Ramblings, rumblings, grumblings, and rambling grumbly rumblings.

Actually, the United States Postal Service.

A big announcement was made in March that their shipping APIs were changing*, going from version 2 to version 4. I've no idea what happened to version 3 and why we skipped that one, but I want to be a good customer, so I'm going along with it.

In the email, the Postmaster General and/or his minions made it absolutely clear that upgrading to version 4 was completely mandatory: you don't have a choice, the email roared. Under no circumstances will version 2 work after May, 2011. You must upgrade your code or die!

Okay, sure. 

The Seamlyne shopping cart - a heavily modified version of Candypress which I have written about before - uses the version 2 API, and is written in classic ASP, a place where everybody knows my name. No biggie. I open the requisite files to have them ready to edit, and I click the link in the USPS email that gets me to the documentation for the version 4 API.

The page opens. I begin reading, looking for example code. The example code is ... drumroll please ... for version 2 ... AND - with instructions that say, "works only in Internet Explorer" does not, in fact, work in Internet Explorer.

Thankfully, the actual API docs are the correct version. Thanks for that at least, Mr. Postmaster. 

I'm glad for this change, believe it or not. Candypress is very poorly written by 2011 standards, and this will give me an opportunity to improve at least a small piece of it. Upgrade? Hell no. It's only gotten worse as it's aged. Supposedly there's a new version out for Web 2.0 - but that sort of terminology was passé two years ago. The version I have works, and I'm not going to mess with it.



* "API" stands for "application programming interface", and means, very simply, the means by which to computer programs talk to one another and exchange information. In this case, my program says, "1 pound package to Omaha", and their program replies, "Right. That'll cost you $6. Thanks, now fuck off." I pass on the $6 to the customer as "shipping." 

Microsoft's own developers prefer to code the old fashioned way: with text editors rather than their own Visual Studio.

Snover joked that programming is getting so abstract, developers will soon have to use Microsoft's in-air motion sensor game controller for the Xbox, dubbed Project Natal, to "write programs through interpretative dance."

http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9141465/Microsoft_s_top_developers_prefer_old_school_coding_methods

Thank you. I was beginning to think I was the only one.