I cannot believe that the Dale Way Essay is not being dissected,discussed,scrutinized,debated.

Has anyone read this essay more than once?? Has anyone read it 4 or 5 times? made notes,underlined points, contemplated every word and every meaning. Discussed the points with another GI. Understood the credentials of Mr. Way and the IEEE?

Almost everything you need to know is in the essay, you just may not want to understand what he is saying due to its ominous information, especially regarding the gov. and banks.

I was just curious!

Here is an example and please think about the IRS or Dod or FAA when you read this excerpt.

""If an organization goes off half-cocked, without complete, detailed knowledge of how its system of systems works altogether in all normal and possible abnormal situations, as the vast majority of remediators have done, yet make wholesale changes as if it did have that knowledge, they are doomed to failure unless it had many more years than the three of four most organizations have been at it.

(Some agencies of the U.S. government were not being fallacious when they first said they would be ready as late as 2014. They were just being honest.

Of course, that "politically unacceptable" response was quickly squelched.) It would be better for the whole world if this could be admitted. Then non-technical contingency planning would have the urgency at all levels of society it deserves. But technical management and the Y2Klatura collectively do not have the brains or the guts to do that DEFINITIVELY. We will hew to our baseless confidence or pussyfoot around the obvious until the end.

Collectively we are going to drive the ship right into the iceberg and not say anything until the screaming starts and then claim we did all we could to make everything compliant. We will burn in Hell.""

Pretty strong finish for a Technical engineer!! Note: "we are going to drive this ship" not we may. or we could,

-- David Butts (dciinc@aol.com), November 17, 1999

Answers

Please post a link to this essay Thanks

-- Donna Messenger (Donnaeli@yahoo.com), November 17, 1999.

Donna, go to this address:

http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/roleigh_martin/end_game_criti que.htm

D.B.

-- D.B. (dciinc@aol.com), November 17, 1999.

D.B. it didn't work :-( Thanks

-- Donna Messenger (Donnaeli@yahoo.com), November 17, 1999.

OK D.B. got it to work thanks

-- Donna (Donnaeli@yahoo.com), November 17, 1999.

David:

That is a most interesting question. I found the essay (yes, read it several times) first, to be on a high level of abstraction.

Many of us, even non techies like myself, are used to thinking in terms of completion dates, critical versus non critical systems, etc. Are we too close to the forest? No different than those doing the remediation?

Yes, this essay was *highly* philosophical. If you don't know what you are fixing, how do you know what to do? How do you know if you did it at all, let alone correctly?

Myself, I expect many years of rebuilding, either this system or a new methodology entirely.

I am not sure I believe in a massive US dieoff as so many do, but I do think we will see many years of deprivation and suffering until our means is again equal to our needs.

-- mushroom (mushroom_bs_too_long@yahoo.com), November 17, 1999.

To get the url to work, remove the space in the word "critique" :)

-- Cash (cash@andcarry.com), November 17, 1999.

I'm linked challenged, but we certainly did work it over pretty hard. The problem is that it pretty much confirmed what's been said here over and over. I think the regulars responded with a resounding, "Yup". Can you highly valuable liners provide a link to: (1) IEEE original letter to the Senate, (2) Yourdon's End Game Essay, (3) DWay's rebuttle to Yourdon, (4) DWay's Q&A with the forum, and (5) The "Is DWay a DGI?" thread. (I would if I was more gifted.)

-- Dave (aaa@aaa.com), November 17, 1999.

because it IS "highly philosophical" .

...which proves that [in this instance, at least, i.e. Y2K remediation and effects], abstract thinking MUST precede 'concrete' thinking;

if you want a superb exercise in 'critical thinking', check out the "Is underestimation a possibility?" thread on the Humpty Dumpty Board by Razon Robinsun

one short paragraph of dynamite!

-- Perry Arnett (pjarnett@pdqnet.net), November 17, 1999.

David --

This was discussed. (At length.) There are several posts relating to it. (Try clicking on 'New Answers'. If you get no joy there, then go to the bottom of the forum's current posts and look under 'embedded chips', 'techno-geek questions', 'technology', etc.

In my opinion, the post was a very valuable one. (Yes, I read it two or three times.) It should also be read in conjunction with the essay which he was critiquing, Ed Yourdon's End Game (www.yourdon.com, Ed's Articles and Essays, End Game Analysis is the actual essay, I believe.)

However, there are some things to beware of. First, the essay deals with the *systemic* nature of the problem. There will be those who discount this as he is from the IEEE and they are first and foremost a hardware organization. (There have already been those who claimed to have read his article as a 'CYA' for the hardware people.)

Second, there was a later Q&A in which he responded to questions on this forum. In this later thread, he backed *way* off of some of the more 'forthright' statements he had made. (The 'drive the ship into the iceberg' was one of them.)

Third, the article is a bit abstract. It was written as a critique of Mr Yourdon's essay, it is not a 'technical journal quality required' offering, and in some ways, it was meant to be on a level that 'non-geeks' could understand. Thus, the tecno-babble was kept to that minimum deemed unavoidable. And it was still too much for some to get all the way around.

I, personally, believe that he did a very good job of pointing out things like remediating code, without having a clue what it is doing, is likely to be pointless, and the interfaces are in big trouble and noone is looking at them, and nobody is doing anything about the systemic level of problems.

-- just another (another@engineer.com), November 18, 1999.

IEEE Y2K Chairman takes questions [Dale W. Way (d.way@ieee.org)]

http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id= 001jnW

(Other links off thread)

-- Diane J. Squire (sacredspaces@yahoo.com), November 18, 1999.

David

I too have followed Dale Way's correspondence regarding Y2K with hieghtened interest. I'm with you thinking the forum should collectively interpet the panorama he has painted. Personally I'm stumped in this regard: there seems to be an extreme vacillation and disconnect between his exposition in the Y2K endgame critique and his subsequent question and answer session here. It's as if I were looking at the thoughts of two different people. Now he said it himself, It's difficult for people to communicate and understand one another on the same level. I accept that, but he has to know he has left many struggling with the broader vacillation in his remarks.

I could kick myself in the butt. I can't believe I didn,t have the presense of mind to ask him about his earlier comments depicting burning in hell, screaming and the Titanic senario. I mean what the hell was this man getting at?

Also, forgive me, but I can't remember the posters name. He answered my question in a thread about Dale Way's perspective. The last I looked he made the last post on that thread. He pointed out where the heck has this(Dale)Johnny come lately been all this time. He also tickled my own agitation with Mr Way by pointing out a series of subtle enigma,s Mr. Way left us with.

I'm just not bright enough to read between the lines anymore. It all looks like tea leaves to me. Apparently I'm not bright enough to ask the right questions either.

Good luck to you

-- Rob Carroll (flyingred@montana.com), November 18, 1999.