Confessions of an IT Manager_Phil Factor
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280 Why do we call them 'Bugs'?<br />
s<strong>of</strong>tware is cursed with malicious spirits. The 'Bug' or 'Bogey' part <strong>of</strong> the word<br />
is traceable back to the fifteenth century in the me<strong>an</strong>ing <strong>of</strong> 'Hobgoblin', devil or<br />
ghost. In East Anglia particularly, the word 'Bugbear', first recorded in the<br />
sixteenth century, is still used in referring to problems with machinery.<br />
A Bugbear is a malicious spirit, <strong>an</strong>d the word has nothing whatsoever to do<br />
with insects. In celebration <strong>of</strong> the finding <strong>of</strong> the real me<strong>an</strong>ing <strong>of</strong> the word 'bug' I<br />
<strong>of</strong>fer the following verses<br />
I always hope there is no place<br />
for bugbears in my database<br />
<strong>an</strong>d wish that no-one ever sees<br />
a bugbear in my foreign keys.<br />
So bugbear go! for I don't need'ya<br />
bugging up my stored procedure<br />
causing table locks, <strong>an</strong>d things<br />
suddenly truncating strings,<br />
endless loops <strong>an</strong>d other terrors<br />
like rogue spids <strong>an</strong>d rounding errors.<br />
Bugbears causing sudden death<br />
in a tested UDF.<br />
Routines that have worked for days,<br />
fail in unexpected ways<br />
It's the bugbears at their game<br />
surely I am not to blame.<br />
Is the database <strong>of</strong>fline?<br />
It's the bugbears' fault not mine,<br />
I suspect that there is a gap in the market for a new type <strong>of</strong> utility s<strong>of</strong>tware,<br />
one that drives out the malicious spirits infecting a piece <strong>of</strong> code. To this end<br />
we <strong>an</strong>nounce the availability <strong>of</strong> two s<strong>of</strong>tware applications: the first one removes<br />
the curse <strong>of</strong> bugbears from a piece <strong>of</strong> s<strong>of</strong>tware, <strong>an</strong>d the other one curses other<br />
people's s<strong>of</strong>tware with bugbears. Any volunteers for helping with Beta Testing<br />
in both categories should contact me.
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