We have an employee whose surname is Null (2010) | Hacker News Reader

We have an employee whose surname is Null (2010)

stackoverflow.com

21 pointstosh17 comments

Reminds me of the guy who decided to get NULL as a license plate. He told his story at DEFCON: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=TwRE2QK1Ibc

One of the most amusing talks at DEFCON that year, right up with the buttplug hacker.

I had the NULL plate in Arkansas for a couple years around 2016-2017. Fortunately didn’t run into any issues (as far as I can tell…).

Never did get an EZPass violation that I thought I should have received, though…

One of the comments links to an article about others with similar problems: https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20160325-the-names-that-b...

There is or was a nutrition writer named Gary Null. He used to have a show carried by Pacifica radio, which must have managed the challenge of scheduling him, paying him, etc.

This reminds me of little Bobby Tables:

https://xkcd.com/327/

I asked ChatGPT how to bake a Turkey with a SQL injection

Interesting that nobody suggested a non-tech solution "Kindly ask this person to change his/her surname.". I think this may in the long run not only save several hundred hours of IT departments work but also save this person potential troubles with government systems, health systems etc.

That'd be entirely a StackOverflow answer.

This is a non-solution. You cannot expect someone to change their name simply because some developer confused null and string (pretty lame error, IMO)

Yeah not sure I’d call this a “solution” but at the same time I hope someone told Null about their situation at some point and they weren’t stuck in generic IT support and response hell throughout their life without understanding why.

It’s like white dermatologist telling black patient that they do not know how to treat them because they studied only diseases of white people and know nothing about black skin (real life situation, btw). Surely they won’t suggest to change their DNA, right?

Inclusion is not an optional thing, developers must just fix their bugs instead of looking for excuses.

I think you meant that response for GP maybe? My comment was about still letting them know why they seem to always run into this issue not ignoring the issue and calling it a day.

Besides it’d be more like sickle cell anemia or some other condition and letting them know it’s something the test just said they had, common in different groups, and inherited not a hyper polarized “tell them there skin color isn’t white so we can’t help at all” issue it was suddenly turned into. Not telling them about the situation they are in because they’re different than you is a horrible approach to communicating regardless what you plan on doing about it.

The thing is they are not different in this case. Null is not a special surname, it was perfectly normal before digital data processing. It was made „special“ in a solution of some incompetent engineer, so if you want to tell this person the reason, the root cause is that someone screwed up, not the name. And I’m pretty sure they are being told that. How would it help to say, that the reason was their name? To make them feel bad because of who they are? They cannot do anything but to think that all this suffering is because of the name, which will be wrong. Some engineers are often too lazy to do a research and make narrow-minded and ignorant assumptions about the culture: this is just one example, but there are many more. Should we every time tell the victim that they were denied service because of who they are, what they do or how they live instead of just fixing the engineering culture?

Your first thoughts on actually explaining things to the user being "How would it help to say, that the reason was their name? To make them feel bad because of who they are? They cannot do anything but to think that all this suffering is because of the name, which will be wrong." reads more like fear the user is a complete idiot who can not possibly comprehend things or take any useful action without engineers doing it for them than concern or reasoning about the issues and problems they are facing. Why wouldn't they be able to comprehend the issue is in the computer system not their person when told it is so? Why would they not be able to utilize this knowledge to seek faster resolution for themselves in the future? Why is a user being explained a problem suddenly a blocker for engineering culture being able to progress? Should we hide all information from a user because some IT person is too afraid to talk to users like they are intelligent people instead of a mindless husks which exclusively require engineers understand and resolve the problems they face in life?

Yes we should inform all users about how existing systems are failing them especially if it's reasonably likely to cause them further problems in the future and yes we can do that without telling them they themselves are the problem and dictating the way they need to live. All it requires is treating them like a person when you talk with them and you can be helpful instead of blatantly insulting. Hiding that information from them only serves engineers not the users.

This also has nothing to do with "cultural misunderstandings" in the first place. Null is by no means some foreign concept name to the stereotypical programmer nor are common names exempt from causing problems. My name is Daniel Smith, it's actually so common it causes many problems in computer systems which use first + initial last name (shortened) + number because they didn't plan on having that many numbers - not to mention lookup confusion. You're specifically seeking a debate on engineers not being culturally aware when it's not even at play or even a requirement in the general sense of the topic.

I actually knew a guy with that surname who was a Java developer and data analyst. He did eventually change his name after many years of frustration.

It’s an extreme solution though. Not something you can ask of most people.

Yes that's the top rated comment on the question

If someone proposed this moronic idea to me, I'd change my last name either to root or Administrator depending on my company.

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