Ask Slashdot: What Software (Or Hardware) Glitch Makes You Angry?

This question was inspired when Slashdot reader TheRealHocusLocus found their laptop "in the throes of a Windows 10 Update," where "progress has rolled past 100% several times and started over." I pushed the re-schedule dialogue to the rear and left it waiting. But my application did not count as activity and I left for a few moments, so Windows decided to answer its own question and restart (breaking a persistent Internet connection)... I've had it. Upon due consideration I now conclude I have been personally f*ck'd with. Driver availability, my apps and WINE permitting, this machine is getting Linux or pre-Windows-8...

That's mine, now let's hear about the things that are pushing you over the edge this very minute. Phones, software, power windows, anything.
There's a longer version of this story in the original submission -- but what's bugging you today? Leave your best answers in the comments. What software (or hardware glitch) makes you angry?

Comments

No unicode on Slashdot.

[phantomfive]

No unicode on Slashdot. All I ask for is a Thorn!

Re:No unicode on Slashdot.

[Rei]

Lol, just ran into two Google easter eggs that I'd never heard of before - searching for "blink tag" or "marquee tag" cause google to blink and marquee their respective search results ;)

Not much

[Anonymous Coward]

Switched to Linux several years ago for the final time. Although some GUI-bugs here and there, I get around them, and not looking back. Keeping W7 in a VM and only for the 2-3 Windows applications I still use now and then. Forget Wine, find and support alternatives.

Forced W10 at work and lose productivity and motivation to work due to that and cloud solutions being rammed from above.

Re:Not much

[TheRealHocusLocus]

I run Linux and Windowsin each others' virtual machines. You can begin with either one running the other. Then create a VM of the outermost OS inside the inner VM. Apply a bit of soap to the screen and hook four standard C-clamps to the innermost VM's window and the edge of the physical monitor. Then just each of the clamps a twist every few minutes and in a day or two the innermost VM window will be stretching against its parent. Line them up carefully and get a friend to help you, four hands at once are needed to get the inner window to 'snap' over the larger, otherwise you will just be chasing both around the screen. With four hands give the clamps a full twist and you will hear a 'PING!' sound.

Once the inner VM has snapped past the outer, continue to tighten all clamps until it is stretched/drawn to the corners of the screen. Then finally tap the clamps off with a sharp blow from of a hammer. As the last clamp is removed the computer will make a strange sound, as the machine's OS merges with the innermost VM. You have now created a Klein Nested VM with unique properties.

Since the original outer-to-inner paradigm has been broken both VMs are simultaneously child and parent of one another, and relative merit and demerit of each OS also (strangely) enters a tesseract-like state. Any two OS 'bred' together in this way become 'best of breed'.

You will also discover that the hardware abstraction layer has itself become an abstraction! Go ahead, gently tug the computer across the desk. You will see the spookily entangled OS hovering in the original position. You can even toss the computer you won't be needing it.

But if you move house you'll have to do it again. Before attempting this it is good to consult your lease to see if it may subject you to penalties or threats of eviction.

Windows focus

[Kokuyo]

When I'm typing on my keyboard and some application thinks it's important enough not just to pop up in front of all the other windows but also move the cursor to its windows.

Especially funny when you're entering an internal password with a customer looking over your shoulder.

I also very much hate it when I enter a domain and the browser goes "Oh, I know tha tone! Let me autocomplete that for you, even though you hit enter after the ".com""

I want the computer to sopt trying to think for me until it's actually smarter than me. But at that point, I want to be able to copy a url, a username and a password and just hit ctrl+v three times and the system pastes the correct value in each field.

Re:Windows focus

[CODiNE]

There needs to be a slight UI freeze of a quarter second or so whenever a dialog or prompt jumps up unexpectedly. This is a universal problem.

iOS, Android, Windows, Mac, Linux all of them. You're typing a command and JUUUUSST as you press enter a dialog comes out of nowhere and you just pressed "Ok" on who knows what! It's worse for people who look at the keyboard while typing, they don't even know anything happened.

Mobile... you're taping away like normal and all the sudden just as your finger is microns from the screen a dialog shows up and you tapped.... whatever it was. Probably just accepted a mysterious self-signed certificate on an important service that definitely shouldn't have one.

There needs to be a tiny inactive period on those so you can't just confirm something in the middle of something else by mistake. The OS can easily handle this without any app code changes since it owns the dialogs.

Re:When it lies, or doesn't say what it wants

[loonycyborg]

The security practice is about not telling whether you got username or password wrong, to avoid revealing existing account names to possible attackers. However if username/password combo is correct then there is no security reason for the system to hide the fact that account was disabled. Telling the real reason of login failure would save the now known authentic user possible futile attempts to reenter password thinking that he made a typo.

My car. Still on same SW version it came with.

[seoras]

Car manufacturers are the worst for software updates. Some worse than others. There's a couple of stupid little bugs in the audio system of my 3 year old car, that make it too painful to use, that could be fixed easily enough with a software update but probably will never get one.
The dealer and manufacturer are aware of the problems. The dealer just gives me a blank look when I ask when a fix is coming.
It's that lack of appreciation of software's importance that sank the likes of Nokia et al in the mobile phone market.
I fully expect the same to happen to the traditional big car manufacturers, they deserve it.

Re:Linux kernel and Xorg not supporting ABIs

[Zontar The Mindless]

A few years ago, I bought a 64-bit laptop that came with 32-bit Windows. I put 64-bit Windows on it only to discover that the wifi card had no 64-bit Windows driver. Period. I found that there was a Linux driver for the same card for which source was available. So I put 64-bit Linux on the machine, got the source for the driver and one make && make install later I had a 64-bit machine running a 64-bit OS with all hardware supported, including wifi. Something that was not possible using Windows, in spite of the fact that the machine came with Windows on it, for neither love nor money.

You like letting your vendors make your decisions for you, fine. But don't try to pretend that isn't what it is.

Deliberately breaking software...

[msauve]

This is to you, Mozilla, Google, Firefox...

STOP deliberately breaking things. I don't care that my 5 year old IOT thing uses HTTPs with old encryption. I don't care that it uses self-signed certificates. It's still better than unencrypted, and I can't update it. You just deliberately broke things so now I'm forced to use unencrypted communications - what idiot decided that's better than even weak encryption? Put up a warning, fine, but don't break it. Idiots.

Re:That computers do what I say....

[TheRealHocusLocus]

In the days before on-screen spellcheck there was a lady at our printshop who was voracious and speedy reader, but she was also a perfect final proofreader. Try as we might all we could do is plod along but she was fast and caught everything, every misspelling, word choice error, even inconsistent spaces. I asked her how one day. She made two passes over every paragraph, the first eyeballing the words in reverse order while noting only spelling and spacing. Then (in double-time she said) moving forward sounding the language normally for meaning, style and grammar.

While she was reverse reading she said, there was NO mental distraction from the actual message, to her it was like being presented a series of word puzzles/problems in a sort of "game" mode. Perhaps you could adapt yourself to examine troublesome code meticulously in reverse sequence this way while not perceiving the task. You seemingly work in some type of overlay mode where as you lay it down you are reproducing a (fuzzy) mental image.

If everything compiles perfectly in your brain, just use that and to blazes with the computer. Best of luck.

Hiding UI functionality

[lordlod]

Programs which hide (delete) menu entries based on state.

I once spent two days trying to figure out how to recover a low quality software raid disk because the recover menu entry had been deleted and the documentation was useless. The menu entry to start the recovery wasn't visible until the spare disk had been precisely configured as the software wanted. Of course with no feedback of that being the case I was left searching through the interface and floundering around until I managed to luck into the solution.

Body

[Anonymous Coward]

- Same hole used for eating, drinking, and breathing
- Same hole used for liquid excretory function and pleasure release
- Same hole used for solid excretory function and object input
- Self copy feature confused with pleasure feature
- No updates, ever
- The only fixes are user-created workarounds and patches from expensive industry

Re:When it lies, or doesn't say what it wants

[dougTheRug]

Oracle here. The reason is that if you say "That account is locked out" then the attacker can enumerate the valid usernames. If bobama is valid user but gwbush is not, then you can try gwbush with random passwords six times and it will still say "Username password combination is incorrect." Whereas with bobama it would say "bobama account is locked out," confirming the existence of the account for further targeting. So, loonycyborg's problem is the error message should be correct, which would be "You could not be logged on with those credentials. Try again or contact your system administrator."

Re:Adobe

[TheRealHocusLocus]

Photoshop and Lightroom. I'm more or less forced to use these tools because all competing products dropped off the face of the Earth

GRAB GOD by the GONADS and GO for GIMP. If you're completely familiar with Photoshop's menus, methods and basic tool functionality you'll have no problem going gibbering insane from Gimp's arbitrary different-ness. Gimp is so unique and unPhotoshopy you'll have to resort to extreme measures to learn it. This means find a cabin deep in the woods, bring a generator and lots of gasoline to stay there during the re-training process. Notify nearby law enforcement of your intentions.

Start by building your own Photoshop-to-Gimp cheat sheet but don't use paper, it soon gets clouded and smudged with tears and spittle. Carve your notes in a wooden desk or the computer case itself with a large bowie knife. Find an uncomfortable funny hat to wear and hog-tie your left arm to your right ear so your body has a unique tactile sensation while learning Gimp's idiosyncrasies. You should always use Gimp this way while wearing the hat, so if you need to use Photoshop again releasing the bonds will permit you to recall its use (and relate to friend and family you knew before you switched to Gimp) more easily.

It is good to notify your insurance company you intend to switch to Gimp. Failure to do so might indemnify them from paying out if they learn you are using it, whether the calamity is traceable to Gimp or not. This is where tipping off local law enforcement helps. Inexperienced detectives sometimes gloss over important details in their reports at the mere note of Gimp. I want to give you the best possible chance to spare yourself legal complications.

And by all means, experiment with the powerful scripting languages and hooks that Gimp provides. Since you'll probably lose touch with friends and family, these scripting tasks can occupy your mind as you descend into your poignantly silent darkness of the soul. There are some good books that may help you learn Gimp but I cannot tell you which ones, my copies have pages missing with bite marks. I think the pages were eaten.

The author had successfully trained himself in Gimp, but its details of operation are presently clouded by prescribed medication. Author has done desktop publishing for 25 years and has used Aldus Pagemaker, Adobe InDesign and Quark spanning 8 continents.

Re:Working on it ...

[TheRealHocusLocus]

"Working on it ..." and a green progress bar. I have just a few (maybe 60) entries. The damn thing cant open a folder with a few files without making me wait. WTF MS???

Many happy little committees have met over the years to help you. All of their ideas were Good Ideas. Every idea only "increased loading by 0.x percent!" but the combined percentages have added to 20,000% thus far. And some of the ideas were APIs for Microsoft Partners and Script Kiddie Partners to sink their pus-filled meat hooks into your bloated registry to affect basic computer operation. Every time you open a folder...

All 32x32 icons on the system are upsampled to 1024x1024 and scaled down again; Microsoft Security Essentials loads completely, realizes you turned it off a year ago, then unloads; Windows checks for updates; Internet explorer checks to see if it is the default browser (it isn't); two dozen corrupted registry branches left by incomplete installs are accessed and the system looks for 50 programs that aren't there; the ILOOKATEVERYTHING utility is run because it installed a registry to look at everything though you have never used it; Windows converts extensions to MIMETYPES and back again just for shits and giggles; media handlers load in multiple threads; folder display flags are inexplicably set to the dumbest view possible; everything is alphabetized; Windows re-sorts by 'group'; a blank window is shown; media apps are struggling to produce thumbnails; (W10 only) inactivity! Time to reboot NOW for updates; Cortana thought she heard you grunt, she transmits a voice-snippet over HTTPS; SSL certificate services loads causing everything else to swap out; certificates are checked for revocation because Paranoid Nerd Is Paranoid; media hooks still trying to make thumbnails; problems with media length detection on improperly encoded files causes long delay, then length is discarded anyway because "..." no one asked for it or there's no room on the display; now media metatag information is being accessed for NO DAMNED REASON; cute (but empty) film borders are painted, what the hell are film sprockets?? Where are those thumbnails??; file names finally appear, mostly hidden after "..."; virus checkers are invoked, both the one you use and the other OEM checker that Windows doesn't know is still operational; twenty smartphone-specific pieces of bullshit code briefly run and then exit (every second); a media codec triggers an Internet lookup for mysterious reasons; DNS delays stall 10 threads and an indeterminate amount of resources; DESKTOP.INI is accessed for Windows 95 compatibility; mouse pointer turns into a pointer for a moment just to torture you then flips to 'busy' again; Windows has synchronously finished counting files, GOLLY GEE, now you have an (unclickable) scroll bar; thumbnails finally starting to come in; dipshit 'subdirectory logic' is triggered for subfolders, all this shit starts to happen for them too; subfolder shit completes and the calculated result is discarded because it wasn't to be displayed anyway; OH HOLY SHIT, ANIMATE/THROB is on, we need more power Scotty because we need moving thumbnails; 3rd party media apps run to see if they are needed now (they're not); you clicked the right mouse button on an item to attempt to regain control which actually starts a whole new CONTEXT MENU WORLD OF SHIT completely separate from this shit; hold on, CrystalFonts has to smooth the edges before you can get control; timeouts for stalled threads finally trigger (cleanup routines delaying you again); a whole second goes by where everything is finished or stalled; inactivity triggers fire making you think the waking nightmare is still going on; finally THE FOLDER HAS BEEN DISPLAYED.

Queued mouse and keyboard desperation events have been detected! Launch stuff you clicked on, push that button that wasn't even there when you clicked, display a context menu and a balloon tool tip containing useless junk and wasn't that easy.