GIGO

The reference Garbage In, Garbage Out is a staple when teaching computer science.  It generately acknowledges that a processor or a processor might be considered as a black box where data goes in one side and information out the other.  The black box essentially contains the ability to do whatever it is programmed to do; the value of the whole process relies on a source for good data.

Note the excellently created graphic illustrating the process done by the graphics department of dougpete labs.

A good debugging process will include garbage data (nonsensical or testing the exceptional conditions) and having the logic or the processes handle the data appropriately.  This might be aborting or sending a message to the operator or some other action so that the process can be corrected, changes made and happiness ensues.  (or at least the program works properly)

Sometimes garbage gets through and unexpected results may happen.  This happened to me this past weekend.

On Sunday, the #ecoo13 committee was meeting at the venue in Niagara Falls and I knew that a 4.5 hour drive there and another 4.5 hour drive back wouldn’t give me the opportunity to blog on Sunday so I decided to do it Friday.  It was just a matter of scheduling it to appear on my blog at the regular 5am time and continuity would be ensured.

I wanted to do a review of the Hopscotch and so created the post.  One of the tools that I use for blogging on the Macintosh is Qumana.  So, I just blindly went ahead and wrote the post, scheduled it, and posted it.  Then, I had a D’oh!

Qumana was part of the black box process for me.  I’d had problems posting with it in the past and had forgotten.  It doesn’t post the time/date properly.  Now, what could go wrong?  Just change the time/date, right?

Bring on the Robots

If only it was that simple.  When I post to the blog, I actually have more going on in the black box process than simply posting.

• First – DLVR.IT monitors the blog and sends a message to Twitter that there’s a new post;
• Secondly – CanuckEduS monitors my blog and a bunch of other Canadian blogs.  The new post is noticed and an announcement posted to Twitter;
• Thirdly – nick_chater uses IFTTT and then announces the new post;
• Fourthly – WordPress sends out email messages to everyone who subscribes to the blog – hey, there’s a new post;
• Fifthly – I have the announcement posted automatically to my Facebook timeline;
• Sixthly – There are just good people that try to spread the word by retweeting my announcement of the new post!

Ack!  Realizing what I’d done immediately, I head into WordPress to change the scheduling manually.

I didn’t have a chance to save face.  The robots had followed their instructions to the letter.  I had fed them garbage and, by following the process, they had turned it into something embarrassing.  When you try to follow the announced link, it’s now broken!

Notice that the posted URL includes the date 1970/01/01!  Did they even have blogs back then?  It seems to me that the IBM 360 was king.  For the sake of eight characters, my garbage date had created a problem.  The robots working away feverishly in the black box had only served to amplify it.

My lesson was learned.  Now, I’m forced to try to determine the problem.  I know that I can write, schedule, and post directly to WordPress natively, with Scribefire, LiveWriter, and Blogio.  It’s just with Qumana.  It’s a shame because it had been such a great actor.  Of course, the first thing I do is check to make sure that I’ve got the latest revision.  Yes, I do.  Rats.

Fortunately, I have alternatives to use while I poke around and see if I can find a solution.

In the meantime, my apologies to those of you who read the announcement of the post only to find a broken link.  The good news is that it was released for public viewing properly this morning!  Thanks for reading.

Related articles

• “G.i.g.o.” “Is That Your Garbage?” (wordsthatlastalifetime.wordpress.com)
• Garbage In Garbage Out, Part 2 (drtimwhite.com)
• Six Great Apps for Working With WordPress (nexcess.net)
• Garbage and politics (politykasmieci.wordpress.com)
• Garbage In Garbage Out, Part 1 (drtimwhite.com)

 

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