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Jennifer Null's husband had warned her before they got married that taking his name could lead to occasional frustrations in everyday life. She knew the sort of thing to expect – his family joked about it now and again, after all. And sure enough, right after the wedding, problems began.
"We moved almost immediately after we got married so it came up practically as soon as I changed my name, buying plane tickets," she says. When Jennifer Null tries to buy a plane ticket, she gets an error message on most websites. The site will say she has left the surname field blank and ask her to try again.
Instead, she has to call the airline company by phone to book a ticket – but that's not the end of the process.
"I've been asked why I'm calling and when I try to explain the situation, I've been told, 'there's no way that's true'," she says.
But to any programmer, it's painfully easy to see why "Null" could cause problems for software interacting with a database. This is because the word 'null' can be produced by a system to indicate an empty name field. Now and again, system administrators have to try and fix the problem for people who are actually named "Null" – but the issue is rare and sometimes surprisingly difficult to solve.
[...] "Null" isn't the only example of a name that is troublesome for computers to process. There are many others. In a world that relies increasingly on databases to function, the issues for people with problematic names only get more severe.
Some individuals only have a single name, not a forename and surname. Others have surnames that are just one letter. Problems with such names have been reported before. Consider also the experiences of Janice Keihanaikukauakahihulihe'ekahaunaele, a Hawaiian woman who complained that state ID cards should allow citizens to display surnames even as long as hers – which is 36 characters in total. In the end, government computer systems were updated to have greater flexibility in this area.
Source: BBC.
What other names have you run into that have been problematic for computers?
(Score: 3, Funny) by Ethanol-fueled on Monday January 02 2017, @03:33PM
I modded you up, because you're right about him. And now he's not only condescending and preachy, he's jumped on the "social justice" bandwagon as a lame attempt to try to get pussy -- but I doubt its working.
Having the balls to openly disagree with women, when done playfully, is what gets the ladies' stinkboxes wet.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 03 2017, @12:00AM
The other problem with his comic is that it's not funny. That's not to say there isn't the occasional strip that gets a chuckle, but you can say the same thing about Garfield.
It says a lot that goatkcd [goatkcd.com] (warning: goatse) manages to improve over XKCD in every way.
(Score: 2) by mojo chan on Tuesday January 03 2017, @09:00AM
A bit touchy, aren't we? Did he hurt your feelings, you poor snowflake?
Seriously, the amount of stuff in his work that could be considered related to social justice is tiny. If it's enough to make you this upset, there is something wrong with you.
Let me guess, it was the free speech PSA that tipped you over the edge, wasn't it? Free Speech Warriors have been pissing themselves over that one since it was published.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)