3 ms·

Somewhat OT, but that is generally referred to as a duck[1], and it _definitely_ has its uses. > The artist working on the queen animations for Battle Chess...

Somewhat OT, but that is generally referred to as a duck[1], and it _definitely_ has its uses. > The artist working on the queen animations for Battle Chess... did the animations for the queen the way that he felt would be best, with one addition: he gave the queen a pet duck. He animated this duck through all of the queen’s animations, had it flapping around the corners. He also took great care to make sure that it never overlapped the “actual” animation. > As expected, he was asked to remove the duck, which he did, without altering the real Queen animation. [1]: https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/a/122148 https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/a/122148

javajosh 8y ago
Haha cool, I've been around a while but I've never heard of this. I wonder if this concept can be combined with confessional debugging, aka rubber-ducking? :)
acqq 8y ago
It’s sill wrong to suggest to every contributor to put “the duck” in his contribution, when the fact is then that it’s the people who handle the contribution who are the problem.
stoolpigeon 8y ago
I had an American friend who lived in Germany for many years who had a similar approach to dealing with immigration officials. He learned quickly that no matter how thorough he was when applying to extend his stay, his packet would always be "missing" some form. So he started leaving a few forms out of his packet, that way what they asked for was something he already had.
- jancsika 8y ago
  Ooh, you know it seems like you could use that method to misdirect the official from noticing a forged document. In fact in open source I can imagine a strategy to get an underhanded bug accepted by pairing it with an obvious, trivial bug. The obvious one gets caught and submitter apologizes and resubmits. Then the dev merges the underhanded bug, comforted that a fairly common iteration cycle has been completed with a newbie.
fencepost 8y ago
I've seen references to something similar in home remodeling - required paint and trim are stored in a closet during the work, but that closet itself never gets repainted. When the homeowner says "hey, you missed this!" they get the option of a discount and doing it themselves or the contractor sending someone to use the materials already on site. People who complete it themselves have a higher feeling of accomplishment because they were involved rather than simply hiring it done.

javajosh 8y ago

Haha cool, I've been around a while but I've never heard of this. I wonder if this concept can be combined with confessional debugging, aka rubber-ducking? :)

acqq 8y ago

It’s sill wrong to suggest to every contributor to put “the duck” in his contribution, when the fact is then that it’s the people who handle the contribution who are the problem.

stoolpigeon 8y ago

I had an American friend who lived in Germany for many years who had a similar approach to dealing with immigration officials. He learned quickly that no matter how thorough he was when applying to extend his stay, his packet would always be "missing" some form. So he started leaving a few forms out of his packet, that way what they asked for was something he already had.

jancsika 8y ago
Ooh, you know it seems like you could use that method to misdirect the official from noticing a forged document. In fact in open source I can imagine a strategy to get an underhanded bug accepted by pairing it with an obvious, trivial bug. The obvious one gets caught and submitter apologizes and resubmits. Then the dev merges the underhanded bug, comforted that a fairly common iteration cycle has been completed with a newbie.

fencepost 8y ago

I've seen references to something similar in home remodeling - required paint and trim are stored in a closet during the work, but that closet itself never gets repainted. When the homeowner says "hey, you missed this!" they get the option of a discount and doing it themselves or the contractor sending someone to use the materials already on site. People who complete it themselves have a higher feeling of accomplishment because they were involved rather than simply hiring it done.