rgraham666
Literotica Guru
- Joined
- Feb 19, 2004
- Posts
- 43,689
For a long time. Due to that fooforaw that's brewing on the 'degree thread' I think I'll tell it.
About twenty five years ago I started work at a small computer company here in Toronto. They'd do the whole nine yards for other companies. Install the mini-computer system, write the programs the clients needed and maintain the system.
I think they hired me mostly because I worked cheap, but it soon became apparent that they had no idea what to do with me. I'd be placed on projects on an ad hoc basis to do little jobs.
Finally they placed me on maintenance to clean up after program crashes and to fix the bugs.
It soon became apparent most of my work would be with one company. This was a manufacturing company. And one part of the system was especially bad; the 'change orders' part. Although the 'enter orders' part needed work too.
The 'enter orders' and 'change orders' was the most used part. And between them they crashed at least three times a day leaving orphan records all over the place. They didn't have filtering to make sure the right data was entered. They didn't have masking to display the data correctly. They didn't check the product file to make sure the product actually existed. They didn't update inventories properly. They didn't calculate taxes properly. They did not update the general ledger properly. The audit trail wasn't updated properly.
The whole thing was a mess. It represented three months work by a team of six and I was spending four hours a day picking up after it.
I tried to alert the managers and the owners of my company to this but it was always, "The client has signed off on it." So it became apparent I was going to be a janitor for a long time.
I decided to do something about it. So I went to the client company and spent a day on the production line and in the office learning how they did things. Then I got to work.
I took a couple of days to plan out what I wanted to do. I also delved into a book on accounting so I could finally understand how double entry bookkeeping worked.
I called up my liaison at the client company and told them that in three weeks time I'll have a new 'enter and change orders' program for them. They'd have to make sure their files are clean and an inventory done. I guaranteed that the new system would work.
Then I got to work. I spent five 12 to 16 hour days coding. Most of that in the data entry areas. The file update areas I blocked off into discrete chunks so that each block of code updated one and one record only. I also set it up so that if the program died it would start up again where it left off.
By the time the coding was done I realized I'd severely underestimated the time I'd need. So the next two weeks were 14 to 20 hour days testing the living shit out of my code. Good thing I did because there were a lot of bugs, a lot of bugs.
But I made it. On the day I said I dragged my ass to the client, installed the program. And it worked. It worked every day for the next three years. Bombed once and it took me twenty minutes to fix it.
Now according to our mythology that is the sort of thing that gets an employee noticed and rewarded.
You'd be wrong.
My peers were unhappy with me because I'd made them look bad. Especially the ones remaining from the original project. (Half left within two weeks of the client signing off. I wonder why?)
The middle managers were pissed at me because I'd done what I did without permission. I know, 'ask for forgiveness, not permission'. But they never forgave me.
The owners were very unhappy for reasons not apparent immediately.
I didn't care. I knew I did a good job. The people that actually did the work at the client were ecstatic. My program was now a help rather than a pain in the ass.
It became clear to me exactly how bad I'd fucked up a few weeks later when the client did their first month end. The owner of the client company calls up and says in a hushed voice. "Oh my God! The General Ledger is telling the truth!"
"Oh good," I reply. "I worked hard to get that right." Then I realize he's not hushed because he's happy or surprised. He's scared.
"Is there some way to make changes to the G/L?" he asks then.
"Oh yes. Use 'make G/L changes' program. And I got the audit trail working."
If I thought he'd been scared before I could now practically hear his bowels let go over the phone. "Is there some way I can change the G/L without updating the audit trail?"
I, innocent naif that I am, finally clue in. "Why would you want to do that?"
"Never mind," he says, and hangs up.
Ten minutes later I get called into the owner's offices and roundly chastised for my poor customer relationship skills.
It turns out the client's owner was a serial book cooker. With a busted system, a common thing at the time, he could use the manual books he 'maintained' for taxes and stockholders. The owners of my company knew this and were pleased to go along as long as a steady revenue stream for 'maintenance' came in.
I'd screwed all that up.
I never rose in that company. And when I left I had to threaten to sue them to get a recommendation.
Every one involved had degrees save me and the people at the client company who had to do the work.
Now you know why I'm rather cynical about the utility of degrees.
About twenty five years ago I started work at a small computer company here in Toronto. They'd do the whole nine yards for other companies. Install the mini-computer system, write the programs the clients needed and maintain the system.
I think they hired me mostly because I worked cheap, but it soon became apparent that they had no idea what to do with me. I'd be placed on projects on an ad hoc basis to do little jobs.
Finally they placed me on maintenance to clean up after program crashes and to fix the bugs.
It soon became apparent most of my work would be with one company. This was a manufacturing company. And one part of the system was especially bad; the 'change orders' part. Although the 'enter orders' part needed work too.
The 'enter orders' and 'change orders' was the most used part. And between them they crashed at least three times a day leaving orphan records all over the place. They didn't have filtering to make sure the right data was entered. They didn't have masking to display the data correctly. They didn't check the product file to make sure the product actually existed. They didn't update inventories properly. They didn't calculate taxes properly. They did not update the general ledger properly. The audit trail wasn't updated properly.
The whole thing was a mess. It represented three months work by a team of six and I was spending four hours a day picking up after it.
I tried to alert the managers and the owners of my company to this but it was always, "The client has signed off on it." So it became apparent I was going to be a janitor for a long time.
I decided to do something about it. So I went to the client company and spent a day on the production line and in the office learning how they did things. Then I got to work.
I took a couple of days to plan out what I wanted to do. I also delved into a book on accounting so I could finally understand how double entry bookkeeping worked.
I called up my liaison at the client company and told them that in three weeks time I'll have a new 'enter and change orders' program for them. They'd have to make sure their files are clean and an inventory done. I guaranteed that the new system would work.
Then I got to work. I spent five 12 to 16 hour days coding. Most of that in the data entry areas. The file update areas I blocked off into discrete chunks so that each block of code updated one and one record only. I also set it up so that if the program died it would start up again where it left off.
By the time the coding was done I realized I'd severely underestimated the time I'd need. So the next two weeks were 14 to 20 hour days testing the living shit out of my code. Good thing I did because there were a lot of bugs, a lot of bugs.
But I made it. On the day I said I dragged my ass to the client, installed the program. And it worked. It worked every day for the next three years. Bombed once and it took me twenty minutes to fix it.
Now according to our mythology that is the sort of thing that gets an employee noticed and rewarded.
You'd be wrong.
My peers were unhappy with me because I'd made them look bad. Especially the ones remaining from the original project. (Half left within two weeks of the client signing off. I wonder why?)
The middle managers were pissed at me because I'd done what I did without permission. I know, 'ask for forgiveness, not permission'. But they never forgave me.
The owners were very unhappy for reasons not apparent immediately.
I didn't care. I knew I did a good job. The people that actually did the work at the client were ecstatic. My program was now a help rather than a pain in the ass.
It became clear to me exactly how bad I'd fucked up a few weeks later when the client did their first month end. The owner of the client company calls up and says in a hushed voice. "Oh my God! The General Ledger is telling the truth!"
"Oh good," I reply. "I worked hard to get that right." Then I realize he's not hushed because he's happy or surprised. He's scared.
"Is there some way to make changes to the G/L?" he asks then.
"Oh yes. Use 'make G/L changes' program. And I got the audit trail working."
If I thought he'd been scared before I could now practically hear his bowels let go over the phone. "Is there some way I can change the G/L without updating the audit trail?"
I, innocent naif that I am, finally clue in. "Why would you want to do that?"
"Never mind," he says, and hangs up.
Ten minutes later I get called into the owner's offices and roundly chastised for my poor customer relationship skills.
It turns out the client's owner was a serial book cooker. With a busted system, a common thing at the time, he could use the manual books he 'maintained' for taxes and stockholders. The owners of my company knew this and were pleased to go along as long as a steady revenue stream for 'maintenance' came in.
I'd screwed all that up.
I never rose in that company. And when I left I had to threaten to sue them to get a recommendation.
Every one involved had degrees save me and the people at the client company who had to do the work.
Now you know why I'm rather cynical about the utility of degrees.
