We all know it: Network connections are unreliable. This is ok and I have no problem whatsoever with that. Connections can go down. Nothing serious, nothing special.
There are multiple ways how software can let you know that a connection dropped:
- Crash. This is the second worst way to handle it. At least the user knows what to do: Restart the application and it will (hopefully) work again.
- Connection failed: Software caused the connection to abort. Somewhat incorrect, too much information, a bit scary for the enduser, but common for many Winsock-Applications as this is the default error-message you can ask windows to provide you with given a specific error-code
- Sorry. The connection somehow went down. Should I try to connect again?. Correct, not technical, not scary. This is how I try to explain it to my users.
Well… and then there’s the IBM DB2 client:
SQL30081N A communication error has been detected. Communication protocol being used: “TCP/IP”. Communication API being used: “SOCKETS”. Location where the error was detected: “3.134.144.87”. Communication function detecting the error: “send”. Protocol specific error code(s): “104”, “*”, “0”. SQLSTATE=08001
What the hell?
gnegg 