Bizarre Droid Auto-Focus Bug Revealed 275
Posted
by
timothy
from the each-droid-has-a-moth-enclosed dept.
from the each-droid-has-a-moth-enclosed dept.
itwbennett writes "Pity the poor engineer who had to find this one. One of the more interesting of the handful of bugs that have appeared since the launch of Verizon's Droid smartphone has to do with the on-board camera's auto-focus. Apparently it just didn't work. And then suddenly it did. Naturally, this off-again, on-again made the theories fly. But the real reason for the bug was revealed in a comment on an Engadget post by someone claiming to be Google engineer Dan Morrill: 'There's a rounding-error bug in the camera driver's autofocus routine (which uses a timestamp) that causes autofocus to behave poorly on a 24.5-day cycle,' said Morrill. 'That is, it'll work for 24.5 days, then have poor performance for 24.5 days, then work again. The 17th is the start of a new 'works correctly' cycle, so the devices will be fine for a while. A permanent fix is in the works.'"
Does it use an Intel CPU? (Score:2, Funny)
Just curious.....
Auto-Focus (Score:5, Funny)
In case you were worried.... (Score:5, Funny)
Spring Break, the biggest part of it, occurs within a working cycle.
Alleged... (Score:5, Funny)
by someone claiming to be Google engineer Dan Morrill
Yeah, it could also be one of those lame Dan Morrill impersonators who solve perplexing engineering/programming issues, then post the solution under his name. MAN that's annoying..
Re:Auto-Focus (Score:1, Funny)
"Sporadically bugs: iDoesn't. Droid does."
"Not waiting long"? (Score:5, Funny)
I've been waiting a long long time for standardization of integer types.
iFocus ... NOT (Score:5, Funny)
Re:In case you were worried.... (Score:1, Funny)
But does is coincide with the monthly cycle of the subjects likely to be photographed by these Droids? ;-)
Re:Auto-Focus (Score:5, Funny)
Simple solution (Score:3, Funny)
Just buy two with opposing date stamps.
Re:When Signed/Unsigned Strikes (Score:5, Funny)
We're waiting unsigned long.
Wow (Score:4, Funny)
Considering that a lunar cycle is 29.5 days long, we've actually found a bug that depends (approximately) on the phase of the moon!
Re:When Signed/Unsigned Strikes (Score:5, Funny)
As long as it's not a justin long... he's already signed.
Re:When Signed/Unsigned Strikes (Score:5, Funny)
Waiting long? Hopefully we're not waiting double!
Re:IIRC, this is the same sort of bug (Score:5, Funny)
I didn't realize there was a real software reason for it.
I wonder if there's a way to do the same for my wife - you know, fix a software bug.
Gotta run she's home!
A permanent fix (Score:2, Funny)
"'There's a rounding-error bug in the camera driver's autofocus routine (which uses a timestamp) that causes autofocus to behave poorly on a 24.5-day cycle,' said Morrill."
Cool! The device will later be fixed to properly behave poorly only every 24.45 days!
Re:Rounding error? (Score:4, Funny)
Spelling error? Inexcusable. The English language is too mature for that type of shit.
(In case you missed it, your argument has just as much validity in the real world due to differences in people.)
Re:When Signed/Unsigned Strikes (Score:4, Funny)
WRONG FOCUS...
Sounds like you are on the wrong end of the 24.5 day cycle :)
Schrodinger's Auto-Focus (Score:5, Funny)
It is necessary to have some radioactive elements in your phone for it to focus.
PS, it may or may not also kill cats!
Re:Time-releated bugs (Score:5, Funny)
I also had a bug report for when you tried to add a prerequisite that didn't exist to a training task (the system tracked flight Air Force crew training and experience), an error would pop up that said "All this time and it still doesn't work..." In that case, apparently debugging was as far as anyone ever got.
Re:A timestamping overflow error (Score:5, Funny)
Congratulations. You are among the few (but growing in number) who not only can't RTFA, but lack the attention span or comprehension skills to read the summary itself.
MTV has a network for you.
Is that network called MTV?
Re:Auto-Focus (Score:2, Funny)
Re:IIRC, this is the same sort of bug (Score:5, Funny)
Same timeframe? You could actually keep a Win 95 system up and running for 24 days?
Re:Does it use an Intel CPU? (Score:5, Funny)
Read and be enlightened [wikipedia.org].
Of course my favorite joke about the matter:
Q: "How did Intel decide to name the 586 processor?"
A: "They took 486, added 100, and came up with 585.999999999999824"
I must have the same bug... (Score:5, Funny)
After about 42 years my auto-focus suddenly stopped working as well.
You think if I live to 84 or so it will suddenly get better again?
I sure hope there's a patch...
G.
Re:IIRC, this is the same sort of bug (Score:2, Funny)
Re:I must have the same bug... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Auto-Focus (Score:4, Funny)
"Sporadically bugs: iDoesn't. Droid does."
Yeah, tell that to the iPhone browser next time it shits out without warning. iDoes, too.
Re:When Signed/Unsigned Strikes (Score:5, Funny)
Sounds like you are on the wrong end of the 24.5 day cycle :)
That's what my wife keeps telling me. :(
Re:"Not waiting long"? (Score:5, Funny)
Yeah? Well, I've been waiting an unsigned long long time for standardization of integer types. Twice as long!
Patriot's Ghost (Score:3, Funny)
Hmmm, did the auto-focus programmer used to work on the Patriot anti-missile system?
Re:I must have the same bug... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:When Signed/Unsigned Strikes (Score:5, Funny)
Under most circumstances, you would be correct. However, there are certain situations under which it is grammatically correct to omit the final mark of punctuation: when a speaking character is defenestrated mid-dialogue; when the narrator has just discovered himself to be his own grandpa; and (as is clearly the case in the grandparent post) when quoting the first line of a limerick:
Wish I had mod points, this entire thread is one of the funniest ever on /.
Second quite possibly only to last week's delightful essay on the breakdancing robot
Of course it would be
somewhat remiss of me
Not to mention that I find most everything hilarious because I just don't get out a whole lot.
Re:When Signed/Unsigned Strikes (Score:1, Funny)
Our jokes aren't like your jokes
Mother said there would be days like this (Score:4, Funny)
Re:When Signed/Unsigned Strikes (Score:2, Funny)
Ahh, but what if it's someone *else* who has to go back and change your clever algorithm next year? Surely after he figures it out he'll be pleasantly impressed and grateful for the challenge you so kindly provided.
This is why I don't comment my code.
Re:New Moon? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:When Signed/Unsigned Strikes (Score:5, Funny)
Re:When Signed/Unsigned Strikes (Score:5, Funny)
Word.
Uh... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Alleged... (Score:5, Funny)
You have some interesting points, person, posting using Artraze's account, on a website my DNS tells me is slashdot.org.
Re:"Not waiting long"? (Score:3, Funny)
me love ulong time