Get documents about "Did I Say Koala Tea
Document Sample
BACKTALK
Did I Say “Koala Tea?”
Q uestion: What do you call a formal
afternoon reception or social gather-
ing of furry, bear-like arboreal Australian
the program to my long-suffering user.
After explaining that there was a one-
day delay between program submission
Satisfied”(words and music by Paul
Simon, 1970). Great song. Great message.
“Just trying to keep my customers satis-
marsupials, where they drink the boiled and the results, I saw the look of dismay fied, satisfied.”
glossy leaves of an Asian evergreen shrub? on his face. Come to find out, the data he You want a definition of quality? OK:
Answer: A “koala tea.” Oh, wait – the wanted sorted consisted of exactly eight Keep the customer satisfied. Do you
issue this month was about quality, not 10-character strings. A six-line bubble sort know what customers want? Do you know
koala tea. That’s my mistake. I guess I real- routine would (and eventually what they really need? Are they part of the
ly didn’t know the correct definition of did) sort the data online decision-making process when it comes to
quality, which is “trait, characteristic or in less than a sec- making trade-off decisions in the
property, degree or grade of excellence1.” architecture and design? Are they
But then, perhaps my first def- part of the decision process when
inition is just about as good as deciding what is part of a release,
the second. It depends on the and what gets put off until the
user’s needs. next release?
As usual with my You see, you are not really ready
columns, let me start with a to discuss quality until you know
story. Back in 1974, I was a the users’ needs. If their overwhelm-
young airman stationed at ing requirement is accuracy, then
wonderful, beautiful Offutt speed might not impress them.
Air Force Base. (Once you get If their overwhelming require-
on it, you can’t get Offutt – the ment is consistent uptime,
Air Force base with its own ceme- then no matter how accurate
tery!) As an applications program- and fast the system is, if it
mer at SAC (remember the crashes frequently, they are
Strategic Air Command?), a user not impressed. If their
asked me to sort a file of need is for a reliable sys-
data for him. Being young tem, and you forget to
and eager, I immediately set implement a quick-and-
forth to write the ultimate sort easy-to-use backup and
routine to end all sort routines. recovery system, then they
I had recently completed won’t be impressed.
an undergraduate course in Remember – the latest and
sorting and searching tech- greatest languages don’t
niques, and I recalled a par- impress them if the resulting
ticularly cool sort from system is slow, unreliable, and
class (something like a buggy. A reliable Fortran pro-
combination polyphase-cas- gram might just impress them more
cade-merge sort). It required sev- than a spiffy (but buggy) program
eral temporary files, but the machine we ond. The lesson I written in Java Plus Plus Sharp
were using at the time was pretty limited. learned: Find out exactly (or whatever the language of
Does anyone remember the World Wide what the user needs before writing the the month is).
Military Command and Control System2 program. I had fallen into the trap of let- You want quality? Talk to your users.
(WWMCCS) Honeywell H6000? It had ting my biases and experience influence Find out what they need (and what they
96K of RAM. Not much memory space at me into giving the user what I thought he want). Involve them in trade-off deci-
all. However, it did have multiple tape needed, rather that giving him what he sions. Write the programs that will make
drives, so I wrote a program that sorted really wanted. them satisfied. Save the polyphase-cas-
using four tapes. Well, I’m a bit older and wiser now (as cade-merge sort for another time.
Of course with only five tape drives my friends would point out, a lot older, Oh – and yes – I do know that getting
for the entire system, running my job took maybe a little wiser) and frequently find the real requirements out of some users is
a bit of scheduling. In fact, it usually took myself teaching this lesson to others. It only slightly harder than communicating
a full day to actually run the job once I had shouldn’t be a secret; lots of people know with the dead. I’ll save that discussion for
submitted it. After a few weeks of devel- about it. In fact, Simon and Garfunkel another column!
opment and testing, I was ready to unveil must have been software engineers. Back
in the ’70s, they produced their “Bridge
1 All definitions are from Microsoft Encarta Encyclopedia,
1999 edition. Over Troubled Waters” album. If my – David A. Cook
2. If you remember WWMCCS, then check out “Defense memory serves me, on side two song No. Software Technology Support Center/
Department Classic Becomes Object of History” at Shim Enterprise, Inc.
<www.af.mil/news/Jul1997/n19970717_970866.html>. 11 was titled “Keep the Customer
March 2003 www.stsc.hill.af.mil 31
Related docs
