4 ms·

SAP must be the sacrificial lamb to keep the “legendary german engineering” myth alive

jimnotgym 4y ago
To be fair US companies have built some truly awful tools in this field. Can anyone remember the name of that awful booking system Oracle sells?
- bigDinosaur 4y ago
  Is there any mythos around US engineering in the way there is about German practicality, efficiency, and reliability?
  - jimnotgym 4y ago
    There is about software engineering yes, a myth that only the US can build great products
    - signatoremo 4y ago
      Only in your imagination. Many great products made by none US companies are used in the US and deservedly recognized — Redis, Jetbrains’ ones, Erlang, Lua, Scala, nginx, etc.
TMWNN 4y ago
I've heard it said that the truth behind the myth of German engineering and German efficiency[1] is that Germans are, rather, rule followers. [1] Example of both: The new Berlin airport
- croes 4y ago
  Wasn't the problem with the Berlin airport that they didn't follow the rules, e.g. fire protection?
  - ingomaro 4y ago
    Fire protection mess ... was a symptom. The root cause was that the local governments (city of Berlin and state of Brandenburg) wanted to split the pie for many small to medium businesses in the region. Noble idea but hard to execute as we found out later... So instead of giving it all to a contractor that actually knows how to build (large) airports they tried to managed it themself. Those people were unexperienced in this size of operation and it went all downhill from there. It's a common theme with big projects: Local administration is unexperienced but tries to do it anyway and they fail or get ripped off every time. What we should have is a federal unit that just does large scale construction/engineering projects.
seabird 4y ago
The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world that German engineering is something they want. In automobiles, industrial equipment, electronics, software, etc. you can sense when Germans were involved. I've accepted that it's something I'll never understand, and that they probably feel the same way about American designs. Same planet, different worlds.
- zelphirkalt 4y ago
  In terms of software you are probably right, since we are behind in so many areas and education for jobs about creating software is not the best. About cars: Do you mean things like the VW scandal? Or do you mean actually shoddy engineering in cars? I think the reputation for engineering stems from darker times.
  - lstodd 4y ago
    Well, considering best german automotive engineering got left behind in early nineties and that for like 20 years already owning a BMW or Mercedes means constant hassle and tons of cash for trivial repairs - yes. German auto engineering just isn't there. VW scandal is different - it's what you get when you set unreasonable and actually conflicting requirements.
throwmeaway1112 4y ago
I recently found out it's not SAP native software - rather it's USA based company/product that was acquired by SAP.

To be fair US companies have built some truly awful tools in this field. Can anyone remember the name of that awful booking system Oracle sells?

bigDinosaur 4y ago
Is there any mythos around US engineering in the way there is about German practicality, efficiency, and reliability?
- jimnotgym 4y ago
  There is about software engineering yes, a myth that only the US can build great products
  - signatoremo 4y ago
    Only in your imagination. Many great products made by none US companies are used in the US and deservedly recognized — Redis, Jetbrains’ ones, Erlang, Lua, Scala, nginx, etc.

TMWNN 4y ago

I've heard it said that the truth behind the myth of German engineering and German efficiency[1] is that Germans are, rather, rule followers. [1] Example of both: The new Berlin airport

croes 4y ago
Wasn't the problem with the Berlin airport that they didn't follow the rules, e.g. fire protection?
- ingomaro 4y ago
  Fire protection mess ... was a symptom. The root cause was that the local governments (city of Berlin and state of Brandenburg) wanted to split the pie for many small to medium businesses in the region. Noble idea but hard to execute as we found out later... So instead of giving it all to a contractor that actually knows how to build (large) airports they tried to managed it themself. Those people were unexperienced in this size of operation and it went all downhill from there. It's a common theme with big projects: Local administration is unexperienced but tries to do it anyway and they fail or get ripped off every time. What we should have is a federal unit that just does large scale construction/engineering projects.

seabird 4y ago

The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world that German engineering is something they want. In automobiles, industrial equipment, electronics, software, etc. you can sense when Germans were involved. I've accepted that it's something I'll never understand, and that they probably feel the same way about American designs. Same planet, different worlds.

zelphirkalt 4y ago
In terms of software you are probably right, since we are behind in so many areas and education for jobs about creating software is not the best. About cars: Do you mean things like the VW scandal? Or do you mean actually shoddy engineering in cars? I think the reputation for engineering stems from darker times.
- lstodd 4y ago
  Well, considering best german automotive engineering got left behind in early nineties and that for like 20 years already owning a BMW or Mercedes means constant hassle and tons of cash for trivial repairs - yes. German auto engineering just isn't there. VW scandal is different - it's what you get when you set unreasonable and actually conflicting requirements.

throwmeaway1112 4y ago

I recently found out it's not SAP native software - rather it's USA based company/product that was acquired by SAP.