alt Hacker NewsI've had issues with this e-visa implementation and was told I could not board flights.
As a someone in tech, I feel this a classic case study of how NOT to roll out a release and develop a solution.
The release was chaotic, none of the airlines staff were trained on how to use this. So they still insisted on the expired cards and then picked on the expiry dates.
Next, almost everyone makes you generate a verification share code in front of them by logging into the e-visa website even if the rules say I can print it out and just use the code. It takes a few minute to get on the website and generate one.
This solution assumed that everyone has access to a smart phone and a good wifi connection to make this work.
Whoever built this didn't test it on the ground.
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I bet you 100% it was built not by in house team but farmed out to an agency for £££££ millions. They will have been saying in their case studies some absolute nonsense about how they saved the government millions rather than burned loads of money too.
So did we, although we were in the end able to persuade them to let us board the flight by showing a screenshot of my friend's eVisa status from the UK government website (so secure!)
To be fair to the airlines here, if they get it wrong then the UK government fines the airline. This is why they are pretty risk averse, and also why I'm surprised that the screenshot worked.
This is the classic difference between testing whether the software works and testing whether the system works
Also for years prior it was explicitly said share code were _not_ to be used for travels and that airlines were not allowed to ask for them.
And now that they are the airlines do not have the system to check them so you have to print the webpage which also explicitly said should _not_ be used instead of the share code...
> As a someone in tech
Computer says no.
How did they roll it out embassy without having at least some old systemd or a human in the loop backup working?
> Whoever built this didn't test it on the ground.
God this happens all the time. Software written by people that don't use the software themselves. It has happened to me so many times, I come across a piece of software with weird bugs or interactions that would be immediately fixed if the developer just spends 5 minutes using the software like an end user would. Dogfood all the things!