It's a race condition that doesn't get triggered when you run the program through a debugger or with copious amounts of debug log output ๐
this post was submitted on 08 Oct 2025
268 points (99.6% liked)
Programmer Humor
27412 readers
2018 users here now
Welcome to Programmer Humor!
This is a place where you can post jokes, memes, humor, etc. related to programming!
For sharing awful code theres also Programming Horror.
Rules
- Keep content in english
- No advertisements
- Posts must be related to programming or programmer topics
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
Or something about packaging. Or I used a function that has a different implementation for debug mode out of its intended purpose. Or
AKA heisenbug.
Observing it changes the outcome.
When adding a debug print statement changes the locking of a thread and the problem doesn't occur..
Only thing worse is not finding the bug that only happens in release mode
Just release in debug mode, problem solved.
Try a bug that sporadically happens only in release mode, with no clear connection to anything else, only to find out years later it only happens when someone uses the microwave for too long in the break room.
"You know, we always get this error after lunch when I reheat leftover soup."
Goddamnit Kyle!
Do trick 33B: Blame it on the crappy corporate anti-virus solution.
Works always because nobody can say anything against that. Nobody knows exactly how it works, if it's secretly sending your data to the NSA for corporate espionage and if you would disable it, everything would be insecure.
The firewall always gets new rules somehow.
Everybody swears the AI feature that adds random rules is disabled, and it has a log that shows the rules don't come from it anyway. Yet, the rules keep appearing.
When you test in prod all bugs are release mode.
Undocumented feature flag in a plug-in, that changes the behavior drastically when in any deployment mode.
Fucking R8 (Android optimizer/obfuscator)
This is why you have play testers