Re: User Defined Fields - HELP PLEASE!

"Eric Bohlman" <ebohlman_at_omsdev.com> wrote in message news:Xns9606857746A63ebohlmanomsdevcom_at_130.133.1.4...
> "Mark D Powell" <Mark.Powell_at_eds.com> wrote in
> news:1109085151.733741.130640_at_l41g2000cwc.googlegroups.com:
>
> > I will take a contrary view. If the user wants user defined columns
> > then perhaps he or she should have them.
>
> But you have to distinguish between the (IMHO rather unlikely) case where
> the user *truly wants* them and fully understands the implications, and
> the (IMHO much more common) "XY problem" where the user has some
> (unexpressed) need to solve problem X and has jumped to the conclusion
> that a particular solution Y (in this case, user-defined columns) is the
> way to do it.
>
> Since Parkinson's been brought up in this thread, I'll bring up Lawrence
> Peter of Peter Principle fame. He emphasized the importance of
> specifying a solution in terms of the problem it solves rather than the
> form it takes (writing in the 1970s, he said that your goal should not be
> to develop the best home movie camera by 2000, it should be to develop
> the best live-action recorder, predicting correctly that other
> technologies would supplant home movie cameras).
>
> So in a situation like this the job of the DBA, programmer, architect,
> etc. is to dig in and discover what real need underlies the user request,
> and only then implement a solution. Or, to put it bluntly, look at the
> problem in business terms rather than technological ones. It's part of
> what I like to call the non-geeky aspects of IT (in fact, sometimes a
> proper analysis reveals that the best solution to the need is a non-
> technological one!). Merely pointing out the technical problems with Y
> won't do it, because the user will understand you as telling them that X
> can't be solved at all, which they will in fact know is incorrect
> (they're right that X can be solved, just wrong about how to solve it).
> The result will just be resistance and pressure, and since they're paying
> the bills, they'll prevail.

I agree 1000% It's almost as if I wrote the above. I run into these problems all the time. Users come to me with problems expressed as solutions. I immediately ask them what the business problem is that they are trying to solve.

When people ask we what I do, I stopped telling them that I'm a Database Administrator. They don't know what that is anyway. I now tell them I'm a "Data Detective". They don't know what that is either, but the look on their faces is great. More of a "I'm a confused puppy" instead of "you must be a geek". Received on Wed Feb 23 2005 - 21:18:07 CET