Eventually the databases come up. I verify that there are some formatting issues with the data. And there is a vast shortage of data. Next I am told to fix all the problems I found. The formatting changes were not too hard. The code is just a view on top of a table which acts as a calendar.
Next I tackle the lack of data problem. Well the underlying table is just missing a lot of rows. Can I just generate some new rows? Not easily. There are all kinds of weird values in this table. My boss asks if the problem is fixed yet. Nope. He asks if there is anyone who can help. Yeah - the person who created the underlying data.
I call up the developer. She is out and about. But she shares with me a grand secret. The method to generate the data is a function in the database. Jackpot. Of course the thing does not work. But at least I have a starting point.
So I drill down to see the table that drives her generation function. It requires only a couple key fields to make the whole process go. Figuring out those key fields is a major undertaking. I dig up a manual I have that is 15 years old. It helps me figuring out some seed data. I eventually write my own function to populate the key fields.
Eventually I got a pretty good function to generate the very low level data. Then I make some calls to the function that takes it up one level. Then I call my function to create a view to wrap the table and expose stuff in the correct format. My counts are close but not exact. I trace it down to some duplicate records. Luckily my view can filter out this duplicate nonsense.
It is past midnight when I am done. I email out the team, letting them know that I am sticking some new data in these tables. I also share that I found some dup data down in there. Get a message from my old boss. He told me the function I found is buggy, and does not work for future dates. FML.
