Aug 29th, 2007.

Do we still waste time on bad technology?
About 20 years ago I was sitting in a quarterly technology review meeting. The person responsible for the new field of computer installation and support, presented a study on time allocation. What got every one's attention was the fact that taking a Macintosh SE/30 from the packing box to a person's desk with a standardized version of software only took an hour! This was largely due to the work I had done building a master disk image which was then cloned, and due also to my detailed documentation of installation procedures that made the work simple. I was understandably pleased with this part of the report.

The presenter then went on to show that achieving the same objectives with a Compaq PC took the better part of two days. He expressed concern, and suggested that perhaps the company should buy more Macs, or get more people. It was decided to get more people and spend more energy solving the PC problem!

After the meeting, a very interesting incident took place, which I happened to overhear. The chair of technology group took the speaker aside, and told him not to discuss the material further.To bring the topic up again would be a career-limiting move, and that the speaker was not in a position to make statements about efficiency.

Very sad. Today we have the same issues.Various technologies are used in the workplace that everyone knows are difficult and time-consuming to use. Can the same be said about programming languages and discipline? You must decide for yourself. I have. Most popular is not always the best! A different technology like Smalltalk could be used to solve many difficult problems effectively and efficiently. Think Different ...or go see a movie!