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This is fun!

(you need to view the image or you'll just like the post)

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QA engineer here. While I am not working for this company (thank god for that),here two possible scenarios that will cause a bug of this magnitude not being recognized by QA.

1. A change was made last second after QA have approved the product, and the change wasn't returned to QA.

This will usually be due to time pressure, and "this is just a small change, what the worst that can happen?". Well, this is the worst that could happen, congrats.

2. This HAPPENED at QA enviroment, blue screened them, at which point QA will be blocked from testing. A developer found the issue, fixed it locally, and told QA it was fixed. In which point QA will approve the version, not knowing the bug was only fixed locally. This is the main reason i keep asking developers where was the bug and how did they fixed it. The amount of time i bug was "fixed" locally to magically reappear in the next drop is alarming, and asking solve the issue.

There are other options, but considering that it seems every computer with the software have crashed, its unlikely this bug was missed by QA in another way. However i can think of one more possible scenario which is even more disturbing, and its that the QA enviroment blue screened, someone assumed it was a virus or a mechanicalcfailure, and they decided to release the version without testing instead of investigating if the version caused the blue screen. This is the worst scenario in my oppinion cause it assume they did not test at all.

Whatever it is, someone is getting fired.

idk if people on tumblr know about this but a cybersecurity software called crowdstrike just did what is probably the single biggest fuck up in any sector in the past 10 years. it's monumentally bad. literally the most horror-inducing nightmare scenario for a tech company.

some info, crowdstrike is essentially an antivirus software for enterprises. which means normal laypeople cant really get it, they're for businesses and organisations and important stuff.

so, on a friday evening (it of course wasnt friday everywhere but it was friday evening in oceania which is where it first started causing damage due to europe and na being asleep), crowdstrike pushed out an update to their windows users that caused a bug.

before i get into what the bug is, know that friday evening is the worst possible time to do this because people are going home. the weekend is starting. offices dont have people in them. this is just one of many perfectly placed failures in the rube goldburg machine of crowdstrike. there's a reason friday is called 'dont push to live friday' or more to the point 'dont fuck it up friday'

so, at 3pm at friday, an update comes rolling into crowdstrike users which is automatically implemented. this update immediately causes the computer to blue screen of death. very very bad. but it's not simply a 'you need to restart' crash, because the computer then gets stuck into a boot loop.

this is the worst possible thing because, in a boot loop state, a computer is never really able to get to a point where it can do anything. like download a fix. so there is nothing crowdstrike can do to remedy this death update anymore. it is now left to the end users.

it was pretty quickly identified what the problem was. you had to boot it in safe mode, and a very small file needed to be deleted. or you could just rename crowdstrike to something else so windows never attempts to use it.

it's a fairly easy fix in the grand scheme of things, but the issue is that it is effecting enterprises. which can have a looooot of computers. in many different locations. so an IT person would need to manually fix hundreds of computers, sometimes in whole other cities and perhaps even other countries if theyre big enough.

another fuck up crowdstrike did was they did not stagger the update, so they could catch any mistakes before they wrecked havoc. (and also how how HOW do you not catch this before deploying it. this isn't a code oopsie this is a complete failure of quality ensurance that probably permeates the whole company to not realise their update was an instant kill). they rolled it out to everyone of their clients in the world at the same time.

and this seems pretty hilarious on the surface. i was havin a good chuckle as eftpos went down in the store i was working at, chaos was definitely ensuring lmao. im in aus, and banking was literally down nationwide.

but then you start hearing about the entire country's planes being grounded because the airport's computers are bricked. and hospitals having no computers anymore. emergency call centres crashing. and you realised that, wow. crowdstrike just killed people probably. this is literally the worst thing possible for a company like this to do.

crowdstrike was kinda on the come up too, they were starting to become a big name in the tech world as a new face. but that has definitely vanished now. to fuck up at this many places, is almost extremely impressive. its hard to even think of a comparable fuckup.

a friday evening simultaneous rollout boot loop is a phrase that haunts IT people in their darkest hours. it's the monster that drags people down into the swamp. it's the big bag in the horror movie. it's the end of the road. and for crowdstrike, that reaper of souls just knocked on their doorstep.

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This is true also when not working with specific client, but for a cause.

Is there a malpractice that company practice? Mention how they can be sued for it.

Is there a green alternative not being used? Mention it as a publicity stunt.

Found a major inconvinience for the employees of the end user of the product but nobody give a shit about the minimum wage worker. Well, i did, so i did back of the napkin math on how it actually losing our customer (aka the boss of those minimum wage employees) approximetly 400,000$ yearly and finally this issue was resolved and the bug fix was done within a week. Tested and delivered in less than a month.

The math was mostly incorrect and inflated, but it save a lot of time for the employee that payed by their performance... which, actually lose the customer some poket change but dont tell them

I noticed today that the deadname of a client was clearly visible in their client file because it was their legal name, and flagged it for IT. I specifically flagged it as "Hey, if someone sees this and calls our client the wrong name, we'll lose them as a client." IT emailed me back immediately, and it's now invisible except on their contract with us, which the majority of us don't have direct access to, as opposed to their client file.

The reason I flagged it framing it as a loss is that what matters to most companies is money. If you can flag a bigoted practice as something that will lose customers, clients, or get them a lawsuit, that is significantly more likely to get taken care of quickly than trying to appeal to their better nature. I could have flagged it as "Hey, this is going to make our client really upset if they hear it.", which was my actual motivation for flagging it, but if I had, then it probably would have been taken care of in a few days or even weeks, not hours.

Always hit them with the profit argument for quick and decisive action.

[time-system]

⭐️ ty pluffies dinosaurs stomps & tromps ⭐️

[time-system]

Flags With PluralKit

Hi! I've been noticing an influx of people who don't really know what the 'flags' on PluralKit messages mean.

!! This is specifically for the pk;s l / pk;l command. !!

As we all know, when you list out your PK members, it shows you a list of your members. However, there are some flags that you can add to your regular pk;s l commands to get more specific.

note! i am going to refer to this command as pk;s l the entire guide, because that is how i learned how to use the bot. however, it still works with pk;l.

SORTING

pk;s l -bn

"by name"

sorts members, well, by name.

Example:

ID: a list of system members after running the pk;s l -bn command. they are in alphabetical order.

pk;s l -bdn

"by DISPLAY name"

sorts members by display name, if set

sorts in alphabetical order

Example:

ID: a list of system members after running the pk;s l -bdn command. they are in alphabetical order by set display name.

pk;s l -bid

"by member id"

sorts members by given id, in alphabetical order

Example: For privacy reasons, there is no example given.

pk;s l -bmc

"by message count"

sorts members by message count, from highest to lowest

Example:

ID: a list of system members after running the pk;s l -bmc command. they are in numerical order by highest to lowest, with the highest given at 50,325 messages, and the lowest at 4,665 messages.

pk;s l -bc

"by creation date"

sorts members by creation date

Example:

ID: a list of system members after running the pk;s l -bc command. they are listed in order by who was created first.

pk;s l -blf or pk;s l -bls

"by last front" / "by last switch"

sorts members by the last time they switched in

Example:

ID: a list of system members after running the pk;s l -blf command. they are ordered by last switch in, with the most recent switched in members at the top.

pk;s l -blm

"by last message"

sorts members by when their last message was sent

UNFORTUNATELY AVALIABLE AS OF 20/11/2022

(please ignore pk's name)

pk;s l -rev or pk;s l -r

"reverse"

reverses the order of the last command given

stackable command, can be added on to the end of a command like pk;s l -bmc or pk;s l -blf

Example:

ID: a list of system members after running the pk;s l -r command. they are ordered in reverse order of the command given.

pk;s l -random

"random sort"

self explanatory

Example:

ID: a list of system members after running the pk;s l -random command. they are ordered randomly.

FILTER

CAN BE APPLIED AT THE END OF ALL PK;S L COMMANDS.

pk;s l -all

"all"

sorts with everyone, private or otherwise

Example:

ID: a list of system members after running the pk;s l -all command. they are ordered in their given format (alphabetically), but all are shown.

pk;s l -po

"private only"

sorts by private members only

ADDITIONAL FIELDS

pk;s l -wls or pk;s -wlf

"with last switch" / "with last front"

sorts members ALONG with their last front

Example:

ID: a list of system members after running the pk;s l -wlf command. they are ordered in their given format, but their last switch times are also there.

pk;s l -wlm or pk;s l -wlp

"with last message"

sorts members ALONG with their last message

CURRENTLY DISABLED

pk;s l -wmc

"with message count"

sorts members ALONG with their message count

Example:

ID: a list of system members after running the pk;s l -wmc command. they are ordered in their given format, but their message counts are displayed next to their names.

pk;s l -wc

"with creation date"

sorts members ALONG with their creation date

Example:

ID: a list of system members after running the pk;s l -wc command. they are ordered in their given format, but their creation dates are displayed next to their names.

pk;s l -wa

"with avatar"

sorts members ALONG with their avatar url

Example:

ID: a list of system members after running the pk;s l -wa command. they are ordered in their given format, but their avatar urls are displayed next to their names.

pk;s l -wp

"with pronouns"

sorts members ALONG with their pronouns

Example:

ID: a list of system members after running the pk;s l -wp command. they are ordered in their given format, but their pronouns are displayed next to their names.

pk;s l -wdn

"with display name"

sorts members ALONG with their display name

Example:

ID: a list of system members after running the pk;s l -wdn command. they are ordered in their given format, but their display names are displayed next to their names.

pk;s l -wbd

"with birthday"

sorts members ALONG with their birthday

Example:

ID: a list of system members after running the pk;s l -wbd command. they are ordered in their given format, but their birthdays are displayed next to their names.

MISCELLANEOUS

pk;s l -pub

shows list by public view

pk;s l -priv

shows list by private view