From owner-oi-users Tue Mar 7 09:18:39 1995 Return-Path: oi-users-owner Received: (from majordom@localhost) by freefall.cdrom.com (8.6.10/8.6.6) id JAA19186 for oi-users-outgoing; Tue, 7 Mar 1995 09:18:39 -0800 Received: from jpmorgan.jpmorgan.com (jpmorgan.jpmorgan.com [146.149.99.127]) by freefall.cdrom.com (8.6.10/8.6.6) with ESMTP id JAA19179 for ; Tue, 7 Mar 1995 09:18:35 -0800 Received: from tcpg01a.ny.jpmorgan.com by jpmorgan.jpmorgan.com (8.6.10/fma-120691.2); id MAA29813; Tue, 7 Mar 1995 12:18:11 -0500 Received: from newton.ny.jpmorgan.com (newton.ny.jpmorgan.com [146.149.2.33]) by tcpg01a.ny.jpmorgan.com (8.6.10/cjy.sub.1.0) with ESMTP id MAA19843 Received: from landau.ny.jpmorgan.com (landau.ny.jpmorgan.com [146.149.3.22]) by newton.ny.jpmorgan.com (8.6.9/8.6.9) with SMTP id MAA10592; Tue, 7 Mar 1995 12:18:10 -0500 Received: by landau.ny.jpmorgan.com (4.1/SMI-4.1) id AA18376; Tue, 7 Mar 95 12:18:06 EST Message-Id: <9503071718.AA18376@landau.ny.jpmorgan.com> To: priag Cc: oi-users@freefall.cdrom.com Subject: Re: Menu hanging/refresh problem In-Reply-To: Your message of "Tue, 07 Mar 1995 08:42:16 PST." <199503071642.AA18481@tenaya.NSD.3Com.COM> Date: Tue, 07 Mar 1995 12:18:05 -0500 From: Tom LaStrange Sender: oi-users-owner@FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > On Tue, 07 Mar 1995 11:15:03 -0500, Tom LaStrange said: > > Tom> Not particularly directed at Shinu, but a more general statement about > Tom> requests for help on this mailing list. Here are three steps you can > Tom> take to get more help on this mailing list. > > Tom> 1. Supply a small test case! > Tom> 2. Supply a small test case! > Tom> 3. Supply a small test case! > > Tom> Seriously. I'm as busy as the next person but try to (90% of the time) > Tom> supply a test case with all problems I find or need help with. > > Tom> Requests like the above tend to fly right out of my mailbox because I > Tom> don't have an immediate answer and I certainly won't spend time trying > Tom> reproduce it myself. > > Tom> Sorry, I think I got up on the wrong side of the bed this morning. > > I appreciate the validity of your desire for a small test case, but I > for one find that it's rarely the "small" case which breaks. If I can > isolate the problem down to a few statements, I can usually work > around it. It's the stuff that evidently involves lots of obscure > interactions which I can't solve or work around... and which can't be > captured in a "small test case". > > Pria (who also got out of bed on the wrong side) > Since leaving the Solbourne/ParcPlace group, I've done consulting work for 4 different companies using OI and in each case, I was thrown into a large unfamiliar software environment depending on many different libraries. I know perfectly well how difficult it can be to isolate a problem. My latest experience happened just last week, I was dealing with completely unfamiliar code and it took me around 4 hours to understand the problem and come up with a small test case. oi-support now has a code that reproduces the problem. When my problem surfaces on their queue of things to look at, my bug will have a much greater possibility of being fixed than the one that was reported that simply said "my program doesn't work." If you can find a work around, great, and that's what I end up doing most of the time because I can't wait for an official bug fix. But if you want the bug fixed and it's important enough to you to get it fixed, spend a little time to try to isolate it. These are simply my opinions and experiences. It's a pain in the ass to write a test case. But if you do, in the long run it will benefit you as well as other OI users. -- Tom LaStrange toml@mercury.com toml@jpmorgan.com (on assignment at) Mercury Technologies, Inc. 53 Wall St. NYC, NY 10005