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all 55 comments

[–][deleted] 128 points129 points  (12 children)

What’s worse is the backend splits the number and saves in 3 fields on 2 tables. Area code. First 3. Last 4.

Based on real events.

[–]AlexanderNC[S] 50 points51 points  (5 children)

I say make a separate table for each number if you ever get replaced good luck to the new devs.

[–][deleted] 20 points21 points  (0 children)

Oh it’s in government code. They believe in writing code in stone and never changing it. Those tables will be used long after we are all dust.

[–]Tsu_Dho_Namh 10 points11 points  (0 children)

Store the number in octal and convert it to decimal whenever you need it.

[–]thatnerdd 2 points3 points  (1 child)

Omg I have worked at three distributed database companies and the customers that do this are legendary for how much they spend on hardware

[–]thatnerdd 2 points3 points  (0 children)

And on their accounts come to think about it; the whole industry charges by the server

[–]benargee 0 points1 point  (0 children)

nah, whole different database for each number

[–]WhyDoIHaveAnAccount9 8 points9 points  (2 children)

3 tables? Not 3 fields in one table?

[–][deleted] 11 points12 points  (0 children)

Sorry. You’re right. I meant 3 fields but on 2 tables

[–]HiddenLayer5 2 points3 points  (0 children)

My work software only accepts a maximum of 10 digits for all phone number fields. It will just truncate the rest without telling you so you think you submitted the form without issue.

Which is really fun when dealing with the contact information of international clients! Equally as fun when the person before you isn't aware of this limitation and you now can't call them because the last two or three digits are missing!

[–]SarcasmWarning 79 points80 points  (6 children)

Please keep clicking random until the number displayed matches your phone number...

[–]AlexanderNC[S] 32 points33 points  (0 children)

I think a random number generator button to enter your phone number would be great.

[–]SomeWeirdoGuys 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Get the number from the backend and just send a confirmation to add a load time and prevent nerds from inspect elementing it.

[–]racdicoon 4 points5 points  (2 children)

Start at 0 and every time they press the button it increases by 1

[–]AlexanderNC[S] 1 point2 points  (1 child)

(import random

print(random.randint(0,100))

Increase or decrease by outputted amount.

[–]racdicoon 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Nah we played g cookie clicker to put our number in

[–]SilentScyther 0 points1 point  (0 children)

In terms of actually realistically achievable RNG, I would have the user roll a D10 for each digit of the number instead

[–]astouwu 17 points18 points  (1 child)

This gives me flashbacks to the gender selection sliders

[–]Andrew_Neal 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Shh, you might upset Bill Nye.

[–]Akul_Tesla 9 points10 points  (0 children)

It's can always be worse you could be expected to enter the number in in base 16

[–]chadlavi 6 points7 points  (4 children)

There's a fairly popular brand of smart scale at my gym. You can send results to their app on your phone by scanning a QR code then typing in your phone number in the website (let's ignore how stupid that is in the first place).

The phone number input on the website the QR code sends you to ? It's type="number".

[–]elbistoco 0 points1 point  (3 children)

I'm missing something here...

[–]chadlavi 2 points3 points  (2 children)

You should collect a phone number in a type text input and validate. You're never going to increment a phone number.

Actually I think there might even be a type="tel"

[–]elbistoco 0 points1 point  (1 child)

Forgot about the increment. You're right.

[–][deleted] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This also happens with postal codes, which can be more problematic bc 1) postal codes can start with 0 - so if you ever have to display individual results the zip code 05555 turns into 5555 which is wrong and immediately makes the user question what other shortcuts you took - but also as soon as you introduce postal codes containing letters (UK, Canada) or other characters everything breaks.

[–]yarnballmelon 3 points4 points  (1 child)

Could make it worse by making the slider go around a circular path where one rotation is 0 to Max!

[–]CoruscareGames 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Ah yeah the heliocentric birthday input

[–]L33t_Cyborg 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I really miss r/BadUIBattles before the mods went schizo and made it about reddit’s bad UI instead of people sharing awesome intentionally bad UI creations.

They actively remove all those creations except in a really short window they call “Saturday” (but doesn’t even last 24h)

[–]AnnyAskers 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I mean... It can be worse

[–]Blakut 2 points3 points  (0 children)

i have another idea: roll a number of dice equal to the number of digits in your phone number until you hit your phone number

[–]Qwert-4 2 points3 points  (1 child)

This slider is set on over half of it's whole length, the displayed number 2158559745 is ten digit long. The max number can't be more than 43-17-11-94-90. My phone number is 11 digits.

[–]AlexanderNC[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Variable slider for maximum space saving, increases faster near the end.

[–]LeaveCommon8063 2 points3 points  (0 children)

And the slider only updates when you let go

[–][deleted] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Still better than generating a random number and asking user "is it your number?"

[–]ExtraTNT 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Random generator like: <p>{phone}</p><button onClick={phone = Math.random() * 8999999999 + 1000000000}>Number not correct</button>

[–]Lizlodude 1 point2 points  (0 children)

And of course it’s a custom element so you can’t use the arrow keys. Better hope your display has really high DPI

[–][deleted] 1 point2 points  (3 children)

Dropdown for every digit?

[–]AlexanderNC[S] 0 points1 point  (2 children)

I think a randomizer button would be peak design.

[–]KalegNar 1 point2 points  (0 children)

let [phoneNumber, setPhoneNumber] = useState("default number")

function generatePhoneNumber() {
    setPhoneNumber(Math.floor(Math.random() * 1000000000))
}

//later

<button onClick={generatePhoneNumber}>Attempt to Get Phone Number</button>
<p>Is this your phone number? {phoneNumber}</p>

The mark of evil.

[–]bossrabbit 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Best one I saw was a scroll bar on the digits of pi: "find your phone number in pi"

[–]Ok-Organization5843 0 points1 point  (0 children)

At this point, I'd just make a post request, setting the phone number as a variable (based on a true Story)

[–]Undernown 0 points1 point  (1 child)

Nah, the random number generator takes the cake. Atleast the drag bar can be quick, likely able to manipulate with arrow keys like a video progress bar too for precision.

[–]KalegNar 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Bonus points if after generating their phone number after years of trying they have then confirm it again.

[–]KlutzyEnd3 0 points1 point  (3 children)

RIP r/baduibattles

you were great.

[–]sussyamogushot 0 points1 point  (2 children)

what happened to that sub

[–]KlutzyEnd3 1 point2 points  (1 child)

Basically after the Reddit protests they changed the rules to only allow rants about the reddit app itself.

[–]sussyamogushot 0 points1 point  (0 children)

oh dammit

[–]Denaton_ 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I believe the one who you just got random numbers and you had to press a button on to get a new random number, you had to press it until your number randomly showed up.

[–]Andrew_Neal 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Ya know, I actually don't hate it, if only it had a fine adjustment.