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This problem is not confined to the government. I've worked in more than a dozen different enterprises, big and small. I think it wouldn't be an overstatement t

This problem is not confined to the government. I've worked in more than a dozen different enterprises, big and small. I think it wouldn't be an overstatement to say that the majority of computer systems I've come across are pretty useless. EDIT: Maybe enterprises should embrace systems like coda.io as a reasonable compromise between rigid enterprise systems and spreadsheets.

David_Reed 7y ago
Thanks. I'll look at coda.io
reallydontask 7y ago
Since your statement is based on personal experience I cannot comment, I would say, though, that the majority of enterprise systems I've used are far from useless. Most of them have been: bloated, slow, outdated and complicated but that's a far cry from being useless.
wayoutthere 7y ago
I just watched my company embark on a 9 figure multi-year automation journey. For some reason, the powers that be thought it would be easier for our folks to figure out an RPA tool than write code — never mind with RPA you have to navigate 3 abstraction layers (the OS, browser DOM and the application itself) instead of just the application. The complexity RPA introduces for web apps kills any benefit it has. I can’t teach an accountant how the DOM works and why some fields have to be selected by an INPUT tag and others by a SPAN tag — they’re numbers geeks. They just don’t think visually. What kills me here is that we use Google for e-mail and documents — and App Script is disabled. Sheets with App Script is one of those “unreasonably effective” tools because it basically allows business analysts to build and test business logic behind even complex web applications (Sheets has some extra data management functions that make it far more powerful than Excel). Or really anything else they want, but with a relatively easy path to converting that process step to a scalable API if that becomes necessary. Heck, I’ve been known to build working wireframes in Sheets — most business applications are glorified spreadsheets anyway. Sure, this is reminiscent of the Access databases that proliferated across companies in the 90s — with the notable difference that Sheets doesn’t have the locking issues Access does and is performant outside a local LAN. Anyone who is going to be able to manage the complexity of an RPA tool is going to be able to figure out App Script. Sure, the quality of code they write will be crap but it’ll be a lot better than the output of an RPA SpaghettiWare tool. Versioning / inheritance are a lot easier to manage. And there are a wealth of existing libraries and connectors. TLDR: code > spaghettiware; always. Any employee who doesn’t have the patience to learn to code will not have the patience to build and maintain reliable RPA automations. If you want to enable “citizen-led automation” (fka “shadow IT”) don’t buy expensive RPA tools — spend that money teaching your folks to code in a tool they’re already familiar with.

David_Reed 7y ago

Thanks. I'll look at coda.io

reallydontask 7y ago

Since your statement is based on personal experience I cannot comment, I would say, though, that the majority of enterprise systems I've used are far from useless. Most of them have been: bloated, slow, outdated and complicated but that's a far cry from being useless.

wayoutthere 7y ago

I just watched my company embark on a 9 figure multi-year automation journey. For some reason, the powers that be thought it would be easier for our folks to figure out an RPA tool than write code — never mind with RPA you have to navigate 3 abstraction layers (the OS, browser DOM and the application itself) instead of just the application. The complexity RPA introduces for web apps kills any benefit it has. I can’t teach an accountant how the DOM works and why some fields have to be selected by an INPUT tag and others by a SPAN tag — they’re numbers geeks. They just don’t think visually. What kills me here is that we use Google for e-mail and documents — and App Script is disabled. Sheets with App Script is one of those “unreasonably effective” tools because it basically allows business analysts to build and test business logic behind even complex web applications (Sheets has some extra data management functions that make it far more powerful than Excel). Or really anything else they want, but with a relatively easy path to converting that process step to a scalable API if that becomes necessary. Heck, I’ve been known to build working wireframes in Sheets — most business applications are glorified spreadsheets anyway. Sure, this is reminiscent of the Access databases that proliferated across companies in the 90s — with the notable difference that Sheets doesn’t have the locking issues Access does and is performant outside a local LAN. Anyone who is going to be able to manage the complexity of an RPA tool is going to be able to figure out App Script. Sure, the quality of code they write will be crap but it’ll be a lot better than the output of an RPA SpaghettiWare tool. Versioning / inheritance are a lot easier to manage. And there are a wealth of existing libraries and connectors. TLDR: code > spaghettiware; always. Any employee who doesn’t have the patience to learn to code will not have the patience to build and maintain reliable RPA automations. If you want to enable “citizen-led automation” (fka “shadow IT”) don’t buy expensive RPA tools — spend that money teaching your folks to code in a tool they’re already familiar with.