I don't deny, and never did, that the software isn't a
The thing is that this application started out as 3270 technology, similar to this...
As originally designed, when you wanted to change the status of the document, there was two strategies;
- To approve the document, enter your password in the "Approved By:" field and press enter
- To switch the document to any other status, enter the new status in the status field and press enter. This status field was similar to the right "application codes" field in the image above.
That was the technology until 1997 or so. Since that time, we've come up with progressively deeper layers of GUI overlay that provides niceties like drop-down lists (combo boxes), check boxes, active buttons and such. But to do an even halfway decent job of upgrading is intrusive to the underlying program logic as well as just overlaying GUI...because under the paint, this steenking app is still 3270.
So you're right, the design is bad...but that's because it grew that way. It was like Topsy, who was never born but just grew. And, worse, this particular app is one of "those" applications that doesn't fit the established architecture well and as a result is fragile and a maintenance nightmare. This bug I described...I spent 4 hours yesterday just figuring out how it could even happen.
So someone...at some point...did an incomplete job of upgrading the app. Approval was changed to a button and, once approved, un-approving is the same button with a different label. But the stupid status field survived and still is used to cancel the document when the user arrives at the conclusion they need to do that (literally, only "cancel" is still relevant of the theoretical four status codes you could choose). So in that area there are three things you can do: Approve, un-approve, and cancel. And cancel is comparatively rare, because it means you want to destroy the document and start over and there really is no longer a reason to do that.
Nevertheless, the user still actively (1) clicked on the combo box; (2) selected "cancel"; and (3) then clicked a button that says, explicitly, Approve Document. Which is kind of a wtf, even if a small one, no matter how bad the design is.
Understand that I am not defending the app. It is wrong, no matter which way you look at it. It's current design is bad, and probably should be revised. (But it isn't going to be, because we're in the middle of an ERP.) It is also wrong, because it responded to an inconsistent user action with a randomly chosen
But I started this because of a comment someone made about a user-driven ...and I'd just seen one, so I thought I would amuse a few people with my user's wtf. Never intended it to turn in to a full-scale discussion of the application , but here it is.