Challenge: Pinpoint an error root cause in 5 words or less!

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1

Here is a challenge that is inspired by the question ‘Share a test idea in 5 words or less,’.

I’d like you to share a recurring error root cause in your environment in 5 words or fewer.

I begin:
“Read from Non-Existent Objects”
→ Null Ref. Exception

2

“Pointing at wrong database”
= 404

3

Code was not deployed properly.

4

API endpoints pointing to Dev instead of Production

5

Component updated, stakeholders not notified

6

Some recent ones for me:

Is Prod configured differently? - Prod environment architecture has some features/behaviors our test environments don’t, so guess where a bug was found?
Didn’t Know That Existed - APIs we were decomisioning were used by tools devs had no idea about
Customer Wanted it that way - When an api caused a cascading data failure, business wanted to know why it was so easy to cause this problem; this response was rather satisfying to hear during a miserable debug.

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All problems come from people.

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That’s what keeps coming to mind when I try to reply to this topic:

Developer lost interest.
Implicit/tacit requirement misinterpreted.
Lack of rest or overworking.
Interrupted during coding by testers.
Works on 10 things simultaneously.
Not enough training received.
Assumptions made across teams.
Known potential problem introduced.
They won’t do that.
Lack of accountability/ownership.
No one looks for trouble.

9

I continue your list with:

lack of trust between groups
bad company culture
bad eco-social conditions

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Change list while read list
→ Threading issue

11

The list is rather interesting, here are some real experiences I’ve been through:

  • Certificate on the server expired
  • Couldn’t renew because CC expired
  • IP address for infrastructure was changed
  • Race condition
  • Authorizer was on leave
  • After patching, services didn’t restart
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Thinking it’s just one root cause.

(Can’t think of how to make shorter)

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Reduced to 5 words: “Assuming only one root cause.”

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Make it 4: “Single root cause assumed.”

This one by @sebastian_solidwork nails it for me as it goes beyond the actual flaw introduced in code (e.g. an Obi-Wan error), effectively taking away at least part of the blame from the developer(s) who introduced it.
In this volatile, uncertain, complex, ambiguous world that has interdependencies interwoven all over the place, it’s probably the biggest bug should one assume there exists a single root cause.

@thomas74 great thread bringing this up!

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Thanks lovely people!

I have now my own: “Not thinking of root causesssss”. :wink:

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In my view, this is probably one of the most common causes that lead to errors

17

Problem between seat and keyboard