There's a lesson to be learnt here:

My nVidia software helpfully told me that a new driver update was 
available that improved frame rates and fixed various bugs etc (the 
usual). Why not, I thought. After the update I find that nVidia surround 
doesn't work (the thing that lets you use 3 monitors as one large one). 
Maybe I have to restart? Nope still doesn't work. Doesn't work as in the 
icon is there and you can click it but nothing at all happens. Had to 
use device manager to roll-back the driver - works fine again now.

I plugged in my Garmin satnav to my PC to download a log of a recent 
trip I did in the car. The Garmin software then tells me that apart from 
the paid-for map updates there are some free map updates available. 
Great, I install them (2GB download). Now the satnav won't start up 
(invalid map key or some such error). Google reveals lots of people have 
this issue, although none of the "official" solutions worked, there's 
probably a reason why the web page of the person who hacked the map 
files to remove the encryption key is ranked #2 in the search result.

The driver for my 3D mouse told me a new driver was available, a totally 
new version packed with new features. Great! Unfortunately now one of 
the axes is reversed for small movements (but corrects itself for large 
movements). Bummer, it's almost unusable now. I'll just uninstall it and 
reinstall an earlier version (luckily still available for download). 
Cannot uninstall "There was a problem starting C:\Program The specified 
module could not be found.". OK so who forgot to put quotes around the 
filename at some point. No solution to this one yet.

Android software update available! For my 3 year old phone. Let's do it. 
Ermmm now the battery lasts 12-16 hours? WTF. Surely they can't be this 
obvious to try and get me to buy a new phone? After much time spent 
googling and installing various diagnostic apps (surely my time costing 
more than the price of a new phone) I trace the problem down to the 
location services feature. Turn it off and now it's back to lasting 
36-48 hours.

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scott <sco### [at] scottcom> wrote:
> There's a lesson to be learnt here:
> Android software update available! For my 3 year old phone. Let's do it.
> Ermmm now the battery lasts 12-16 hours?

my experience exactly

hate updates.  IMHO, they're just sales tactics to get you to buy newer,
"faster" hardware now that they updated your old hardware into complete junk by
making it run far more "optimizations" than it can deal with...

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> my experience exactly
>
> hate updates.  IMHO, they're just sales tactics to get you to buy newer,
> "faster" hardware now that they updated your old hardware into complete junk by
> making it run far more "optimizations" than it can deal with...

I am currently employed full-time to write these "updates".

You know we actually spend all day, every day, trying to actually 
improve our product?

Sadly, sometimes you try to improve the product and end up actually 
making it worse. For example, we deleted a load of crufty old code and 
replaced it with a single, streamlined class which is far smaller, 
simpler, easier to test, etc. Unfortunately, it also exposed a Linux 
kernel bug whereby our product can't read HFS+ filesystems anymore. :-S

I assure you, we didn't break HFS+ support on purpose! Indeed, a few 
kernel updates later, and it's working again. It's weird like that 
sometimes...

OTOH, I've seen updates where you seriously have to wonder if the 
manufacturer is actually trying to make you stop using the product. 
(E.g., why does Windows 8 exist?)

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Orchid Win7 v1 <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
> I assure you, we didn't break HFS+ support on purpose! Indeed, a few
> kernel updates later, and it's working again. It's weird like that
> sometimes...

oh my

andrew is involved in android updates! o_0

that explains a lot jk

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> Sadly, sometimes you try to improve the product and end up actually
> making it worse. For example, we deleted a load of crufty old code and
> replaced it with a single, streamlined class which is far smaller,
> simpler, easier to test, etc. Unfortunately, it also exposed a Linux
> kernel bug whereby our product can't read HFS+ filesystems anymore. :-S

But of course that came up in testing before you released the update... ;-)

I assume the issue with Android is that it is expected to run on 1000 
different combinations of hardware and it would be impractical to 
thoroughly test on all the devices, especially the ones that haven't 
been on sale for a few years.

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On 09/10/14 21:25, Orchid Win7 v1 wrote:
> 
> I am currently employed full-time to write these "updates".
> 

So now we know who to blame ;-)

> You know we actually spend all day, every day, trying to actually
> improve our product?
> 

Really?

<snip>

> OTOH, I've seen updates where you seriously have to wonder if the
> manufacturer is actually trying to make you stop using the product.
> (E.g., why does Windows 8 exist?)

... A good question.
5000 words on the subject by our next tutorial, please ... and that
includes you two, Henderson and Macavoy.

John
-- 
Protect the Earth
It was not given to you by your parents
You hold it in trust for your children

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On 10/10/2014 16:25, Doctor John wrote:
> On 09/10/14 21:25, Orchid Win7 v1 wrote:
>>
>> I am currently employed full-time to write these "updates".
>>
>
> So now we know who to blame ;-)
>
>> You know we actually spend all day, every day, trying to actually
>> improve our product?
>>
>
> Really?
>
> <snip>
>
>> OTOH, I've seen updates where you seriously have to wonder if the
>> manufacturer is actually trying to make you stop using the product.
>> (E.g., why does Windows 8 exist?)
>

It exists to drive people to Windows 10.

(I hate it!
)^2.125401807


> .... A good question.
> 5000 words on the subject by our next tutorial, please ... and that
> includes you two, Henderson and Macavoy.
>

Yes dear doctor. And a quicker response if you spell my name correctly. 
The Mac is abbreviated and the "a" is capitalised as all proper names 
are in English. :-P


-- 

Regards
     Stephen

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On 10/10/14 17:53, Stephen wrote:
> 
> Yes dear doctor. And a quicker response if you spell my name correctly.
> The Mac is abbreviated and the "a" is capitalised as all proper names
> are in English. :-P
> 

Sorry. Slip of the fingers
... but, for answering back, you will provide 10,000 words by tomorrow.

John
-- 
Protect the Earth
It was not given to you by your parents
You hold it in trust for your children

Post a reply to this message

On 10/10/2014 18:03, Doctor John wrote:
> Sorry. Slip of the fingers

Accepted :-)

> ... but, for answering back, you will provide 10,000 words by tomorrow.

Yer bum's oot the windie.

Old chum. ;-)

-- 

Regards
     Stephen

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On 10/10/2014 01:16 PM, scott wrote:
>> Sadly, sometimes you try to improve the product and end up actually
>> making it worse. For example, we deleted a load of crufty old code and
>> replaced it with a single, streamlined class which is far smaller,
>> simpler, easier to test, etc. Unfortunately, it also exposed a Linux
>> kernel bug whereby our product can't read HFS+ filesystems anymore. :-S
>
> But of course that came up in testing before you released the update... ;-)

Naturally.

> I assume the issue with Android is that it is expected to run on 1000
> different combinations of hardware and it would be impractical to
> thoroughly test on all the devices, especially the ones that haven't
> been on sale for a few years.

We recently moved our product from only working on hardware supplied by 
us, to working on ANY arbitrary PC that meets the minimum specifications.

This causes an explosion of possible test combinations. And the entire 
company is 10 people. Oh, did I mention we have no money? We can't 

assortment of PCs to test the product on...

...I guess that makes the customer the beta tester? :-S

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