6 ms·

Same with commands with no output in nominal execution - output only happens in case of error

kibwen 6y ago
This one's a little trickier to apply: if e.g. I'm executing a command to update some rows in a database, a successful execution can tell me how many rows were changed. If the number seems too high or too low, that's useful for setting off my own internal alarms that something might have been wrong with my query.
scottLobster 6y ago
Which is kind of a dark pattern for anything even a little time consuming. A pilot can tell just by looking out the window/flying the plane as to whether the plane is moving. Software however can hang up for all sorts of reasons and never complete execution. You might be waiting on a network timeout for an hour because some didn't code that piece properly, or some random hardware error causes a stall. Reasonable visibility into the real-time operations of the program is useful for the same reasons package tracking numbers are useful.
- inamberclad 6y ago
  > A pilot can tell just by looking out the window Not in IMC
  - t0mas88 6y ago
    Then by looking at the PFD
    - AceyMan 6y ago
      I first read that as "by looking at the PNF", which almost makes sense. If the first officers eyes are bulging out of his skull, you clearly have a problem... :-D
      - t0mas88 6y ago
        Hahaha, and if he's hanging from his seatbelts you're either pulling negative G's or flying upside down ;-)
- saagarjha 6y ago
  One extremely useful debugging "superpower" is just to sample a process when its hung–the stack trace can often give you a good idea what it is doing, even if the UI doesn't.
  - hashhar 6y ago
    I've recently learnt this trick too but am having a hard time manually diffing stack-traces. Do you know of some tool that can help me analyze samples of stack-traces?
    - jeffbee 6y ago
      "Analyze samples of stack traces" is what a profiler does. Can you feed such information into a profiler (such as pprof or perf-report)?
    - saagarjha 6y ago
      On macOS I just use Activity Monitor's sampling tool, which gives me the hottest stack trace. Something similar probably exists for other platforms? If not, you can emulate it poorly by attaching a debugger and repeatedly interrupting execution and seeing if anything shows up many times–if your program is truly stuck, it will generally be easy to see why because it'll show up in all your traces.
- oh_sigh 6y ago
  One of the first things humans discovered about flight is that you can't trust your senses.
  - TeMPOraL 6y ago
    Yes, but you can trust your senses enough to tell you're in the air and not yet dead. Software with no output doesn't give you even that.

This one's a little trickier to apply: if e.g. I'm executing a command to update some rows in a database, a successful execution can tell me how many rows were changed. If the number seems too high or too low, that's useful for setting off my own internal alarms that something might have been wrong with my query.

scottLobster 6y ago

Which is kind of a dark pattern for anything even a little time consuming. A pilot can tell just by looking out the window/flying the plane as to whether the plane is moving. Software however can hang up for all sorts of reasons and never complete execution. You might be waiting on a network timeout for an hour because some didn't code that piece properly, or some random hardware error causes a stall. Reasonable visibility into the real-time operations of the program is useful for the same reasons package tracking numbers are useful.

inamberclad 6y ago
> A pilot can tell just by looking out the window Not in IMC
- t0mas88 6y ago
  Then by looking at the PFD
  - AceyMan 6y ago
    I first read that as "by looking at the PNF", which almost makes sense. If the first officers eyes are bulging out of his skull, you clearly have a problem... :-D
    - t0mas88 6y ago
      Hahaha, and if he's hanging from his seatbelts you're either pulling negative G's or flying upside down ;-)
saagarjha 6y ago
One extremely useful debugging "superpower" is just to sample a process when its hung–the stack trace can often give you a good idea what it is doing, even if the UI doesn't.
- hashhar 6y ago
  I've recently learnt this trick too but am having a hard time manually diffing stack-traces. Do you know of some tool that can help me analyze samples of stack-traces?
  - jeffbee 6y ago
    "Analyze samples of stack traces" is what a profiler does. Can you feed such information into a profiler (such as pprof or perf-report)?
  - saagarjha 6y ago
    On macOS I just use Activity Monitor's sampling tool, which gives me the hottest stack trace. Something similar probably exists for other platforms? If not, you can emulate it poorly by attaching a debugger and repeatedly interrupting execution and seeing if anything shows up many times–if your program is truly stuck, it will generally be easy to see why because it'll show up in all your traces.
oh_sigh 6y ago
One of the first things humans discovered about flight is that you can't trust your senses.
- TeMPOraL 6y ago
  Yes, but you can trust your senses enough to tell you're in the air and not yet dead. Software with no output doesn't give you even that.