• (cs)

    Sounds to me like The City basically amended the requirements to say "Must use Excel for data entry, Word for reporting" and the consultants did the best they could with what they were given.

    Maybe this story was a bit tongue-in-cheek and was really a criticism of people resisting change in their work environments, I don't know. I do know that most of the time, when you ask somebody to change his routine, no matter how mind-numbing said routine is, he will immediately zero in on the tiniest little flaw in the new process and use it as an excuse to go back to his comfort zone.

  • Duke of New York (unregistered)

    This isn't a WTF, it's a success story! The real WTF is that the testers, technicians and writers think the system is "exactly the same." Meanwhile, all the keypunchers are out looking for new jobs.

  • (cs) in reply to Aaron
    Aaron:
    I do know that most of the time, when you ask somebody to change his routine, no matter how mind-numbing said routine is, he will immediately zero in on the tiniest little flaw in the new process and use it as an excuse to go back to his comfort zone.
    Ayup. I had such a person designated as the tester on one of my projects. The IT department was writing the software that would convert the Purchasing department from paper to computer, and this Purchasing employee resented it greatly. She fought and lost the battle; upper management gave it the go-ahead, and as one of two people who would be using my software, she was picked to test it. It was just as Aaron said: she would nitpick every little thing, even the color and location of controls on the program windows.

    I delivered up a final QA version to her with two weeks til development deadline, and waited for feedback. Seven workdays later, my boss called to ask if my part was complete. "Still waiting for feedback from the tester," I told him.

    "Call her and ask about it," he said.

    So I called her. "Let me guess," I said. You haven't done any testing of the new purchasing software, right?"

    "You got it," she answered, laughing.

    So I called my boss and told him what she'd said. I could feel the heat of his silent anger through the phone.

    Half an hour later, she came into my office, face flushed, with eyes red from crying and full of genuine fear, sat down in a chair beside me and said, "Tell me what I need to know to test this program."

  • James (unregistered) in reply to foxyshadis
    foxyshadis:
    Sigivald:
    So, uh, what does .NET (in any of its senses) have to do with the problem of

    A) Crappy PDAs

    B) Crappy Excel exports and kludgy VBA scripts

    C) More VBA kludge?

    Maybe the problem was not enough .NET and a crappy architecture?

    It was likely crappy .Net programming on the (Windows Mobile) PDAs that would lock them up when attempting to use the initial input offline.

    "Crappy programming", yes. .Net programming, no. WM .NET apps are no different from native WM apps. If somebody wrote one that hangs up (???) when it loses connection, that's 100% their fault. Like an earlier poster said, if they bought decent PDAs with a built-in keyboard that don't freeze up in a stiff breeze, there's no reason to have problems. And like Sigivald said, all the other problems either go back to requirements gathering (in this case, the end users don't actually want the process to change at all) or implementation (what's local caching?).

  • Sam Thornton (unregistered)

    What's the problem? I thought .NET was supposed to work this way.

  • Bob (unregistered)

    Just a few days ago, we had a WTF with a private construction firm buying software to work out what beams would suit particular buildings, and the vendors had built some lovely software that never showed any hint of anyone involved actually understanding the real world use.

    And today we have a government department getting some software that never showed any hint of anyone involved actually understanding the real world use.

    Therefore clearly we have proven beyond all possible doubt that government is evil and the real WTF is that people won't vote libertarian, cos those libertarians would let the flawless private contractors get on with delivering their wonderful software. The contractors who don't consider the real world when designing their software are obviously not at fault, because only government is bad.

  • wtf (unregistered) in reply to az

    I am sorry, I think Slashdot is that way ~~~> http://slashdot.org/

  • wtf (unregistered) in reply to az
    az:
    the robustness of Excel
    Greetings from Bizarroworld. WTF?
    I am sorry, I think Slashdot is that way ~~~> http://slashdot.org/
  • Scott (unregistered) in reply to Code Dependent
    Code Dependent:
    Aaron:
    I do know that most of the time, when you ask somebody to change his routine, no matter how mind-numbing said routine is, he will immediately zero in on the tiniest little flaw in the new process and use it as an excuse to go back to his comfort zone.
    Half an hour later, she came into my office, face flushed, with eyes red from crying and full of genuine fear, sat down in a chair beside me and said, "Tell me what I need to know to test this program."
    This made me smile. It's so nice when testers get yelled at for not testing a system. It's too often that they never get around to testing the whole system and you get sh!t for delivering a defective app.
  • (cs) in reply to Scott
    Scott:
    Code Dependent:
    Aaron:
    I do know that most of the time, when you ask somebody to change his routine, no matter how mind-numbing said routine is, he will immediately zero in on the tiniest little flaw in the new process and use it as an excuse to go back to his comfort zone.
    Half an hour later, she came into my office, face flushed, with eyes red from crying and full of genuine fear, sat down in a chair beside me and said, "Tell me what I need to know to test this program."
    This made me smile. It's so nice when testers get yelled at for not testing a system. It's too often that they never get around to testing the whole system and you get sh!t for delivering a defective app.

    I smiled a bit too, but for a different reason - it's nice to see someone throw a hissy fit like that and get called on the carpet for it. I expect the tester got a Come To Jesus talk from CD's boss.

  • (cs) in reply to Franz_Kafka
    Franz_Kafka:
    I smiled a bit too, but for a different reason - it's nice to see someone throw a hissy fit like that and get called on the carpet for it. I expect the tester got a Come To Jesus talk from CD's boss.
    Even better. My boss went to the head of Purchasing. It was HER boss who gave her the Come To Jesus talk.
  • Josh folder (unregistered)

    LOL, Makes sense to me. How about you?

    www.privacy.de.tc

  • (cs) in reply to Bob
    Bob:
    Just a few days ago, we had a WTF with a private construction firm buying software to work out what beams would suit particular buildings, and the vendors had built some lovely software that never showed any hint of anyone involved actually understanding the real world use.

    And today we have a government department getting some software that never showed any hint of anyone involved actually understanding the real world use.

    Therefore clearly we have proven beyond all possible doubt that government is evil and the real WTF is that people won't vote libertarian, cos those libertarians would let the flawless private contractors get on with delivering their wonderful software. The contractors who don't consider the real world when designing their software are obviously not at fault, because only government is bad.

    +1

    Couldn't have said it better myself! Bad is bad and there's bad all over - not just in the government.

  • Mr.'; Drop Database -- (unregistered) in reply to Nerf Herder
    Nerf Herder:
    Hmmm....FBI Virtual Case system anyone?

    The Government blew over $100 million of tax payers money on a state of the art system called Virtual Case that was supposed to replace old paper-based and mainframe systems and bring it into the 21st century. In the end they completely scrapped the project before anything came to fruition.

    The end result? Yup they went back to using paper - the exact reason they tried getting the system in place to begin with.

    Job well done!

    It may have failed, but that's still better than worse than failure.

  • (cs)

    I wrote this comment with a heavy dose of VBA.

  • (cs) in reply to Code Dependent
    Code Dependent:
    This comment has a heavy dose of VBA.
    Reports -- including the monstrous, 100-plus-page water survey --
    Since when is 100 pages a "monstrous" report?

    Umm...maybe it's on legal paper... double-sided... and in a 2-point font?

  • (cs) in reply to Code Dependent
    Code Dependent:
    This comment has a heavy dose of VBA.
    Reports -- including the monstrous, 100-plus-page water survey --
    Since when is 100 pages a "monstrous" report?

    Ever try reading one? I expect that with something like this, only the summary is ever read more than once, and the rest only by an engineer to make sure the 90 pages of charts line up with whatever's in the first 10.

  • crap (unregistered) in reply to g0ats3
    g0ats3:
    i have to poo
    luptatum:
    I can't shake the feeling I've read this before...
    g0ats3:
    i can't shake the feeling that i have to poo.

    This gets to stay, but TopCod3r's conpletely on topic posts get deleted. What a crock.

  • Patches O'Hoolihan (unregistered) in reply to Nerf Herder

    The real WTF on the VCS is that they're trying it again...with the same company.

    And the money is coming out of their fuel budget for this year.

  • rudraigh (unregistered) in reply to Crabs
    Crabs:
    Why didn't they ...

    Why didn't you get the consulting gig with The City?

  • The Fake WTF (unregistered) in reply to zip
    zip:
    az:
    the robustness of Excel
    Greetings from Bizarroworld. WTF?

    Excel is ridiculously robust from an end-user perspective. Maybe the programmability isn't so "robust" but shit, even my mom can manage data and make graphs and reports with Excel. That's freaking robust.

    Just don't do any date calculations that work before 1904. And beware of problems where statistical functions don't do what they're supposed to. And improper rounding.

    But you're right, all the little graphical widgets do look nice, even if the number crunching isn't always up to par.

  • Rook (unregistered) in reply to DWalker59
    DWalker59:

    [snip]

    If my Mom can use a piece of software to make graphs from data and enter formulas, then YES, the software is robust.

    Let me see YOU write something as complex and user-accessible as Excel is.

    Sounds like you work in Office!

  • PseudoBovine (unregistered) in reply to rudraigh
    rudraigh:
    Crabs:
    Why didn't they ...

    Why didn't you get the consulting gig with The City?

    Nepotism?

  • (cs) in reply to wtf
    wtf:
    az:
    the robustness of Excel
    Greetings from Bizarroworld. WTF?
    I am sorry, I think Slashdot is that way ~~~> http://slashdot.org/
    +5 informative
  • Casey (unregistered)

    Before people make fun of "lecgacy hardware and software", just remember how many Daily WTF stories revolve around so called "upgrades"

  • Mappy (unregistered)

    Lyle can build a .NET Bridge to Nowhere better than you can.

  • (cs)

    In other words a well thought out system that was poorly tested and created without any input from the end users. Sounds like about every second IT project (and probably most other sectors as well) out there.

    The only real WTFs here are lack of testing of the PDAs in remote areas (should have realised those PDAs might not work well outside urban areas, what with the poor cellphone coverage outside such in the US) and the lack of trying to engage the end users in the decision making process (which would have pointed out that a small laptop might well have been a better choice for the fieldworkers, and desktop applications with some more options for the others).

  • bg (unregistered)

    Seems to me the issue here is that the consultants were trying to replace the technology the technicians were using instead of automating the process - those electronic testers probably provide an interface for communication with other devices - use it. Then apply the special slide rules the lab techincians were using to create the tables they needed (so that the lab techinchians only need to verify the data). As for the reports, if they need to be tweaked after being generated the solution is to generate Word documents based on a template and let the typists edit it as they wish.

  • mitschke (unregistered)

    The Real WTF™ ist the fact that there is an annual water survey - shouldn't this be a continous process? Another WTF is mentioning chlorine as part of "the good stuff" in drinking water. Where is "The City"? In the sahel zone?

  • FileNotFound (unregistered) in reply to Code Dependent
    Code Dependent:
    So I called my boss and told him what she'd said. I could feel the heat of his silent anger through the phone.

    Half an hour later, she came into my office, face flushed, with eyes red from crying and full of genuine fear, sat down in a chair beside me and said, "Tell me what I need to know to test this program."

    My oh my.. not nice but it must've been a funny situation for you. Somehow I'm glad that people are not that resistant to change over here that much. Most of the responses on new software were like happy ones like hey this makes stuff easier/faster/whatever. Oh well most of the time I've replaced ancient patchwork horrors. :)

    captcha: why does WPF sound like WTF

  • shenanigans (unregistered) in reply to SQLDave

    [quote user="SQLDave"][quote user="Code Dependent"]Umm...maybe it's on legal paper... double-sided... and in a 2-point font?[/quote] With a two-point font you could only express the state of 8 different characters (which wouldn't resemble characters in the traditional sense anyway), so that would be hard. I guess writing a dot and the letter "i" could be done.

  • RiF (unregistered) in reply to Josh folder
    Josh folder:
    LOL, Makes sense to me. How about you?

    www.privacy.de.tc

    Time to beef-up the captcha?

  • validus (unregistered) in reply to virgil
    virgil:
    Actually, if the "expensive consultants" just did the implementation - they did not necessarily do a very bad job... it was the spec that was severely broken. If "The city" provided the requirements, it's their fault that they haven't figured out what they actually needed.
    Crap. The "Highly Paid Consultants" job should have included speccing.
  • Disgruntled Postal Worker (unregistered)

    Yet another case where a customer spends a lot of time and money take a new system custom built for them, and then another lot of time and money to change it back into what they had before because their employees refuse to change the way they work.

    This is the way in which most ERP projects fail or go 100% over budget. If you want a modernization to succeed, you have to be willing to change the way you do business. If not, don't even start.

  • eco-IT (unregistered) in reply to Crabs
    Why didn't they just set up connected sensors around town in the water mains to do all these tests, and hard wire them to the internet to send the data automatically to the central server?
    Because fysical-chemical analyses of water quality is more complicated than just following one parameter. Several tests need a few minutes to perform (add reagent A, leave for a few minutes, add reagent B). You can't take two samples from the exact same spot, so you need to "scout" the surroundings for good sample sites.

    A fixed sensor would interrupt the water current, giving a consistently distorted reading (higher stream velocity, lower temperature, etc) and debris might accumulate, increasing the "presence" of contaminants in the water, etc.

    No, sampling for water quality analysis is still very much an on-site job that needs to be performed by people. Believe me, I've had nearly 5 years of first-hand experience.

  • (cs) in reply to jwenting
    jwenting:
    In other words a well thought out system that was poorly tested and created without any input from the end users... <snip>
    "I need to create complex technical reports using Microbiological and Chemical data; they require specialist analysis by trained technicians; they need careful formatting and reformatting by secretarial staff to ensure they a) fit the paper they will be printed on and b) meet local governmental publications guidelines. The system will be used for a specific purpose in a single organisation, that can specify strong controls on both the hardware and software in use. I know - I'll make it web-based! That'll be cool!"

    Yeah, well thought out...

  • (cs) in reply to eco-IT
    eco-IT:
    Because fysical-chemical analyses of water quality is more complicated than just following one parameter... <snip>

    ... Believe me, I've had nearly 5 years of first-hand experience.

    But apparently you can't spell physical? Or has the US completely given up on 'ph' as a phoneme ?

  • eco-IT (unregistered) in reply to JimM
    JimM:
    But apparently you can't spell physical? Or has the US completely given up on 'ph' as a phoneme ?
    I don't know about the US, but when I type my third language a little too quick without having a spell-check running, the occasional error does tend to creep in.
  • (cs) in reply to eco-IT
    eco-IT:
    Because fysical-chemical analyses of water quality is more complicated than just following one parameter.

    Apparently, you have never heard of the One Click Titration(tm).

  • itsmo (unregistered) in reply to Squiggle
    Squiggle:
    1. If it ain't broke don't fix it.
    1. Just because you can doesn't mean you should.

    Not quite right on #1 there:

    If it ain't broke fix it until it is.

  • (cs)

    Where is TopCod3r when you need him?

  • (cs) in reply to ogilmor
    ogilmor:
    Surprised nobody commented on this WTF. How many of you have heard this prediction? "It will all be web based" "No need for client heavy apps any more."

    Once at an airline I saw a web based monstrosity. Somebody had decided that browser based apps were the thing, so these folks got a demo. When asked what sorts of keyboard shortcuts would be provided, the developers responded "It is browser. No keyboard."

    And like many web based apps it tended to get amnesia when it came to data, forget which window it was focused on, navigate away from unsaved data in the same window (oops, there goes 30 minutes of work!) and other quirks.

    The heavy client isnt' going away. Even the best web based apps, a la google, have some way to go. As they increase in features, they will still use hard disk space to store and install them, and they will be able to do this because fatter pipes are getting more ubiquitous (love that word!)

    I'll second that. What everyone seems to forget is that the web is only an excellent deployment/delivery mechanism. As it stands now, it's completely shit as an application platform for the reasons you mention and many more. Just today I used a site (well Sharepoint, but it's the same thing) that looked quite a lot like a Windows directory explorer. Only trouble was I could not right click, drag & drop, send to, upload or do anything useful or natural to a Windows user despite the best efforts of a Javascript guru. There are things the web currently is simply not good enough at. What is also funny is that, at least where I work, millions of dollars can get allocated to web development without too much scrutiny simply because it is a web app. Everyone gets excited when a window magically appears on top of another one or some other really basic UI technique, even though the developer took 2 months to do it and it still does not work properly on Apples or Firefox. The web is basically a rendering platform and the real work still happens at the back end with 'proper' systems, but the web site gets all the credit. Strange....Yeah, maybe one day it will work, and I recon it will be Silverlight of Flash or something that can give you some useful, pre-written functions.
  • jaq (unregistered) in reply to virgil

    I used to work as a consultant. Customers very rarely know what they really want. It is the job of the consultant to understand the business and figure out what the requirements really are.

    The trouble is the average person isn't very good at imagining how a potential solution will work out for them, so it is a good idea to build something they can actually try out.

  • sheepdan (unregistered) in reply to Crabs

    Where do you live? That's not a solution for a UK council certainly; you'd be employing fewer Field Workers. Round here, a council would never introduce a system that would make staff redundant.

  • (cs) in reply to JimM
    JimM:
    Or has the US completely given up on 'ph' as a phoneme ?
    Foneme.
  • (cs)

    The Real Real WTF:

    The biggest annoyance was that they were no longer able to instantly preview layout changes, such as changing font size to make a table fit on a page. Try as they might, the consultants simply could not figure out a way to allow them to easily tweak the layout.

    Isn't it part of the whole purpose of a reporting tool to automate layout adjustments? They aren't writing job applications for foo's sake. Why do they need to tweak the layout at all?

  • (cs) in reply to Code Dependent

    I'm guessing the conversation probably went along the lines of "We will be using this software, you will learn how to use it and you will test it or you will be out of a job and we won't be giving you a reference."

  • opeadeoye (unregistered) in reply to Code Dependent

    Would you read 100 pages happily? I won't.

  • (cs) in reply to LoztInSpace
    LoztInSpace:
    ... There are things the web currently is simply not good enough at. ...
    Yes! Absolutely! That pesky web - we should all get together and give it what-for. It needs to buck it's ideas up if it's ever going to be a real success!
  • Beldar the Phantom Lurker (unregistered) in reply to Mappy
    Mappy:
    Lyle can build a .NET Bridge to Nowhere better than you can.
    Lyle cannot work on your project because his current project is better than yours. What do you do?

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