[HN Gopher] Letters about Soap (1997)
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Letters about Soap (1997)
Author : pxeger1
Score : 144 points
Date : 2022-09-09 13:31 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (people.cs.ksu.edu)
(TXT) w3m dump (people.cs.ksu.edu)
| JJMcJ wrote:
| Ha, I expected it to be about SOAP the protocol
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SOAP but this seems to be more
| interesting.
|
| I suppose if you have a Galactic Empire sized business, maybe
| something like SOAP (or EDI) to really nail things down makes
| some sense. Otherwise I'm not so sure.
| zwkrt wrote:
| Not a year goes by where I'm not convinced that things would be
| easier if as a community we used a modern version of the soap
| protocol, maybe with JSON instead of XML. RPC is such a clean
| design compared to REST, and it we had auto-generated client
| code 15 years ago, something the likes of swagger are still
| catching up with.
| brianm wrote:
| Thrift and GRPC fill that niche nicely.
| Deadron wrote:
| Auto generated client code is nice in theory. In practice I
| find it only really useful as a starting point. There are
| enough choices to be made in writing even a simple HTTP api
| that its unlikely that a generic tool will generate useful
| code for a given application. This could include library
| usage (http client, serialization, logging, DI integration),
| async vs sync, logging requirements, tooling support for
| generated code. If you are in a language which has
| established std libraries and patterns this is less of a
| problem, but in something like Java that has evolved in all
| these areas over the years it can be a real problem.
| tzs wrote:
| SOAP was OK in theory but many implementations left something
| to be desired. In particular I generally found it worked OK
| if the client code was autogenerated from the same SOAP
| implementation that the server used, but if you could not use
| that autogenerated code (such as when your client was using a
| language that the generator did not support) it was a lot
| more iffy.
|
| I found a great book at Safari Books Online on SOAP that said
| that it was written because the author had been bitten by
| those issues and other things caused by some less than
| brilliant decisions on the part of those who made the SOAP
| standard (he was considerably less polite than I have phrased
| it) and wrote the book so the rest of us didn't have to waste
| as much time figuring it out as he had.
|
| I don't remember the name of the book or the author, and when
| I needed a SOAP book a couple years after that it did not
| show up when I searched.
|
| At one point I got tired enough of the quirks of making
| servers work with clients not using the server's client
| generator that I wrote a little proxy that would sit between
| the server and client. Then I'd write a client using the
| server's client generator that would just go through all my
| services and log the communications.
|
| For example lets say I had a server to look up VAT, which
| takes a sales price and a country code and returns the VAT
| rate and the VAT amount.
|
| I'd do that through the proxy two or three times, which would
| save the XML the client sent to the server and the XML
| response. I'd then compare the XML from the different client
| requests to see if anything changed, such as timestamps.
|
| I'd then open the client XML in an editor, replace any
| timestamps with "___TIMESTAMP___", then search for the price
| and country code to see how those were stored. I'd replace
| them with "___PRICE___" and "___COUNTRY__".
|
| For the XML from the server, I'd open that in an editor and
| search for VAT rate and amount. For those I'd figure out a
| regular expression that could find them.
|
| Then on the client I could dispense with using a SOAP
| library. When I wanted to look up VAT I'd just use the normal
| HTTP library of the client language, using the edited client
| XML as a template. I'd use the normal string or regex client
| library to replace "___TIMESTAMP___", "___PRICE___", and
| "___COUNTRY___" with the correct values, send the XML to the
| server, then use the regex to pull the answers out of the
| response.
|
| From there it was a simple matter to make a library to handle
| this. Input was the client XML template, URL of the server,
| and a list of name => value pairs, and a list of name =>
| regex pairs. It would look for "___name___" in the template
| for each input name and replace it with its value, call the
| server, and then for each name in the second list, use the
| corresponding regex to find the result, and return a list of
| name => value pairs with those results.
|
| It was a bit tedious. If someone deployed a new SOAP service
| I had to go generate a client using the same SOAP
| implementation the server used, call the new service from
| that through my proxy to get the XML for the templates, and
| then make a template and the extraction regexes, but it was
| still usually less hassle than mixing server and client SOAP
| implementations.
| datalopers wrote:
| This reads like a dev happy with their single server when the
| kubernetes toting new devops hire shows up.
| staticassertion wrote:
| God some people are so _whiny_. I bring my own soap to the hotel
| and I just ignore the soap that 's there.
|
| I realize that's not the point, but damn.
| bbarnett wrote:
| Part of me thinks this was faked/exaggerated at the time,
| except...
|
| Once on Amazon, I ordered an open tent. Basically, it is just an
| aluminum frame, 12 feetx12, 8 feet high, with canvas, to keep the
| sun off when presenting things at outdoor events.
|
| The one I received took 5 weeks to arrive, and was supposed to be
| new. But it was used, with scruff marks on the posts. I sent
| pics, and said "Hey, this is supposed to be new! What gives!!"
|
| An immediate "Sorry" with a "We have shipped a replacement." was
| the response. Really, all I wanted was a discount, mostly to
| compensate me for the paint I needed to buy.
|
| But OK, I said thanks. And waited.
|
| 8 weeks later, I again contacted them. "Where is my replacement?
| Do you have a tracking number? It has not arrived yet."
|
| Another immediate response, "We have shipped you a
| replacement..."
|
| Whatever, I think. Scam, I think.
|
| 1 week later, it arrives. I notice the ship date, and realise it
| was the original replacement.
|
| Worried, I contact them, and explain that the first replacement
| had arrived, all is good, it was just late, can they cancel the
| replacement's replacement?
|
| I received a response "We have shipped a replacement."
|
| And yes, I now have 4 of the things. I did not try to contact
| them again, for fear of ending up with more.
|
| They got 5 stars though.
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| I had a similar issue. I really think that it is cheaper for
| them to write things off, than to receive replacements.
|
| I had an item shipped from China, and it arrived a day past
| when it was due (actually, it arrived in the late evening of
| the due date, so I guess you could say it "arrived as
| scheduled").
|
| In any case, on arrival day, it had not arrived, so I sent in a
| complaint, and it was refunded immediately (Amazon is actually
| really good for that).
|
| The problem was, it arrived, and I wanted to rescind the
| refund.
|
| That's where things got complicated. After trying various
| things, Amazon finally just told me to keep the item (and the
| refund).
|
| In point of fact, I felt bad, because I know it was a low-
| margin mom and pop store (albeit Chinese mom and pop). I don't
| think it was one of those massive "fraud factories."
|
| But it was actually impossible to return the money.
| johnmaguire wrote:
| I have always assumed that for items which are shipped from
| Amazon fulfillment centers, if stolen or lost during
| shipment, Amazon is covering the cost not the vendor. But I
| don't know if that's actually true.
| squeaky-clean wrote:
| My back-and-forth with support wasn't as funny as these, but I
| had the same thing happen with a subscription to the print
| edition of Computer Music Magazine in 2019/2020.
|
| It took them over 4 months to ship my first issue. With
| magazines you usually get the issue for the month after you
| subscribe, so I waited 6 weeks before emailing support. They
| told me it should have been sent, they would send a
| replacement. Repeat this every month-ish and after the 3rd try
| I gave up.
|
| About a month after my last contact I got 4 copies of the April
| issue. A month later I got 4 copies of the May issue. And so on
| for the next year. Rather than ship me a new December (or
| whenever it started) issue, they just kept giving my account a
| new subscription and calling it a day.
| JJMcJ wrote:
| When the Sorcerer's Apprentice works on Customer Support.
| dreamcompiler wrote:
| My brain just flashed on packets and time-to-live and ACKs
| getting out of phase. Which doesn't happen in TCP.
|
| Moral: Always use sequence numbers in customer service
| communications.
| InCityDreams wrote:
| Very USA... _> Really, all I wanted was a discount, mostly to
| compensate me for the paint I needed to buy.
|
| Ad the time to seal off an area, shake the cans....
|
| Jack up the price, 3 for the price of two, when it all fucks
| up, give 20% off...they fucking love it.
|
| Save 8.1%. Sold. Save $10.00 if you buy 3. Sold.
|
| _ Return the fucking thing. It's not what you wanted. Or, start
| the haggle BEFORE you enter into the negotiation.
|
| Thankfully, a company i just dealt with explained/ replied to
| every question very clearly that if i got fucked, they will
| pay. Ha. I doubled my order. But, if i need to paint
| anything....it goes back (the items have to be failsafe). Or, i
| would have requested 'sub-standard paint job...no problem".
|
| My credit card/ bank do not understand 'quality', or 'taste',
| or 'dissatisfaction'. I do, and I'm the customer.
| derefr wrote:
| Sending the item back requires more effort than painting it.
| If you don't own a car (which is one of the main reasons you
| would order things like a tent for online delivery instead of
| going to your local outdoor/sporting/camping goods store
| where you could inspect them personally) then you need to
| somehow get a tent-sized and tent-massed box to the post
| office. (Remember, this isn't an ultralight-camping backpack
| tent; more a piece of yard furniture. It isn't necessarily
| portable.)
| projektfu wrote:
| My sister received 3 bur-type coffee grinders in a similar
| sequence of events. So now I have a nice grinder.
| raesene9 wrote:
| I thought I recognized this story, then I noticed the date in the
| headers 1997... yep this used to get forwarded round in e-mail in
| the 90's.
| nokita wrote:
| I think I saw a comment, perhaps 20 years ago, saying that this
| is an adaptation of a stand up comedy routine. A quick search has
| failed to confirm or refute this, and regardless of the origin it
| is (a) very funny, and (b) instructive.
|
| But I suspect it shouldn't be taken as real, even if the lessons
| one can learn from it certainly are real, and it is all too
| plausible.
| TremendousJudge wrote:
| Yeah it has all the beats of one of those old email humor
| chains that would get forwarded back in the day.
| SaintGhurka wrote:
| The comedian was Shelley Berman.
|
| Edit: notice he signed each note "S. Berman"
| joshspankit wrote:
| This is an excellent addition to HN and I hope that devs and
| product managers alike see what happens when everyone tries to do
| as little as possible without taking the time to understand the
| bigger picture or even the underlying problem.
|
| This could have been solved so simply at any step of the journey.
| cptcobalt wrote:
| Hiliariously, my PM brain that can never be at-rest was
| thinking about how this whole interaction could be improved.
| Hampered, of course, that this was dated in 1997-now hotels
| have magical things like in-room tablets.
| fsniper wrote:
| That's a huge problem. This situation is not something that
| requires "improvement". It's a well defined, easy to
| implement, no frills request. And which is particularly tried
| hard not to be delivered. Any of the parties which are to
| provide the solution do not use one modicum of brain to solve
| this. They ignore clear and concise communications and try to
| play dumb and by the book. Which was the all ask. "Don't play
| by the book, ignore this part which I particularly don't
| need".
| juancb wrote:
| Which means that this can now play out with tablets instead
| of bars of soap.
| teh_klev wrote:
| At least things didn't completely escalate. Tangentially, these
| exchanges reminded me of "Computers Don't Argue":
|
| https://www.atariarchives.org/bcc2/showpage.php?page=133
| prmph wrote:
| Sounds like stateless customer service, the ultimate result of
| applying functional programming principles to running a hotel.
| yaodong wrote:
| haha, this comment made my day! functional programming customer
| service!
| teachrdan wrote:
| Room service is a lambda
| xen2xen1 wrote:
| I would 100% start collecting these in a bag somewhere and not
| bother contacting anyone. Things like this are why. Only contact
| the front desk for immediate, large problems which can be taken
| care of by immediate personnel.
| opwieurposiu wrote:
| I assume this guy did not want to bin the unused superfluous soap
| because that would be wasteful. I would feel the same way.
|
| Nowadays there is a no-pro that recycles the hotel soaps:
|
| https://thehustle.co/the-surprising-afterlife-of-used-hotel-...
| realslimjd wrote:
| This is great, but they're solving the wrong problem. Using
| soap and shampoo dispensers is a lot easier and more
| environmentally friendly, but there's still a bit of a stigma
| around liquid soap coming from a box stuck on the wall.
| smashah wrote:
| Great read! thanks for sharing but I have to ask, what is a
| "no-pro"?
| youainti wrote:
| I presume it means non profit.
| ImPostingOnHN wrote:
| reminds me of a lot of "support" these days: figure out which
| script contains words which sound like the problem being
| described, then follow it, without actually taking the time to
| understand the problem
| cptcobalt wrote:
| That's exactly what happens here. There should be some sort of
| "GPT-3 Summary" of support notes--I've recently had
| interactions where some problems were documented very clearly
| by good folks in early notes, but everyone that works on a case
| afterward tends to only read the most recent 2-3 notes.
| acqbu wrote:
| Did anyone else click on the link expecting a rant about the
| soap protocol?
| UglyToad wrote:
| I clicked on it expecting effusive praise of SOAP.
| Disappointed to find it's still only me, there must be tens
| of us who like it.
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| Poor dear. I think they have medication for that...
|
| I have done ONVIF programming, and I actually licensed a
| dependency for the SOAP part.
| derefr wrote:
| My company has been scaling its way into the realm where
| the use-cases for things like workload managers and
| enterprise service busses are _just_ starting to make sense
| to me. Can you ELI5 the (presumably very enterprise-y)
| niche where SOAP really shines, above-and-beyond just
| building regular REST APIs with OpenAPI schemas?
| UglyToad wrote:
| I'll be honest I've never really considered the various
| drawbacks and benefits against other solutions. It's just
| something I occasionally run into in a legacy context
| where I need to integrate to get unblocked.
|
| I think not having used it to any real extent I've not
| run into the parts people hate. I just get an
| automatically generated client library that can be
| treated like normal method calls, more or less.
|
| But I've also not had the opportunity to work with
| OpenAPI stuff so I'm not sure what the current state of
| the art there looks like
| InCityDreams wrote:
| Are you talking about 'soap' the tv series? That fucker
| took me years to understand, but when i finally did get it,
| Barney Miller suddenly made a lot more sense. Especially
| that one-eyed green guy.
| marcosdumay wrote:
| I have heard praise of SOAP once. It came from a Sun
| spokesperson, before the protocol had support on anything
| on the real world.
|
| I have never heard praise of it again.
|
| To tell you the truth, the autodiscovery part would be
| really awesome... if it worked. But instead, the thousands
| of pages long set of standards that create SOAP are not
| specific enough, so it doesn't work.
| andrewf wrote:
| The S stands for Simple:
| http://harmful.cat-v.org/software/xml/soap/simple
| purplerabbit wrote:
| Yes.
|
| Only tangentially related: does anyone else have the sense
| that GraphQL is fancy, modern SOAP?
| doctor_eval wrote:
| Oh no, I love me some graphql, soap on the other hand was
| like my worst interop nightmare.
| [deleted]
| tristor wrote:
| I've taken to the habit of just taking all the toiletries and
| dropping them in my bag because I bring my own. It's not worth
| arguing with them, and incidents like this are unfortunately
| commonplace (as a regular traveler, I attest). The hotel
| toiletries I end up using for future travels, it's not that I
| have any issue with them, but rather that I don't always stay in
| hotels so I always keep my own toiletries.
| bennyp101 wrote:
| I enjoyed that!
| acqbu wrote:
| Likewise, I like it nice and soapy ;-)
| flint wrote:
| How can my 1 tiny customisation request be so dificult -
| afterall, you serve millions of customers everyday?
| pliuchkin wrote:
| > In just 5 days here I have accumulated 24 little bars of soap.
| Why are you doing this to me?
|
| Laughed so much here, but such a kafkaesque nightmare.
| sharken wrote:
| Came here to say the same, that was when the story went from
| interesting to hilarious.
| joshstrange wrote:
| Flashbacks of most long support threads I've been on...
|
| > Hi I'm $insertNewName and I'll be taking over your case. Have
| you tried turning it off and on again?
|
| Despite 10 other interactions suggesting the same thing
| :facepalm:
|
| That and just finding whatever support article comes up when they
| stuff a few keywords into their search, no matter that the same
| document has been linked multiple times before in the thread.
| fsniper wrote:
| exactly what I thought reading this .
| zaszrespawned wrote:
| I LOL'd
| billpg wrote:
| Why do I feel the urge to find this guy's address and arrange for
| an industrial crate of tiny soap bars delivered to him?
| dylan604 wrote:
| But they have to be in stacks no more than 4 high due to their
| tendency to tip over, so it might be more than one crate
| required.
| Cthulhu_ wrote:
| And some of them have to be very moist.
| marcosdumay wrote:
| If you create enough stacks around each other, that stops
| being a problem.
| dylan604 wrote:
| maybe, but that lessens the level of asshattery since by
| sticking to 4 bars high you are still complying with the
| customer's preference.
| billpg wrote:
| "Welcome to the Soap-of-the-Week Club! Every week we'll send
| you some tiny bars of soap in a little stack. You may not
| revoke your membership."
| zhte415 wrote:
| 3.. 2.. 1..
|
| Someone starts a subscription service for small bars of
| hotel style soap, perhaps themes of hotel, room type,
| region, season regional or other soap minutiae, shipped
| once a month.
|
| Like Candy Japan, but for tiny bars of hotel soap.
| kevin_thibedeau wrote:
| I'm thinking a millennial lifestyle brand promising to
| bring world peace and eliminate CO2 emissions one mini
| bar of soap at a time.
| acuozzo wrote:
| I did some research on newspapers.com.
|
| The original story was published by The Guardian over four issues
| in March 1996 on the 12th, 13th, 15th, and 18th under the
| following respective titles:
|
| 1. "Soap Opera":
| http://acuozzo.sdf.org/The_Guardian_Tue__Mar_12__1996_.jpg
|
| 2. "Slippery Tale":
| https://acuozzo.sdf.org/The_Guardian_Wed__Mar_13__1996_.jpg
|
| 3. "Late Bar":
| https://acuozzo.sdf.org/The_Guardian_Fri__Mar_15__1996_.jpg
|
| 4. "Soap Flakes":
| http://acuozzo.sdf.org/The_Guardian_Mon__Mar_18__1996_.jpg
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