www.indianrail.gov.in : usability & accesibilty issues

Software has been a growth sector in India. But has software really changed our lives ... the way it should have .. or to its maximum potential ... ??

I am talking of government sites in particular ... I don't think that the Indian government web sites live up to the reputation that the Indian software industry has !!

I was not so much in favor of using the Indian railways web site for bookings until recently started using internet reservation... and not surprisingly found the following MAJOR BUGS in the same

1. The page picks up date of reservation from the client ... and does calculation accordingly .. if i change my computer date by a month then the it will be shown on the journey date ... but the worst part is the three months reservation period will be calculated based on the wrong date .... yikesss !! Only a novice web programmer can do such a thing ... taking clients date instead of server date ... i wonder which software company has developed the site
2. I wonder what will the output be on linux systems ... or mac systems .. as using javascript to get clients date ... that part needs to be checked on all platforms ... what will happen for symbian OS ?? ;o)
3. Site being slow .... and ... bank being debited for ticket charges while not getting the tickets is a common error !!
4. The look and feel is not at all professional .... Off track ... not talking of bugs .. but general ... while going for e-ticket one is asked to carry the identity proof ... as if the normal tickets have a photo or some other identity mechanism ... so why this rule for e-tickets ?? i find no logic ... for same !! possibly a way to get
5. Using outdated DOS based reservation system at the ticketing counter ,,,, phew !! ontop of that the dot matrix printers may give you un readable print outs ...

laloo bhai ... with so much reformation going around in the railway industry i think its high time you also pay attention to the old software & printers being used in the system