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It blows my mind that Oracle gets paid huge sums of money for the garbage they put out. I went to a CUNY school and they rolled out a "new" administration syste

by kcb 6y ago

It blows my mind that Oracle gets paid huge sums of money for the garbage they put out. I went to a CUNY school and they rolled out a "new" administration system called CUNYfirst. Literally a several $100 million dollar contract and Oracle provided a slightly modified version of Peoplesoft. The UI looks like something that should have never existed on this earth. Every student gets an Employee ID, you choose classes for a semester by adding then to a shopping cart and checking out. Minimal effort from them for maximum cost.

MisterTea 6y ago
I went to QCC from 98-01 and you'd sit in the admin building on an IBM green screen terminal and setup your schedule. There was little to no prerequisite checking so I made all sorts of goofy schedules and took classes out of order. I don't remember having any issues with it as the interface was pretty strait forward. I wound up going back several years later when I was thinking of a different field and they had that trashcan CUNYfirst system. By then the UI was already outdated and clunky. I wound up with the wrong class the first time around because of some issue and have to have it changed post payment which was time consuming. I would have rather used the IBM's.
rubicon33 6y ago
That’s aggressive sales department, make no mistake about it. It’s actually easy to sell shit software. The average person knows a lot more about cars, for example, thank they do software. I’m sure Oracle makes huge money on name alone. The IT manager doesn’t want to take a chance with some lesser name. Just get Oracle, then nobody can blame them when shit hits the fan.
- MegaButts 6y ago
  > Just get Oracle, then nobody can blame them when shit hits the fan. Only incompetent people wouldn't blame the IT manager for choosing Oracle.
- saas_sam 6y ago
  I would be more inclined to blame the buyer, not the seller.
- Pasorrijer 6y ago
  It's the old big business joke. "No one ever got fired for buying IBM". You can easily replace Oracle in that sentence.
josephorjoe 6y ago
yeah, a shopping cart existing on a webapp where you are not purchasing product is such a red flag
unethical_ban 6y ago
I absolutely loathe any time I see "shopping cart" in an app that isn't me buying something.
- colejohnson66 6y ago
  When you see that, it’s clear a system/framework/etc. is being used for something it was not designed for
  - yazmeya 6y ago
    In college, we had a two-week stretch at the beginning of a new semester when you could audition classes and add/drop them at will. This was called the "shopping period", so in my view, the shopping cart analogy on the registrar's web site doesn't sound too out of place here. Of course, the logic behind it would need to be different from an off-the-shelf e-commerce cart.
  - duderific 6y ago
    Eh, not necessarily. There might be a thought on the UX team that shopping cart is something anyone can relate to, so they use that as the metaphor.
    - sokoloff 6y ago
      Exactly. There are folders and a trash can on my computer desktop for the same reason.
      - colejohnson66 6y ago
        Yes, but to me, a “shopping cart” implies a purchase. It’s what I use at a grocery store to put my food and stuff in. A “cart” would be better term IMO despite just being a shorter form of “shopping cart”. But idk.
- thaumasiotes 6y ago
  But you signing up for classes is you buying something. I used a class registration system that wasn't this and didn't mention a "shopping cart" metaphor anywhere, but the system was exactly the same. Why object to calling it a "shopping cart?
cbaleanu 6y ago
I have to use an Oracle product for timesheets and besides the UI which is as you can imagine reading the previous comments, contains javascript code for a 'finite state machine for controlling the notification popup component'... [edit: typo]
quasse 6y ago
The University of Wisconsin used (and still uses AFAIK) this system as well. "Shopping" for classes was horrendous, and there were at least three interfaces to search for classes. I can only imagine how hard it was to populate the available classes. I wouldn't be surprised if part of the huge administrative bloat in the various departments was people who's only job was to force data into and out of PeopleSoft.
- billh 6y ago
  10 years ago I did exactly this for the University of Wisconsin. My job was entirely to facilitate data extraction out of oracle databases / PeopleSoft for longitudinal studies done by faculty or other interested parties. There were a few dozen of us spread across the UW System who's sole job it was to extract and massage data from these databases... One, very large, central database that handled data for UW and every satellite college they had.
Spooky23 6y ago
As shitty as it is, do you think that the CUNY school has the ability to write a spec for an administration system that handles all of the business needs and compliance requirements? Or do that and manage the delivery of those requirements? The answer is of course no. The Oracle pitch is "We do this for Michigan State and can do X, Y and Z". That is true. Oracle gets alot of shit for this stuff because they own the market for enterprise financial software. Their software is gross, they bought out the competition and generally suck, but that is what the market demands. My uncle is a locomotive engineer. His railroad makes a conscious decision to remove any creature comforts from the cab, like a chair cushion. It's needlessly uncomfortable and is awful, but that doesn't mean that GE (or whomever) sucks. They delivered what they are asked to do.
- dopidop 6y ago
  The scalability argument of the solution is becoming less relevant with readily available cloud architecture, no? The school cannot handle the requirements or implementation. Of course, but maybe a smaller, more focused provider than oracle can? And yes, you have to be at peace with your data being god-know-where.
- tialaramex 6y ago
  To be fair, comfort can be a mixed bag for system safety, especially when humans are alone, safety critical and on weird schedules which can all be the case for train drivers (which is what I understand "locomotive engineer" to mean in this context) - because comfort is conducive to sleep. One of the setups I come to almost expect in maritime accident reports is an officer taking a night watch, alone, while somewhat fatigued. Warm, dark, quiet. After a few hours the ship has drifted significantly off its intended course. For unknown reasons (the officer was probably asleep) no attempt is made to correct... When they do wake up, they often don't have good situational awareness, and their focus is on pretending nothing is wrong, even if they are in fact already in serious trouble and need all the help they can get. Night-time railway accidents are less common in my country, perhaps because the relevant unions insist on proper "if you're too tired just go home you aren't fired" type rules to reduce fatigue errors, but I do recall a case where a freight driver was dipping in and out of consciousness. When he was conscious he could see a red lamp out of the window, signalling "Danger" ahead so he'd reduce the traction power. If he'd been less sleepy he'd have noticed those red lamps were not getting closer each time, they were moving gradually away from him. His train was on a steep climb, and he'd reduced power so much it was gently rolling backwards. Oops. Nobody died, that time.
SilasX 6y ago
They ... couldn't even relabel the shopping cart and other stuff? Like, call it "courseload" or something?
- dmurray 6y ago
  When you've finished adding classes, would you know to click the "courseload" button in the top right to complete your enrolment? Probably not. It's lazy UI but in some ways it's going to be more intuitive, not less, to any student who's ever used an online retailer before.
  - SilasX 6y ago
    That's just an example, there are other ways to indicate that they need to click on that button to review all selections and finalize.

by kcb 6y ago

MisterTea 6y ago

I went to QCC from 98-01 and you'd sit in the admin building on an IBM green screen terminal and setup your schedule. There was little to no prerequisite checking so I made all sorts of goofy schedules and took classes out of order. I don't remember having any issues with it as the interface was pretty strait forward. I wound up going back several years later when I was thinking of a different field and they had that trashcan CUNYfirst system. By then the UI was already outdated and clunky. I wound up with the wrong class the first time around because of some issue and have to have it changed post payment which was time consuming. I would have rather used the IBM's.

rubicon33 6y ago

That’s aggressive sales department, make no mistake about it. It’s actually easy to sell shit software. The average person knows a lot more about cars, for example, thank they do software. I’m sure Oracle makes huge money on name alone. The IT manager doesn’t want to take a chance with some lesser name. Just get Oracle, then nobody can blame them when shit hits the fan.

MegaButts 6y ago
> Just get Oracle, then nobody can blame them when shit hits the fan. Only incompetent people wouldn't blame the IT manager for choosing Oracle.
saas_sam 6y ago
I would be more inclined to blame the buyer, not the seller.
Pasorrijer 6y ago
It's the old big business joke. "No one ever got fired for buying IBM". You can easily replace Oracle in that sentence.

josephorjoe 6y ago

yeah, a shopping cart existing on a webapp where you are not purchasing product is such a red flag

unethical_ban 6y ago

I absolutely loathe any time I see "shopping cart" in an app that isn't me buying something.

colejohnson66 6y ago
When you see that, it’s clear a system/framework/etc. is being used for something it was not designed for
- yazmeya 6y ago
  In college, we had a two-week stretch at the beginning of a new semester when you could audition classes and add/drop them at will. This was called the "shopping period", so in my view, the shopping cart analogy on the registrar's web site doesn't sound too out of place here. Of course, the logic behind it would need to be different from an off-the-shelf e-commerce cart.
- duderific 6y ago
  Eh, not necessarily. There might be a thought on the UX team that shopping cart is something anyone can relate to, so they use that as the metaphor.
  - sokoloff 6y ago
    Exactly. There are folders and a trash can on my computer desktop for the same reason.
    - colejohnson66 6y ago
      Yes, but to me, a “shopping cart” implies a purchase. It’s what I use at a grocery store to put my food and stuff in. A “cart” would be better term IMO despite just being a shorter form of “shopping cart”. But idk.
thaumasiotes 6y ago
But you signing up for classes is you buying something. I used a class registration system that wasn't this and didn't mention a "shopping cart" metaphor anywhere, but the system was exactly the same. Why object to calling it a "shopping cart?

cbaleanu 6y ago

I have to use an Oracle product for timesheets and besides the UI which is as you can imagine reading the previous comments, contains javascript code for a 'finite state machine for controlling the notification popup component'... [edit: typo]

quasse 6y ago

The University of Wisconsin used (and still uses AFAIK) this system as well. "Shopping" for classes was horrendous, and there were at least three interfaces to search for classes. I can only imagine how hard it was to populate the available classes. I wouldn't be surprised if part of the huge administrative bloat in the various departments was people who's only job was to force data into and out of PeopleSoft.

billh 6y ago
10 years ago I did exactly this for the University of Wisconsin. My job was entirely to facilitate data extraction out of oracle databases / PeopleSoft for longitudinal studies done by faculty or other interested parties. There were a few dozen of us spread across the UW System who's sole job it was to extract and massage data from these databases... One, very large, central database that handled data for UW and every satellite college they had.

Spooky23 6y ago

As shitty as it is, do you think that the CUNY school has the ability to write a spec for an administration system that handles all of the business needs and compliance requirements? Or do that and manage the delivery of those requirements? The answer is of course no. The Oracle pitch is "We do this for Michigan State and can do X, Y and Z". That is true. Oracle gets alot of shit for this stuff because they own the market for enterprise financial software. Their software is gross, they bought out the competition and generally suck, but that is what the market demands. My uncle is a locomotive engineer. His railroad makes a conscious decision to remove any creature comforts from the cab, like a chair cushion. It's needlessly uncomfortable and is awful, but that doesn't mean that GE (or whomever) sucks. They delivered what they are asked to do.

dopidop 6y ago
The scalability argument of the solution is becoming less relevant with readily available cloud architecture, no? The school cannot handle the requirements or implementation. Of course, but maybe a smaller, more focused provider than oracle can? And yes, you have to be at peace with your data being god-know-where.
tialaramex 6y ago
To be fair, comfort can be a mixed bag for system safety, especially when humans are alone, safety critical and on weird schedules which can all be the case for train drivers (which is what I understand "locomotive engineer" to mean in this context) - because comfort is conducive to sleep. One of the setups I come to almost expect in maritime accident reports is an officer taking a night watch, alone, while somewhat fatigued. Warm, dark, quiet. After a few hours the ship has drifted significantly off its intended course. For unknown reasons (the officer was probably asleep) no attempt is made to correct... When they do wake up, they often don't have good situational awareness, and their focus is on pretending nothing is wrong, even if they are in fact already in serious trouble and need all the help they can get. Night-time railway accidents are less common in my country, perhaps because the relevant unions insist on proper "if you're too tired just go home you aren't fired" type rules to reduce fatigue errors, but I do recall a case where a freight driver was dipping in and out of consciousness. When he was conscious he could see a red lamp out of the window, signalling "Danger" ahead so he'd reduce the traction power. If he'd been less sleepy he'd have noticed those red lamps were not getting closer each time, they were moving gradually away from him. His train was on a steep climb, and he'd reduced power so much it was gently rolling backwards. Oops. Nobody died, that time.

SilasX 6y ago

They ... couldn't even relabel the shopping cart and other stuff? Like, call it "courseload" or something?

dmurray 6y ago
When you've finished adding classes, would you know to click the "courseload" button in the top right to complete your enrolment? Probably not. It's lazy UI but in some ways it's going to be more intuitive, not less, to any student who's ever used an online retailer before.
- SilasX 6y ago
  That's just an example, there are other ways to indicate that they need to click on that button to review all selections and finalize.