Got an email today from our IT guy who is running Ops for a client. Their accountant is claiming that all vacation hours (and only vacation hours) have disappeared from their timesheet system. We didn't develop it, but we keep it running as part of our contract. The original developer was a real genius. This guy absolutely read the book on .Net development. Well, when I say read the book, I mean he looked at the pictures. The first three at least.
*remotes into their timesheet server*
*pulls up DB*
*finds project code for Vacation and queries for records*
1490 records returned...hmm
Don't have an account to log into the frontend, but that's not a problem. Their developer was on the cutting edge of security, and realized all the way back in 2005 the massive folly of storing user passwords encrypted. So just a quick squizz into the users table to find plaintext credentials for someone with admin rights. Log into the frontend, pull up approved hours for the prior week, and oh look, vacation records.
Remaining email chain:
Me: The records are still there. 1490 rows for Vacation code 00030, and I can see 16 hours for last week for [user] when I log in as an admin.
IT Guy: [Accountant] said they added the entries back...
Me: All 1490 entries? In the span of 80 minutes? *confused*
IT Guy: So am I... Let's forget about this!
We've always been amazed at the sheer number of WTF problems they send us. I've provided some support for this client in one capacity or another for about five years now. The one lesson I took away from the first year with them: Stress is caused by giving a fuck.