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RE: Formalism and complexity

• To: "Bullard, Claude L (Len)" <clbullar@i...>
• Subject: RE: Formalism and complexity
• From: Rick Marshall <rjm@z...>
• Date: Tue, 06 Jan 2004 20:19:34 +1100
• Cc: "'David Megginson'" <dmeggin@a...>, XML Developers List <xml-dev@l...>
• In-reply-to: <15725CF6AFE2F34DB8A5B4770B7334EE03F9F0CB@h...>
• Organization: Zenucom Pty Limited
• References: <15725CF6AFE2F34DB8A5B4770B7334EE03F9F0CB@h...>
• Reply-to: rjm@z...

On Tue, 2004-01-06 at 07:42, Bullard, Claude L (Len) wrote:
> Related orthogonally to the flexibility and grunt 
> work assessment that I do agree with:  the problem 
> I have with so many tools today is that the engineers 
> have succeeded spectacularly at enabling us to get 
> information into the systems, and failed almost as 
> spectacularly at enabling us to get information out.
> 

but any useful system is 

inputs -> transfer function(s) -> outputs

anything else is stamp collecting

rick

> How many projects have you worked on where the 
> requirements have been driven almost exclusively 
> by one culture of the data entry specialists?  Udell 
> makes reference to the social life of XML documents 
> in his current xml.com article.  Isn't this a redux 
> of what we were talking about in the heyday of 
> comp.text.sgml?
> 
> Over the holidays, I stumbled over a TAG (the mag, 
> not the group) article that I wrote in 1992 describing 
> feedback adaptation, enterprise integration, chaotic 
> systems, and so on.  It is 2004 and we are still working 
> on the same problems.  Whoda thunk it...
> 
> len
> 
> 
> From: David Megginson [mailto:dmeggin@a...]
> 
> It would probably work very well if problems remained constant throughout a 
> project (like, say, building a bridge across a river), but in high tech, 
> they do not -- we have only a limited need for people who can create an 
> algorithm to do a computation in Olog(n) instead of On(log(n)), but we have 
> an enormous need for people who can track changing requirements and 
> userscapes and refactor code violently and continuously to match them, and 
> we have an even bigger need for people who help build consensus and 
> communities of users.  It's mostly flexibility and unscientific grunt work 
> that brings success.
> 
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• References:
  • RE: Formalism and complexity
    • From: "Bullard, Claude L (Len)" <clbullar@i...>

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