Funny programming comments

Happy Turkey day.
Post your favorite funny comments.

// Dear programmer:
// When I wrote this code, only god and
// I knew how it worked.
// Now, only god knows.
//
// Therefore, if you are trying to optimize
// this routine and it fails (most surely),
// please increase this counter as a
// warning for the next person:
//
// total_hours_wasted_here = 40
//

One I found a few years ago in a waste water system

##############################
As far as I can tell I have created magic. I do not know why or how it works
If you touch it you own it
##############################

One I left on a rotary pneumatic press
##############################
This machine fears no God do not trust it to do what you tell it
##############################

In an old Ti-565 SFPGM (aka structed text in the 80's):

*If you can understand this convoluted logic, god bless you.
*If you do not understand it and need to modify it, may the force be with you.

This isn't directly mine , but a coworker recounts a story where a certain action was 'supposed' to take place when some code issued a command in a machine. And it didn't always. So the programmer put a loop around the command and did it again. And again. And again. Until he got the results he wanted.


So when in the office and something similar happens we snark, to each other - #Do Till Crispy.

exabmorgan said:

So when in the office and something similar happens we snark, to each other - #Do Till Crispy.

Click to expand...

Reminds me of a job where I built a bag filling machine and then later the customer engaged an IT company with zero OT experience to do some interfacing to their IT systems. They asked me how to get the bag weight figure into their C#-based software from an Allen-Bradley PLC. With some help from this forum I pointed them to an API specifically designed to do this, but they decided that was above their level of expertise.

So anyway, the solution they came up with was to use a Windows tablet with a USB-serial adaptor, permanently mount the windows tablet instead of having it mobile like the customer wanted, add an ASCII serial module to the PLC, and send the weight over a serial link. They sent the PLC an ASCII message saying "please report last bag weight" and I had the PLC reply with the weight.

But, as if that were not already enough of a terrible hack, they had no idea how to set their software up to "listen" for an ASCII message. In the end they just asked me to continuously transmit the value for 10 seconds, and most of the time their software would catch one of them at about the 5-6 second mark.

So the rung comment on the rung that repeatedly transmitted this message was:

Scream into the void and hope somebody hears

Click to expand...

ASF said:

So anyway, the solution they came up with was to use a Windows tablet with a USB-serial adaptor, permanently mount the windows tablet instead of having it mobile like the customer wanted, add an ASCII serial module to the PLC

Click to expand...

That is giving me flashbacks of the WITS protocol. LOL

I was callecto complete a project where the programmer had upped sticks & left, one comment on the first rung was to whom has to sort out this bag of $H%£ out the Engineering manager is a complete A£$E so good luck you unfortunate XXXXXX.
Afer a week at that site I understood the guys sentiments.

This as a faux screen saver on SCADA application. Modify text to suit your industry and desired level of terror.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?l=schinese&id=39216944

I did a project in the 80's, this was an upgrade of a pilot plant for soup manufactuer, this was done on-site, being in a production area we had a tent over the control panel, ripped out the old Klockner system, rewired the new controls in the existing panel. My collegue & I worked on it for about 4 weeks, commissioned it fine, however, my collegue had put a pop up CHAD character from the vessel with a caption "What no soup" when the lid opened, the production manager was not too pleased, however, the operators loved it, he gave way to them. this was only a pilot plant and expected to only be in service for a year or two, in 2000, I was given the task of upgrading the PLC & graphics, removed the Chad, but they insisted I put it back in.

Just incase some may not know what a chad is

I was asked to put some extra buttons on an HMI.
I followed the trail to the last screen until there was some space to put them.
The company electrician was with me so he'd know where these new buttons would be.

I touched the screen area where they would be going and unbeknown to me at that time, there was a secret hidden button.
It jumped to a new screen where there were 3 photographs of the foreman.

In one he was asleep on a camp bed in his office. The next he was drinking beer with lots of empty bottles lying around and the last he was putting stolen items into his car.
The photos were timed and dated (all Saturday afternoon) and a description of the events.

He was a nasty piece of work (even to me) and was hated by all.

The programmer had retired and left the condemning pictures as a parting gift.

I did a new control for a hot platen press for a buddy more of a favor than a paying customer.


It had a status display of what step, or "Done", the cycle was on. I added a counter to count how many cycles was started and every 13 cycles replaced "Closing" with "OMG! WTF Did You Do?"


It took him 2 years to notice it, and it would have popped up 2 or 3 times a week.