The more things change...

[dsrtao]

The more someone is shouting "I didn't change anything!", the more likely that they did.

What I want to hear: "OK, let's look in version control... something changed at about that time. Let's change it back and see if it works."

What I expect to hear: "I don't think I changed anything, but let's double-check."

What I usually hear: "I didn't change anything! It's your fault!" and later: "Changing that fixed it. You should give better diagnostics."

(Actually, better diagnostics are usually a good idea.)

Comments

[elizabear.livejournal.com]

Clue-by-four.

[hungrytiger]

Must be something in the air; this came up for me this week as well. At a release management meeting I was at on Wednesday, it was pretty much agreed around the table that when a user says "I didn't make any changes to my computer" that's guaranteed to be false.

Our particular favorite was a user who had changed their screen color to black and then called to complain that her monitor was broken.

[dlevey.livejournal.com]

Nothing changed at all. The sysadmins did install a new kernel, they updated some drivers, and reconfigured the firewall. But nothing changed.

PEBCAK: Problem Exists Between Chair And Keyboard
- or -
Faulty Chair-to-Keyboard Interface.

[metahacker.livejournal.com]

robertdfeinman's usual response:

"I didn't change anything!"
"Then it works just the same as it does before."

[patsmor.livejournal.com]

My problem is that I may have changed something that I think is trivial, more or less forgotten it, and then am really surprised when it turns out to be the problem. Like changing the scheduling of some task, and not realizing it has a higher priority than some other thing.