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RE: (data) medium is the message

• To: "'Simon St.Laurent'" <simonstl@s...>
• Subject: RE: (data) medium is the message
• From: "Hunsberger, Peter" <Peter.Hunsberger@s...>
• Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 09:08:16 -0500
• Cc: xml-dev@l...

Arg, bitten once again.  Yes, this was meant for public consumption...

Peter Hunsberger
 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Simon St.Laurent [mailto:simonstl@s...] 
> Sent: Thursday, May 01, 2003 6:39 PM
> To: Hunsberger, Peter
> Subject: RE:  (data) medium is the message 
> 
> 
> This is cool - did you mean to send it to the list?
> 
> 
> Peter.Hunsberger@s... (Hunsberger, Peter) writes:
> 
> >Simon St.Laurent <simonstl@s...> writes:
> > 
> >> Peter.Hunsberger@s... (Hunsberger, Peter) writes:
> >> >Although I can understand this vision and even buy into 
> some of it I
> >> >wonder how close it is?
> >> 
> >> It's not close.  The vast majority of people are going down
> >> the "we need prior agreement on all semantics" path.  I 
> >> translate that as "we need information totalitarianism", but 
> >> it's painfully common.
> >
> >We're more at "we need some agreement on the use case" stage 
> of things. 
> >Sure, when arguing use cases one does end up arguing 
> semantics but only 
> >to make sure you're all actually working on the same use 
> case.  Again, 
> >I'm not
> >a huge fan of UML and less so of RUP but I do like having a use case 
> >hanging
> >around for everyone to aim at.
> >
> ><snip/>
> >
> >> >From the metadata we generate schema.  What we don't do 
> is arrive at
> >> >these business rules by bouncing data around until we get it 
> >> right and
> >> >frankly I don't see how we could.
> >> 
> >> "Bouncing data around" is, of course, how business rules
> >> emerged in the human world.  When I was a sales assistant, if 
> >> I got a fax I didn't understand, I took it to my boss or to 
> >> the warehouse or whoever I needed to talk with about how to 
> >> handle it, and learned from that experience.
> >
> >And if the business was big your boss probably handed you a SOP
> >manual...
> > 
> ><big snip/>
> >> 
> >> And I've argued for years that secretaries know more about
> >> office information than anyone in the company, so I'm 
> >> obviously coming from a different perspective.  I've actually 
> >> done this myself, building a database that did most of my 
> >> job's menial tasks with minimal intervention, so I know it's 
> >> quite possible, but the social milieu isn't there at present.
> >> 
> >> >Maybe Joe user can do top down
> >> >development, but that means stepping back and 
> understanding the big
> >> >picture and that's not something that everyone can do. So I 
> >> think for
> >> >the next couple of years there's still going to be a need
> >> for Frank the
> >> >IT guy, or at least Frank the consultant who helps you build some
> >> >schema.
> >> 
> >> For a long time, sure.  But it's time to start exercising
> >> some imagination and asking what else we can do.  Trading 
> >> pre-defined data is boring, to put it mildly, 
> >
> >Having business processes in place that work might be boring 
> but that's 
> >what's needed for the most part?
> >
> >> and top-down
> >> development requires trusting the top.  I don't trust the 
> >> perspective that people at the top or looking from the 
> >> top of a problem seem to share; I never have.
> >
> >Well if the secretaries are the ones with the knowledge 
> that's who you
> >talk
> >to get your business rules...  Let me be clear, when I say 
> we document
> >business rules I don't mean the developers.  I mean the business 
> >analysts
> >(who wouldn't know a DTD from a XSD at the best of times) 
> and the end 
> >users
> >(who might know how to use Excel and maybe Brio).  The analysts are
> also 
> >the
> >people who create and review the metadata.  The developers tweak the 
> >metadata to make it consumable by our applications, but that's more 
> >because the current state of the art (the mapping tools) 
> then anything 
> >else...
> >
> >> Frank the IT guy's job is safe.  I'd just like to develop
> >> systems that include people beyond Frank the IT guy, people 
> >> who may not know a lot about XSLT or C, but do know about the 
> >> actual subject matter they're working with.
> >
> >Absolutely, that's why I say the end user needs Frank the IT 
> guys help
> >to
> >create the schema, not the other way around...
> >
> -- 
> Simon St.Laurent
> Ring around the content, a pocket full of brackets
> Errors, errors, all fall down!
> http://simonstl.com -- http://monasticxml.org
> 

• Follow-Ups:
  • Re: (data) medium is the message
    • From: Mitch Amiano <mamiano@n...>
  • RE: (data) medium is the message
    • From: "Simon St.Laurent" <simonstl@s...>

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