From: Jean-Pierre Rosen <rosen@adalog.fr>
Subject: Ammunition for strong typing...
Date: Mon, 20 Jul 2009 09:49:14 +0200
Date: 2009-07-20T09:49:14+02:00 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <1i714h.3hs.ln@hunter.axlog.fr> (raw)
Seen on SlashDot
(http://it.slashdot.org/story/09/07/15/2050215/Software-Glitch-Leads-To-23148855308184500-Visa-Charges?from=rss)
Recently several Visa card holders were, um, overcharged for certain
purchases, to the tune of $23,148,855,308,184,500.00 on a single charge.
The company says it was due to a programming error, and that the problem
has been corrected. What is interesting is that the amount charged
actually reveals the type of programming error that caused the problem.
23,148,855,308,184,500.00 * 100 (I'm guessing this is how the number is
actually stored) is 2314885530818450000. Convert 2314885530818450000 to
hexadecimal, and you end up with 20 20 20 20 20 20 12 50. Most C/C++
programmers see the error now ... hex 20 is a space. So spaces were
stuffed into a field where binary zero should have been.
--
---------------------------------------------------------
J-P. Rosen (rosen@adalog.fr)
Visit Adalog's web site at http://www.adalog.fr
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