Fast turnaround of fixes...

Successful morning working to debug a series of problems that we've been working on for at least the last three years. Every time we run a test, we get slightly closer to a solution; but every time we try, uncover yet another glitch, making our approach to a solution somewhat asymptotic.

After carefully enabling debugging — something which, when switched on across the board, generates so much data that it causes everything to grind to a halt in a matter of minutes — and tracing a job, I noticed that the start of the job coincided with a periodic cleanup event. Checking the source code, I noticed the cleanup was using a negative match to determine what to remove, confirming my suspicion that either a race condition or a type mismatch was to blame.

The person I was working with was in a chat session with the developer. They mentioned that we thought the failure was caused by a race with the periodic event but didn't provide any further details. Within seconds, they'd got a reply which effectively restated our hypothesis. Then, a few seconds after that, they got another message from the developer saying that they were in the process of producing a fix and could we please send the logs for confirmation.

It took longer to work out how to transfer the logs than it took to develop a first cut fix for the problem...

Training hard

Managed to make it down to the quay in reasonable time, despite getting away later than hoped. On the way down, I realised I hadn't cut my fingernails, and I dug out the scissors as soon as I arrived. While I was trimming things down, I tried to work out if the legs I could see going through a series of warm-up exercises in the training room might be my partner's. They certainly looked familiar and the leggings were suitably lurid, but would've been slightly embarrassing to have stuck my head around the door only to discover a total stranger so, in best introvert style, I texted instead, only to be rewarded by A sticking her head around the door frame!

After doing some easy warmups, we settled in to some harder stuff, with A working one of the 6as on the slab. Although she's done it before, it doesn't play to her (current) strengths because she's still working to improve her footwork. I think the only reason she came off was because she wasn't enjoying it. After that we did a tricky 6b which featured a couple powerful moves followed by a more exposed section on a trio of EP honeycomb slopers, and then I suggested a very soft 6c — I'd be surprised if it was actually any harder than a 6a+.

To atone for my suggestion, I finally managed a completely clean send of the hard fluro orange 6c I've been working for a couple of sessions and, in doing so, I realise I'd finished it without using two holds on the headwall section. I also repeated most of the hard 7a on the pillar, only to drop the last move yet again. I really need to try early enough in the session that I'm fresh and after I've given the troublesome foothold a good brush from one of the other routes. Once I'd tried that, A gave a hard-for-the-grade 6a+ a go on the next line and couldn't get past the overhang on it. I'm not surprised: the move features a powerful pull-up on the arete and big reach up to a less-than-spectacular hand, followed by a series of high steps and hand-foot matches, before more pulling on the arete, making it feel more like a high boulder problem than a route.

I then tried to pass on the basics of how to clip a lead route — there was an idea that A might get a colleague to teach her to lead climb while I was away. The results were not entirely successful, given that A almost immediately managed to z-clip the second clip before promptly falling off! I think the problem was entirely down to poor teaching — Chef Paul always says you can spot the people who've been taught by their mates a mile off — and trying something at least a grade too hard as a starter route...