| ??? 09/24/03 20:46 Read: times |
#55408 - Proven Product Syndrome Responding to: ???'s previous message |
Another one:
"No, that can't possibly be a fault - there's thousands of these in the field, and nobody's complained; it's a Proven Product..." I had this very problem only a couple of months back, interfacing a telemetry device to a vending machine (VM) DEX port. I already had an implementation working, and the Client had a requirement to talk to a new machine; I hooked it up and the data looked fine, but always failed the CRC data integrity check. After some detailed examination, I was convinced that the VM's CRC implementation was wrong; but the VM manufacturer said, "No, that can't possibly be wrong - there's thousands of these in the field, and nobody's complained..." I, of course, used exactly the same argument: "my implementation works fine with X, Y, and Z other manufacturers' machines, so it must be right!" The manufacturer then insisted, "It must be right - we tested it with this software from the European Vending Association" Looking at this "test software," I found that it doesn't actually check the Data Integrity CRC at all! It eventually transpired that they had misinterpreted the spec, and their implementation was, in fact, incorrect - despite all those machines already in the field without complaint! |



