A Tester asked me to send them a Test Harness tool which I had been using the previous day. I thought I can either send them it, or remind them how to download it from Source Control and build it themselves. As it goes, I already had the Test Harness in my shared folder, which I’m pretty certain it was from last time when they asked me for it.
I also remembered that was also the time when they had checked out a folder which had several branches in it, and was building the code from one branch, and looking for the output in another.
Anyway, I send them the link to it, then thought it would be best if I actually give them the config file to point to the test system they are using. So put the file into the Instant Messaging app along with the text “this is the config file I used for the test system”. They accept it and thank me for my help.
Ten minutes later, they tell me the Test Harness crashes and asked if I knew why. I tell them that the Test Harness is a bit crap and doesn’t appear to have any error handling whatsoever. However, when it crashed for me, it was because it didn’t have the correct connection details to the server. So I ask them:
TimeInInts: “did you use the config file I sent?”
Tester: “No”.
TimeInInts: “Why not?”
Tester: “I wanted to use the config file you used, because that one works”
TimeInInts: “but the config file I sent you was the one that works”
Tester: “Oooooooooh right, I thought you were just saying that’s what the config file looks like”
HOW CAN YOU BE SO DUMB? If I was telling them where the config file was, why wouldn’t I simply send them a direct link to the file within the appropriate subfolder? Why would I make them download a file which is a copy of what they have already copied to their machine?
Stranger Coding Tings 