You might be surprised to learn that in India, all addresses are more or less like this. This is due to the fact that we never ended up with the standardised street numbers and names that a lot of other countries have, and road naming is a highly political thing in India, so a lot…

Quite a bit of the Arab world is like this too. Some colleagues of mine were working with a Middle Eastern courier firm recently, and it's quite a headache.
Post reply on HN