Y2K meeting and comments on FAA

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I'll be addressing a Y2K group on April 8, Thursday at 6:30PM. Location: 2525 S. King St., Honolulu. Point of Contact: Josh Harvey, 373-5797. Admission: No Charge.

Re: the FAA. While we've all had a good time demonizing the FAA (I think they're all idiots and bombasticly clueless, see the WRPs from about a year ago.), the mess at the FAA is essentially a metaphor for what is going on in the Fortune 5,000.

Here are the facts: their systems are a mess, remember this is the organization that tried repeatedly to upgrade their systems and blew billions of dollars. Air travel can be accomplished without computers, it just will be more dangerous and there will be fewer flights. Something will go wrong but it is very unlikely that you or I will be affected directly.

Business travelers will miss connections. Yuppies will whine about delays and not being able to ski 5 times a year. A very few people may die. Life will go on.

The FAA mess is good because people like Joel Willemssen of the GAO has released accurate information and others have been able to comment on that information. Use the FAA situation to gauge your own understanding of organizations that have not been audited by the GAO.

The FAA, like other organizations, has been saying, Yo! No problems here, we be smart like bull. While in reality they're slinging the bull.

As for the discussion on what the meaning of "is" is, or is "sex" sex, if it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, and if the FAA said words that caused most people to think they were done and they weren't. They were fibbing.

But the issue isn't the FAA. The issue is, what did other organizations say, private firms, your employer, your supplier. Didn't their words sound very familiar?

Note: I'm not claiming that we won't be able to erect a few bypasses and use bailing wire and duct tape. I'm working on just such a kluge right now.

There will be a cost in efficiency. Get ready.

-- kiyoinc (cory@you.know.where), April 06, 1999

Answers

thank you so much for comments and update--very welcome as always. in my husband's field, CAM and design engineering, people will go into the "skunkworks" and produce some very ugly, but serviceable solutions. got any baling wire and spit? 73 cory, and have a good time on 2 meters in hawaii.

-- jocelyne slough (jonslough@tln.net), April 06, 1999.

speaking of ugly solutions, we have a Field Day satellite antenna you would love. it's a square piece of chicken wire, with a 2-meter length of household wire stuck in the middle of it, folded in 2. very ugly, but works anyway.

-- jocelyne slough (jonslough@tln.net), April 06, 1999.

Cory,

then doesn't the critical question become "At what point do overlapping kludges reach a state where the inertia caused by their collective inefficiency can no longer be overcome?"

any thoughts on that point?

Arlin Adams

-- Arlin H. Adams (ahadams@ix.netcom.com), April 06, 1999.


"At what point do overlapping kludges reach a state where the inertia caused by their collective inefficiency can no longer be overcome?"

I nominate Windows 95 for Operating System Closest To That State.

-- Tom Carey (tomcarey@mindspring.com), April 07, 1999.


LMAO! Second that, Tom!

-- just sunshine (lurkinghere@ho.me), April 07, 1999.


Here's what amazes me.....I'm having a bugger of a time trying to find buyers for my 'random binary code' which I offer for the incredible low price of $99.00 per meg.

Yet millions shell out good money for Windows95 which often works just as well as my random binary.

Go figure!!!!!

-- Craig (craig@ccinet.ab.ca), April 07, 1999.


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