This topic was discussed about two months ago. See http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=108528
Why is this shameful practice so common?
31–40 of 40 posts
Re: Why is this shameful practice so common?
#32As a consumer, I'd agree wholeheartedly with this post. I can't tell you how annoying it is when online companies make it almost impossible for me to give them my hard-earned money. More than once I've left a site I was ready to buy from in disgust because the forms are so awful.
Re: Why is this shameful practice so common?
#33The example code I've seen from popular payment gateways is some of the worst code I've ever seen and that's usually the code the web developers start with. It's obvious the original authors of payment API examples has zero experience with each language. It's doesn't surprise me that the whole payment gateway feels and operates like one giant hack.
> zero experience with each language
I've seen ecommerce documentation billed as having examples in Perl, PHP and Java. What they meant was some of the examples were in each language and you needed experience with all three to get something working.
Re: Why is this shameful practice so common?
#34In some way it is a security feature... Some keyloggers are set to record when a combination of '4 number + space + 4 number + etc'. This is why my bank removed the first 4 numbers (which are common to everyone) when I login to my account. Also, they switch automatically to the password field as if it was a continuation of the number.
I disagree. It would be easier to write keylogger which reads 16 sequential digits, computes a checksum and then emits a UDP packet to a hardcoded IP address.
Re: Why is this shameful practice so common?
#35http://weblog.raganwald.com/2007/09/you-suck.html
My other major rant is when an application presents information to you in a certain format but won't accept it in the same format. So if they display the credit card number with spaces, and I copy/paste it into their own application, they reject it! My bank fixed this bug, but for years they would display the credit card balance with a $ and a comma for more than a thousand; $1,234.56. But could I paste "$1,234.56" i…
Now I know why it works in my ING Direct Orange account. Thanks :) Any chance you guys can make my account balance field editable? That would be a killer feature.
Re: Why is this shameful practice so common?
#36Earlier quoted context omitted.
My other major rant is when an application presents information to you in a certain format but won't accept it in the same format. So if they display the credit card number with spaces, and I copy/paste it into their own application, they reject it! My bank fixed this bug, but for years they would display the credit card balance with a $ and a comma for more than a thousand; $1,234.56. But could I paste "$1,234.56" i…
Now I know why it works in my ING Direct Orange account. Thanks :) Any chance you guys can make my account balance field editable? That would be a killer feature.
Although there is some rumour that some, most or all of their web development is handled by a team in Toronto, am no longer "you guys" :-)
That being said, there are some places where you can type in a date and it accepts a wide variety of formats, including the format it displays on its own pages. Rumour has it that some team-lead-type-guy proposed that as a bug fix, was shot down, coded it himself, and it waited in queue for a month or two before there were QA resources available to make sure it worked.
Re: Why is this shameful practice so common?
#37Earlier quoted context omitted.
Now I know why it works in my ING Direct Orange account. Thanks :) Any chance you guys can make my account balance field editable? That would be a killer feature.
Although there is some rumour that some, most or all of their web development is handled by a team in Toronto, am no longer "you guys" :-) That being said, there are some places where you can type in a date and it accepts a wide variety of formats, including the format it displays on its own pages. Rumour has it that some team-lead-type-guy proposed that as a bug fix, was shot down, coded it himself, and it waited in…
Oops I thought I was up to date. I'd make a sucky stalker :)
Re: Why is this shameful practice so common?
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
My other major rant is when an application presents information to you in a certain format but won't accept it in the same format. So if they display the credit card number with spaces, and I copy/paste it into their own application, they reject it! My bank fixed this bug, but for years they would display the credit card balance with a $ and a comma for more than a thousand; $1,234.56. But could I paste "$1,234.56" i…
Now I know why it works in my ING Direct Orange account. Thanks :) Any chance you guys can make my account balance field editable? That would be a killer feature.
I made a few calls. Turns out that this can be done, and with an AJAX edit-in-place to boot. It was so easy, my buddy coded it up in a few minutes while we discussed it over IM.
The feature is still pretty rough, really just a demo. But as a proof of concept, it's not too bad. For now, you can reduce your deposit balance and another account's balance automatically goes up by the same amount, in real time.
My buddy was in a bit of a hurry, so he hard-coded the target account--the one that rises--to be his own personal account. But he says that you can try teh feature out and send him feedback.
Amazing how quickly those folks cotton on to helping customers.
Re: Why is this shameful practice so common?
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
Now I know why it works in my ING Direct Orange account. Thanks :) Any chance you guys can make my account balance field editable? That would be a killer feature.
I made a few calls. Turns out that this can be done, and with an AJAX edit-in-place to boot. It was so easy, my buddy coded it up in a few minutes while we discussed it over IM. The feature is still pretty rough, really just a demo. But as a proof of concept, it's not too bad. For now, you can reduce your deposit balance and another account's balance automatically goes up by the same amount, in real time. My buddy wa…
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Re: Why is this shameful practice so common?
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
I personally don't find that particulary annoying, I just hit the tab key. You can always take the user to the next textbox automatically with JavaScript.
I find that intensely annoying. I type 4 digits; press the tab key; start typing the next 4 digits; realise that the page had automatically taken me to the next box, so I’m typing into the 3rd box instead of the 2nd; swear…
Nevermind what happens if you need to backspace. Almost no one handles going back a box when you've made a mistake.