Re: It is okay for things to break in the future!

Michael Kay <[email protected]> writes:

>> This is a really, really common mistake made by inexperienced
>> developers - we used to see this all the time in phone number
>> formats, for example. Then mobile numbers came along and changed the
>> formats. And international phone calls became really common,
>> necessitating country codes as a standard part of phone numbers. Etc
>> etc etc :)
>> 
>
> I have had to invent an imaginary US phone number before now in order
> to get past such stupid validation rules.
>
> A golden rule of validation - never force your users to enter
> incorrect data in order to get past your validation rules!

Just today I filled out an online form only to have the form rejected,
with the request please to put in a correct last name.  The web site did
not accept the form until I replaced the hyphen in my name with a blank.
(Why it would accept a blank when it would not accept a hyphen, I leave
to your imaginations. I can think of several explanations but none are
flattering to the programmers involved.)

-- 
C. M. Sperberg-McQueen
Black Mesa Technologies LLC
http://blackmesatech.com

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