Topic: Embarrassing anecdote for the software developers among us (Read 3619 times)

Probie · « **on:** March 02, 2009, 11:55:56 AM »

I just asked my colleagues to give me a hand with some code. I'm utilising some of the systems he put in place and I was getting a little stuck...now please don't laugh to loudly my face is already pretty red.

He just sat at my desk stepping through my code, we had both deduced that a NULL pointer was being de-referenced from somewhere, and obviously I was looking to the dynamic casts for the culprit.

Turns out that I was deleting something from the scene graph using a pointer I had declared but not initialized... He's a doctor of physics and is one of the smartest people I know.
I'm sure the temperature in the room just shot up?!?!

...I hate being a rookie, someone tell me it gets easier?

12AX7 · « **Reply #1 on:** March 02, 2009, 11:59:53 AM »

What do I get if I tell you that?

What do I get for lying to you?

12AX7 · « **Reply #2 on:** March 02, 2009, 12:00:27 PM »

ohwait Im not a developer...

xolik · « **Reply #3 on:** March 02, 2009, 12:04:07 PM »

I have no idea what any of that meant, but the fact that you understood it all impresses the hell out of me.

Probie · « **Reply #4 on:** March 02, 2009, 12:12:49 PM »

xolik :

Maybe 'understood it all' is an over statement, if I'm honest. If I understood it all I wouldn't have made such a bad n00b mistake.

Oh well, a nice healthy dose of shame is good for character building, or so I am lead to believe.

12AX7 :

Not a developer? dang...Here's what you could have won!

12AX7 · « **Reply #5 on:** March 02, 2009, 12:34:40 PM »

But this is what I have:

Probie · « **Reply #6 on:** March 02, 2009, 12:36:13 PM »

I guess that beats the crap out of a hug!

12AX7 · « **Reply #7 on:** March 02, 2009, 12:39:40 PM »

Yep. Especially cos you already said I didn't win it.

HeavyJay · « **Reply #8 on:** March 02, 2009, 12:43:15 PM »

I know how you feel, Probie. The other day my flux capacitor wasn't working as intended...turns out my speedometer was off, and I was only hitting 87.5 MPH! Boy, was my face red.

And then there was the time I had a zany misunderstanding with the guy I buy dilithium crystals from...what a mess!

Probie · « **Reply #9 on:** March 02, 2009, 12:56:09 PM »

Quote from: HeavyJay on March 02, 2009, 12:43:15 PM

I know how you feel, Probie. The other day my flux capacitor wasn't working as intended...turns out my speedometer was off, and I was only hitting 87.5 MPH! Boy, was my face red.

And then there was the time I had a zany misunderstanding with the guy I buy dilithium crystals from...what a mess!

HeavyJay....that reminds me of an incident with some Libyan terrorists I once had. Long story short, my good buddy went back in time and left me a note, even though I knew it could seriously disturb the space time continuum, I read it. A good thing to ... or I may not be here to tell the tale.

ivan · « **Reply #10 on:** March 02, 2009, 01:44:33 PM »

Quote from: Probie on March 02, 2009, 11:55:56 AM

...I hate being a rookie, someone tell me it gets easier?

What happens, if you are a good coder, is you develop mental checklists for stuff like initializing variables. Some people develop these checklists as general cases because they are disciplined; these folk tend to write cleaner code as rookies. Others develop what I call never-again lists. The former tend to be more creative, and not bound to slavish convention.

In other words, Mr. Perfect initializes pointers because it's the right thing to do. Mr. Hacker initializes pointers because he wants his code to work.

xolik · « **Reply #11 on:** March 02, 2009, 02:00:27 PM »

I once accidentally the whole universe.

Probie · « **Reply #12 on:** March 02, 2009, 02:58:09 PM »

Gawd I hope there isn't only two kinds of programmer. Although i did consider initialising it, but I wasn't sure where it would go in the current set up as the initialisation of that member relies heavily upon the state of other nodes in the tree. I didn't want want the app to barf out while I was testing something...so it didn't barf out....until much later.

Anyway...I blame Luci; I find is his quizzical style of writing very distracting! I'm also going to make up for it by doing work this evening and putting in a late check in....because I am a kiss ass.

Edit: Grammar police!

Demosthenes · « **Reply #13 on:** March 03, 2009, 11:25:05 AM »

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zfODSPIYwpQ#noexternalembed

Probie · « **Reply #14 on:** March 03, 2009, 11:27:48 AM »

Demosthenes · « **Reply #15 on:** March 03, 2009, 11:31:39 AM »

Oh yes. Sorry, I should have mentioned that it's SFW.

Probie · « **Reply #16 on:** March 03, 2009, 11:33:22 AM »

brokeback to the furture?!?! lol I'll be watching that when i get home...

Probie · « **Reply #17 on:** March 03, 2009, 05:01:29 PM »

That was pretty emotional! haha

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