The Weird and The Wonderful

Re: Found this little gem in one of the applications

17-Dec-12 16:58

I will not underestimate it again!! ^^

A train station is where the train stops. A bus station is where the bus stops. On my desk, I have a work station....
_________________________________________________________
My programs never have bugs, they just develop random features.

KP Lee18-Dec-12 6:29

Re: Found this little gem in one of the applications

18-Dec-12 6:29

Super Lloyd wrote:
I will not underestimate it again

OK, I fess up. I have been surprised by the stupid programmer before me when that programmer was me. Smile | :)

Super Lloyd18-Dec-12 12:52

18-Dec-12 12:52

Haha.. I should be wary of that one too indeed!! ^^

Facepalm time.

fjdiewornncalwe13-Dec-12 4:36

fjdiewornncalwe

13-Dec-12 4:36

I have a singleton data cache I'm working with.
I was testing whether or not the cache items were removing correctly from a consumer of the data.
I was checking via a different object in the debugger that would pull the object in question from the cache.
The problem: This different object creates the bloody cache item if it doesn't exist, but in the debugger it just looked like it wasn't deleting. My code was fine all along... The brain fart was in the debugging... Double D'Oh! | :doh:

I wasn't, now I am, then I won't be anymore.

wout de zeeuw13-Dec-12 4:59

wout de zeeuw

13-Dec-12 4:59

Been there! Logging/tracing would have given you insight a bit quicker.

Wout

fjdiewornncalwe13-Dec-12 6:44

fjdiewornncalwe

13-Dec-12 6:44

I was trying to save some time in the testing as a failure would have been really obvious to spot in test.
Figure that... You'd think I would know better after how many years of doing this.

I wasn't, now I am, then I won't be anymore.

Anna-Jayne Metcalfe13-Dec-12 22:34

Anna-Jayne Metcalfe

13-Dec-12 22:34

That's what unit tests are for, surely?

Debugger based testing is fundamentally limited by the lack of repeatability intrinsic in having a human poking around during the session, whereas automated tests to do the same thing should (if designed correctly) be absolutely repeatable.

As a bonus the tests stick around long after the debug session is ancient history. If someone breaks the code several years from now, the tests will start failing to alert you to that fact.

Anna

Tech Blog | Visual Lint

"Why would anyone prefer to wield a weapon that takes both hands at once, when they could use a lighter (and obviously superior) weapon that allows you to wield multiple ones at a time, and thus supports multi-paradigm carnage?"

KP Lee15-Dec-12 23:58

Extract from the code I'm working on

15-Dec-12 23:58

When I first started in a Microsoft position, I asked why they were renaming procedures that were basically doing the same thing. It was their control method, the old procedures retained old behavior, the new code expected new behavior. After the new was promoted to production, the old was removed from SQL. If the lab started squaking, they knew they missed something.

Sure missed that on a later project. About 80% of the existing tests were failing because the sprocs were massively changed and no-one bothered to maintain the tests when they re-wrote the sprocs.

Super Lloyd10-Dec-12 16:26

10-Dec-12 16:26

I think that's the most stupid code I refactored today!
But barely, and there is a lot more! Sigh | :sigh:

public XYZ()
{
    _xyz = "0 , 0 , 0";
    string[] parts = _xyz.Split(',');
    Double.TryParse(parts[0], out x);
    Double.TryParse(parts[1], out y);
    Double.TryParse(parts[2], out z);
}

Brisingr Aerowing10-Dec-12 17:57

Brisingr Aerowing

10-Dec-12 17:57

public void WriteCode(ICodeContent ctx)
{
  throw new BrainNotFoundException();
}

Super Lloyd wrote:
A train station is where the train stops. A bus station is where the bus stops. On my desk, I have a work station....

Where the work stops. Right?

Bob Dole
The internet is a great way to get on the net.

2.0.82.7292 SP6a

Super Lloyd10-Dec-12 18:13

10-Dec-12 18:13

You nailed it!
Both remarks! Poke tongue | ;-P

KP Lee11-Dec-12 12:08

11-Dec-12 12:08

Super Lloyd wrote:
public XYZ() { _xyz = "0 , 0 , 0";...

Looks like someone was planning on getting a string feed and forgot to feed the string or forgot to stop destroying the string.
So what did you do to refactor it? Change code to x=0;y=0;z=0;? And keep _xyz = "0 , 0 , 0";? Remove _xyz = "0 , 0 , 0"; and verify the split causes at least 3 parts? Add error checking on the tryparses? Remove XYZ and all references?

Super Lloyd11-Dec-12 22:04

11-Dec-12 22:04

I got rid of the '_xyz' string, it was only used internally (in addition to x,y,z double) and parse every now and then, to get the value of 'x,y,z'

Nemanja Trifunovic13-Dec-12 7:29

Nemanja Trifunovic

13-Dec-12 7:29

There is a design pattern for that: Stringly typed code[^]

utf8-cpp

Super Lloyd13-Dec-12 13:12

No foreign keys on the first date.

13-Dec-12 13:12

Ho... I'm learning new power pattern every day!!! Poke tongue | ;-P

Brady Kelly9-Dec-12 2:21

9-Dec-12 2:21

I wrote this little workaround earlier this year. EF complains about an insert where ParentId is set, but allows me to set it with an update.

// TODO Address this cluster-wtf.
using (var scope = new TransactionScope(TransactionScopeOption.Required, new TransactionOptions { IsolationLevel = IsolationLevel.ReadCommitted }))
{
    if (newProject.ParentId != null)
    {
        // I don't know why I need this, but EF won't insert with a ParentId, but allows me to set it immediately after.
        int parentId = newProject.ParentId.Value;
        newProject.ParentId = null;
        _projectRepository.Insert(newProject);
        newProject.ParentId = parentId;
        _projectRepository.Update(newProject);
    }
    else
    {
        _projectRepository.Insert(newProject);
    }
    scope.Complete();
}

KP Lee11-Dec-12 8:17

11-Dec-12 8:17

Assuming this is a SQL Server connection, I don't think you can lay this directly at SQL's door, but you might want to see if triggers are involved and see what they do on insert/update. Maybe the update trigger on the child will insert the parentID in the parent table if it doesn't exist?

No, that doesn't make sense, the update should fail with a foreign key constraint failure before it reaches the trigger.

So, when it complains, what is its complaint?

Brady Kelly11-Dec-12 8:34

11-Dec-12 8:34

Something long winded about referential integrity.

KP Lee11-Dec-12 11:33

11-Dec-12 11:33

Brady Kelly wrote:
Something long winded

What else is new with SQL? Big Grin | :-D

Pete O'Hanlon11-Dec-12 9:10

Pete O'Hanlon

11-Dec-12 9:10

Do you have an insert trigger behind this table in the database by any chance? It would seem to be consistent.

*pre-emptive celebratory nipple tassle jiggle* - Sean Ewington

"Mind bleach! Send me mind bleach!" - Nagy Vilmos

CodeStash - Online Snippet Management | My blog | MoXAML PowerToys | Mole 2010 - debugging made easier

Brady Kelly11-Dec-12 16:36

11-Dec-12 16:36

No. The table is created by EF Code First, nothing but the table itself. Not even indexes but for the PK. I think it's something to do with EF trying to also save another child of the same parent, and clashing somewhere far away.

Andrew Rissing13-Dec-12 6:42

Andrew Rissing

13-Dec-12 6:42

As a suggestion, you could debug into the code using the newly open sourced code - http://entityframework.codeplex.com/[^].

ryan_b200917-Dec-12 6:55

ryan_b2009

17-Dec-12 6:55

with EF, it helps you out and takes care of all the FK IDs for you Smile | :)

You can fill the nested object and let it handle all the FKs (don't even set the ID properties)
ie:

parentObject.Project = newProject;
_projectRepositroy.Insert(parentObject);

Brady Kelly17-Dec-12 7:04