This will be meaningless to any non-mainframe programmer, but. . .
I had to back out a change. The change worked perfectly, but the user didn't bother to do the testing with the applications who used the modified output file. One of them choked on it. . .
So I had to "back it out" (in the parlance of mainframes). I did so, and repaired (brought back to the previous standard), the data that caused the problem. Standard mainframe PITA.
However. . .
The back out procedure didn't back out the source code for the change out of the automated code library.
So I had to go in and change the source code back.
Which meant I had to do all the documentation for another change. Which I did, explaining that the original change had been backed out and I was backing out the source code.
I get to the QA review, and the QA idiot couldn't figure out what I was saying.
Where were the code change results for the before and after data test? (There was no before and after! This was a code back out!)
Why didn't I show the code changes between Production and Test? (There weren't any. I was <backing out> the changes!!)
Why was I comparing Prod data to Prod data? (Because there were no data changed. I was showing a regression test to <show there were no data changing!!!>, you blithering idiot!!!!)
I <had> written up exactly what I was doing, and why, in the documentation. The moron said nobody could glean what I was doing, from my explanation. (Gee, nobody knows what backing out a change means, with full explanation as to why, and that there would be no changing data, because the code was not changing from the existing production? Arrgh!!!!!)
So I had to add several more paragraphs to explain, in a "Run, Spot, Run" manner, what a back out meant, and how I did actually run a test with the new source against the Production source (Which was exactly the same. I had already included a comparison between the two sources, showing they were identical.
), and that the Regression test was actually the Test vs Prod; it was placed as a regression test because there were no source changes and therefore no data changes to any data. (The purpose of a regression test is to show that no data, other that what was supposed to be changed, was changed. No code change, no data change, you only <have> a regression test anyways. . . (Bloody h*ll, I've seen smarter goldfish
)
Then, and only then, would that idiot sign off. . .
