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RE: accountability, code inspection

  • To: "'Simon St.Laurent'" <simonstl@s...>
  • Subject: RE: accountability, code inspection
  • From: "Bullard, Claude L (Len)" <clbullar@i...>
  • Date: Mon, 22 Apr 2002 12:34:54 -0500
  • Cc: xml-dev@l...

RE:  accountability
I agree.  I offer that commentary to those who 
harbor illusions of frictionless commerce, or 
that one degree of separation is as easy as a 
pickup in a singles bar.  Lasting relationships 
are made of tough commitments... made upfront 
and tested on delivery and before acceptance.  
I don't want to predict the future; I want 
to constrain it. 

There are some benefits.  With Internet 
services, the lack of humans in the loop may 
make some forms of insider shenanigans a little 
less likely because the game is exposed.  I can't 
speak for other business entities out there, but 
if we fail to deliver on time and in accordance 
with the signed documents, a thing called 
"liquidated damages" goes into effect.  It may 
be that some of the sellers and buyers are going 
to have to get sharper about these issues and 
learn to operate this way.

And yes, XML-Dev is exactly the place to air 
out issues if the technology fails to live up 
to the promises made in writing.  Very valuable 
even when painful.  If people accept promises 
not made in writing or take the brochures/UDDI at 
face value, then nature eliminates the unfit.

If it comes down to the spirit of the law or 
the letter of the law, the judge is a lot more 
likely to rule fairly where there are signatures, 
and as far as I know, ghost writing is hard to xerox.

len

From: Simon St.Laurent [mailto:simonstl@s...]

For better or worse, I think the environment you're describing is only a
small part of the technology universe.  To some extent it's that only
organizations of a certain size can invest the time in such contracts,
but even such contract-based organizations often have technology arrive
through backdoors or upgrades.

Industrial users are wise to protect themselves this way - ripping
plumbing out of a factory (to extend the metaphor) is much more
difficult than ripping plumbing out of a house or office, though neither
is pleasant.  

Unfortunately, my experience (and worse, my behavior on prior projects)
suggests that such careful procurement is hardly the rule.  Even people
who are away of the risks of "caveat vendor" often find themselves bound
in unexpected ways, and telling the future is difficult.

There's no Underwriters Laboratory here.  It seems to me that xml-dev
offers at least discussion, if not formal testing, with a bit more care
taken than a lot of other sources of information.  To me, that's hugely
valuable.

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