Fellow programmers will feel my pain
Dec. 1st, 2009 11:07 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pbrayWe're in the midst of a crash development project, that's being sandwiched in around November close, prep for year-end and everyone's understandable desire to take vacation days before they lose them.
The goal is to build a new subset of the corporate spend database. Last week they created a test database for this project and I've been asked to pull sample data to load into it so we can start the analysis.
- The corporate spend database model has 12 dimensions.
- The test model that they built for me has 18 dimensions. The person who built it is on vacation this week and no one can explain why we have the 6 extra dimensions, or whether or not it is safe to delete them and go back to the regular 12 dimensions.
- The SQL queries that load the corporate spend model create an output file with 42 fields (dimensions). Several of these dimensions are obvious duplicates (three different formats for department numbers, for instance) but no one can explain to me which of the 42 fields are used to load the 12 dimensions in the corporate model and which ones are ignored. The expert on this is too busy to talk to me, and the backups are... you guessed it, on vacation.
And now the project lead is IM'ing me to ask why we haven't been able to load sample data yet.
The goal is to build a new subset of the corporate spend database. Last week they created a test database for this project and I've been asked to pull sample data to load into it so we can start the analysis.
- The corporate spend database model has 12 dimensions.
- The test model that they built for me has 18 dimensions. The person who built it is on vacation this week and no one can explain why we have the 6 extra dimensions, or whether or not it is safe to delete them and go back to the regular 12 dimensions.
- The SQL queries that load the corporate spend model create an output file with 42 fields (dimensions). Several of these dimensions are obvious duplicates (three different formats for department numbers, for instance) but no one can explain to me which of the 42 fields are used to load the 12 dimensions in the corporate model and which ones are ignored. The expert on this is too busy to talk to me, and the backups are... you guessed it, on vacation.
And now the project lead is IM'ing me to ask why we haven't been able to load sample data yet.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-01 05:02 pm (UTC)(Yeah, right. I'll wait while you stop laughing.)
(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-01 05:35 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-01 05:24 pm (UTC)I hope you can get it smoothed out with a minimum of bloodshed and tearing out of hair!
(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-01 05:36 pm (UTC)But yeah, it's pretty typical to be explaining to people that databases aren't like suitcases, you can't just cram in extra things in the side pockets and hope no one notices.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-01 06:31 pm (UTC)*snort* What, we're not supposed to have data spilling over the edges in random order, and just pray it dances itself into line when we ask nicely?
(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-01 07:23 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-01 05:33 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-01 05:39 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-01 05:42 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-01 07:25 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-02 02:59 am (UTC)Heh. We must work for the same employer.
Don't forget Malaysia and Manilla. Apparently India is getting a bit expensive these days.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-01 11:45 pm (UTC)When I was in Naval Aviation Electronics school years (decades?) ago, we were going over a circuit schematic and noticed that it used way more diodes than was really needed to do the job. The instructor said it was a result of the "brother-in-law effect." Yeah, the circuit designer's brother-in-law manufactured diodes.
Dave
(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-02 05:56 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-02 02:36 am (UTC)Yeah, this kind of thing (on a smaller scale) happens all the time where I work. Of course, mostly that's because we have N the Network Guy and his sidekick S instead of, like, a proper IT department, but there's also the issue of "Oh, you mean when you said 'database' you meant an Access database? Doesn't an Excel worksheet work the same way?" ::facepalm::
(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-02 03:01 am (UTC)Just, wow.
Excuse me while I go get a beer...
(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-02 02:24 pm (UTC)I spend a lot of time, some weeks, helping other people figure out how their computers work (No, there's nothing wrong with your new word-processing software; your ASCII diacritical codes don't work because Num Lock isn't on. No, you can't make Excel do that with data you copied in from Word, but you can do it in Word, so why did you even put it in Excel in the first place? Sure, no problem, I can do your Word troubleshooting over the phone and tell you how to accept tracked changes for the fifteenth time. And so on), and every so often I toy with the idea of chucking this editing gig and becoming an IT guy (on the grounds that it might be a refreshing change, and surely the pay would be better?), but every time that happens
(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-02 03:02 pm (UTC)Yes, I'm one of those guys who thinks that they don't pay first and second level support enough considering all of the stress they go through.
That said, there are enough clueless people in IT to make me shudder. In a field that demands critical thinking and teamwork, we sure have a lack of both a lot of the time...
(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-02 03:03 pm (UTC)Coffee.... Need coffee....
(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-02 07:45 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-02 08:42 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-02 05:58 pm (UTC)Which sums up a lot of this stuff.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-02 06:17 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-02 07:03 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-02 07:45 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-02 08:51 pm (UTC)Fourth row down, far right column.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-03 03:15 am (UTC)I don't think I can get away with wearing an actual f-bomb t-shirt either at work or in front of my seven-year-old, though ...
(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-03 07:23 am (UTC)There are days when that shirt is awfully tempting, however.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-03 01:32 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-02 07:42 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-02 05:57 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-02 02:37 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-02 05:59 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-12-02 07:44 pm (UTC)