I've recently been handed a project that involves fixing some of the most bletcherous code I've seen thus far in my career, apparently written by a professional perl programmer.
Here are some examples, posted for you're amusement ;-)
$content_dem = "$content_dem"."DEM"."\t"."1"."\t"."1"."\n";
#Remove commas
$content =~ s!, "?!!gis;
@array = split(/"/, $content);
if (system("/bin/cp $temp_cur $final_file")) {
printf("Error - file '$final_file' not updated.\n");
exit(-1);
}
select STDOUT;
$| = 1;
open SAVEOUT, ">&STDOUT";
close STDOUT;
open STDOUT, ">&SAVEOUT";
Suffice it to say, I would much rather re-write all of this from scratch than have to live with the thought that anyone else would ever have to try and hack / decipher them. Or end up having to work on them again in a couple of months time.
However, it did get me thinking, what's the worst / most bizarre / inexplicable code my fellow monks have come across over the years?
I'm sure I'm probably just scraping the tip of the iceberg here (though, having said that, I must confess that the intention of the writer of the last chunk of code is a mystery to me).