[RndTbl] Sun making users feel better through fakery

Adam Thompson athompson at avant.ca
Sat Jul 11 14:26:36 CDT 2015


I have a Sun Storage Array 7110.  This is an "integrated" appliance,
running custom hardware and custom software.  In the configuration GUI, on
the page where I configure the 4 gigabit network ports, there are - as with
everything else in the GUI - visual aids.  In this case, there are
schematic-style icons of four network ports on the left-hand side of the
page, with little green and yellow indicators for link and traffic
respectively.
I know the green dots actually track the green LEDs on the back of the
chassis, i.e. they do show actual link status in (near-)real-time.
However, the yellow dots also flicker in a manner than *might* reflect the
physical LEDs... but I was never sure.

[image: Inline image 1]

Today, while doing some unrelated maintenance on the unit, I got curious
and dug in.

I found this in the page's javascript:

akNetDevice.prototype.setActivity = function (active)
>
{

var dev = this;


> for (var i = 0; i < this.akno_widgets.length; i++)

this.akno_widgets[i].setActivity(active);


> this.akno_timeout = setTimeout(function () {

if (dev.akno_timeout)

dev.setActivity(!active);

}, 100 + Math.random() * (active ?

    akNet.DEVICE_FLICKER_ON : akNet.DEVICE_FLICKER_OFF));

};​



*Despite* having found this, the flickering yellow dots *STILL* give me a
sense of satisfaction, a vague notion that "oh, OK, the network ports are
working"!

Someone at Sun actually listened to a UI designer, it would seem.  And yet
I now also feel cheated - I was hoping the UI team was geeky enough to
actually flash the browser window graphics in time with the hardware :).


  [image: Avant logo] *Adam Thompson*
Senior Systems Administrator
*voice:* 204.789.9596 x24 | *email:* athompson at avant.ca | *web:* avant.ca
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://www.muug.mb.ca/pipermail/roundtable/attachments/20150711/34cc2c0f/attachment.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: image.png
Type: image/png
Size: 13206 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://www.muug.mb.ca/pipermail/roundtable/attachments/20150711/34cc2c0f/attachment.png>


More information about the Roundtable mailing list