Undocumented features

[redbird]

That's programmer/hacker snark, as in "it's not a bug, it's an undocumented feature" when the code doesn't do what it's supposed to.

Only sometimes there really are undocumented features: deliberately created by the programmers, tested, doing what they're supposed to, and part of the running software, but deliberately not documented.

In this case, I've run across one that is deliberately undocumented, but will be explained to anyone who writes to tech support and says "I want to do this thing". As far as I can tell, this has the effect of adding to the workload of the support staff, and rewarding people who either don't read the documentation or assume that it's incomplete, while depriving people who figure that if it's not in the documentation, they can't do it.

I can't see how this is a win for anyone.

The feature in question isn't one I have any particular interest in--it controls how much of your LiveJournal [1] is syndicated via RSS. But (a) this strikes me as a bad idea, and (b) I wonder what else they have tucked away that I might want to use.


[1] more precisely, the publicly visible posts therein

Comments

[liv]

On second thoughts, I probably shouldn't rant about this stuff publicly. But the general message remains: I agree entirely with this post and I'm feeling pretty frustrated myself.

[redbird]

Understood. At moments like this, though, I'm glad I get emailed replies.

I haven't done much support lately for other reasons, as you know--health, then work, and that I'm spending my random evening online time IM'ing with adrian_turtle instead of on the support board--but things like this do not encourage me to continue/return.