Flipperganda?

greenspun.com : LUSENET : TimeBomb 2000 (Y2000) : One Thread

Hello everyone,

Found this on debunk site. In the last 2 months I've gone from 8 at my extreme, to 5, my scale. Why does Ed Yourdon constantly get lumped with Gary North. I've never seen or read anything from Ed that is comparable to Gary.

(snip)

" First, I would like to say that the FACTS on the Gary North is a Big Fat Idiot" page are ACCURATE. North can link to a million "sources" and it represents nothing more than Random Noise which he is trying to orchestrate to the Pathetique Symphony whose Composer died a week after it was first pleyed. Music people know that the alternate name of it is "the Suicide Symphony". In North's case we can separate the SYM and the PHONY. Edward Yourdon is as bad and both are equaled by the "Gold Coin Dealers" preying on the Fearful. North is not even "buzz word" compliant and I have some 17 megs of storage filled with his errata and that of the rest of the 'head for the hills gangs". My latest score was finding Gary using links this week to that of a big "Legalize Marijuana" and also one owned by someone who is in final appeal of a felony conviction. Today, he applauded a new site by an avowed "agnostic" who "sees no reason to believe in Jesus Christ". I am known as one of Brer Gary's opponents and I openly defy him or anyone to sue me if I ever write something non-factual on him, Yourdon and all the rest of Y2k Doom and Gloom sayers. The only point of contention might be whether or not Brer Gary is "Big" horizontally or vertically.

The point above about the technical "hypeing" of Y2k is correct. The gross exaggerations about the "embedded systems problem" are almost the Laughing stock of the Engineering fraternity. Similarly that has now proven to be true in Software. It *is* possible to inventory and analyze rather quickly. One can also automate much of the remediation. That alone blows away the "core logic" of Edward Yourdon that since software projects do not come in on time, Year 2000 will lead to a host of problems. He sold his NYC pad to move to the Taos area and claims "NYC will resemble Beirut in 2000" (that anolgy is interesting because a Saudi Prince is building a one billion dollar complex in downtown Beirut. DOOM SAYERS are seldom bothered by "facts" at least any that intefere with their beliefs (ala: "The Gary") or their presumptions: (ala: most of the rest). As the facts come out about the true status of most Y2k Projects, "The Gary" will say, "Wait till next time" and Yourdon will have destroy a once solid reputation. The scanning tools available to isolate potential date problems make "mince meat" out of the compexity, and some are so automated they can remediate to 90% of the problems automatically. I hesitate to mention any vendor but since NATURAL is such a niche I will use the following as an example.(Mostly because I've seen their demos also and have verified the quality.) The products of Formal Systems for NATURAL are so good that they leave a complete "repository" for future uses so Y2k is not a total loss. The analysis tools render diagrams in HTML that enable one to "drill down" to the source and come back out to see what could be effected by changes. There are more like that for COBOL. The PC tools are in place also. BIOS fixes for one company were deployed to 6,000 PCs over the company network in two hours and that was reported over a year ago.

Fixing the rest is not trivial but can be done. Curiously that tends to be the range found in most projects that have been reported. Depending on insustry between 2-15% of the Lines of code need some attention. Fielding the results is required to insure that the parts work in the whole. WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT?? SIMPLE: and even the Expert Yourdon does not understand his Logic Fallacy. He claims that based on the expertise from 30 years and 20+books, the "Metrics" he has show that"Software Project do not come in on time 65% of the time". TRUE. SO WHAT? ....WHO CARES??? When one discusses a Software Project from scratch that very well could be true. However as you show, we are NOT concerned with building an entire project for Y2k only fixing it for the date problems by whatever techniques are required from expansion to encapsulation to "windowing". As the massive Enterprise projects are fielded some could have required "one year to test" as North keeps saying citing the "California Paper" as proof. (Even though of course he hardly understands what he is reading aside from the difference between the letters and the spaces.) THE ANALOGY IS CLEAR: Year 2000 Remediation is the equivalent OF INSPECTING A BUILDING PRIOR TO SALE. YOU DO NOT NEED the 5 YEARS to build the Empire State or GM BUILDING start to finish from buying the dirt to moving the tenants in. Rather, you must inspect all the mechanicals,environmentals and wiring, the leases, the building's cladding, and a host of other parameters. It goes without saying that inspecting a home of 2,500 ft. with four bedrooms AKA: THE PC and its software is a matter of hours to analyze. So the problem is one of scale. YOURDON'S thinking is FLAWED and the facts bear that out. He claimed 2/3rds of the projects would not get done. That is not the case. I claim he wrote the BOOK to make a killing and that IS the case. CHARLIE REUBEN buytexas@swbell.net (end snip)

Overall I really don't think of this forum as a doom site. It seems to be will rounded. I've read the paper Ed gave to congress and It all seems well thought out. Just a man asking for the truth. Who could argue with a request like that, unless it was an invasion of privacy, something to hide, or their report could not stand even the test of our slanted legal system.

-- R. Wright (blaklodg@hotmail.com), May 26, 1999

Answers

Yea, good old Charlie makes it sound so easy, doesn't he? I only have a couple of questions really. Why is the world spending at least a trillion dollars on the problem? Why do the lawyers think they can get at least that much back? And, why isn't it fixed yet? <:)=

-- Sysman (y2kboard@yahoo.com), May 26, 1999.

Sysman,

Chucky is about the most extreme nut case I've ever run into, If you don't agree with him, he goes ballistic, fun guy : )

-- CT (ct@no.yr), May 26, 1999.


I think "a" had a real good post further down, pessimists thread. He about sums it up for me real well. The thing I've noticed about people who want to refute this whole thing is simply this.

They can point to details, but have to stay away from the big picture, usually resorting to namecalling. (CT, I won't even go there)

-- R. Wright (blaklodg@hotmail.com), May 27, 1999.


The problem with scanners is that the naming conventions have to be present and USED by EVERYONE. The data dictionary has to be THE ONLY PLACE for data names, and EVERY DATA NAME ever used has to be there. Miss just 2 or 3, and now you haven't gotten those taken care of.

After the scan, you have to take care of EVERY access to the data record, whether there are date logic blocks in the program or NOT, because COBOL data handling is in the programmers' hands COMPLETELY. COBOL programmers work byte by byte, NOT data element by data element. If you are looking for STREET-NAME PIC X(45) at the 32nd through the 76th byte in the record, and I just expanded DATE-REC by two bytes, you HAVE to change the logic to look at the 34th to 78th bytes, and you GOTTA DO IT BY HAND!! Even if and especially if there are no date handling routines in the program!!

Chuck

-- Chuck, a night driver (rienzoo@en.com), May 27, 1999.


Chuck,

Thats what I'm looking for. Thanks. Any more guys? (oops) gals)

-- R. Wright (blaklodg@hotmail.com), May 27, 1999.



CPR's big ** point** is allways they make all this money!!

They must be wrong.

Frankly this sounds a lot like sour grapes to me.

He IS full of envy. I pitty him.

-- Rickjohn (rickjohn1@yahoo.com), May 27, 1999.


Personally, I thought Gary North's post of Martial Law on Nov. 17, 1998 concerning the National Guard's stockpiling body bags, refrigerated vans and antidotes for anthrax was most informative. Got your NBC masks yet?

-- Betty Alice (Barn266@aol.com), May 27, 1999.

I found the following quote intereseting because 2 1/2 years ago I purchased a 2600 sq. foot 4 bedroom home. "It goes without saying that inspecting a home of 2,500 ft. with four bedrooms AKA: THE PC and its software is a matter of hours to analyze. So the problem is one of scale."

Naturally it was duly inspected by an expert who knows what he's doing. He did the normal things....checked the dishwasher, pipes, wiring, plumbing etc, etc. and it took him about 2 hours. The sellers duly fixed or paid for the minor and few problems that were detected. Immediately after moving in, I discovered the disposal had no blades and would not grind, the motor ran just fine.(replacement $350.00) Then discovered the tub faucet in one of the baths had rusted out and water gushed out as if it was coming from the opening.(replacement $75.00) Within 6 months I had to replace all the water and gas lines from the house to the alley.($5500.00) The next month pump for swimming pool quit working. (repair $750.00) The next month it was the hot tub heater, filter and plumbing. (replacement & repair $475.00) Things are slowing down a bit after 2 1/2 years, but last month I replaced a 50 gal hot water heater. (replacement $395.00) So the analogy that the author of the post above, deserves my analogy IMNSHO. No matter how experienced, honest or dishonest or how well you think inspection (inventory), fixing and replacing (remediation) has been done....there are always things overlooked until you test.(g)

P.S. My husband just came in and read my response over my shoulder...he laughed and said...oh you've forgotten about 10 other expensive things we've had to do.

-- Cary Mc from Tx (rcmcbc@yahoo.com), May 27, 1999.


Ouch - Cary. Hope you got your money back from the inspector, and/or made a strong protest to his regulating body (city or county) - missing that level of stuff is inexcuseable!

-- Robert A. Cook, PE (Kennesaw, GA) (cook.r@csaatl.com), May 30, 1999.

Moderation questions? read the FAQ