[447] in Project_DB
Re: A Proposal For Moving Forward on Project DB
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Bill Cattey)
Mon Mar 22 19:20:58 1999
Date: Mon, 22 Mar 1999 19:20:53 -0500 (EST)
From: Bill Cattey <wdc@MIT.EDU>
To: project-db@MIT.EDU, Mike Barker <mbarker@MIT.EDU>
In-Reply-To: <4.1.19990321213159.00bc1150@po8.mit.edu>
Mike:
Summary:
I agree with almost all of what Mike Proposes
I suggest a 4th principle.
I suggest 2 amendments.
I ask we try to improve on Priority and Commitment longer term.
Amendment 1: Keep Status, but cut back to ONLY 5 values:
Pending, Active, OnHold, Terminated, Completed
Amendment 2: Get rid of Process and Practice and instead have Director.
-wdc
----
Detail:
That is an excellent analysis and proposal, and I agree with almost all of it.
In hallway chat the other day, I tripped over another principle that
should definitely underly the longer term work, and might be able to
benefit the short term work:
4. There is a need for structure in what is displayed about projects,
and web page creation may or may not offer sufficient structure.
I feel uncomfortable with the decisions you've proposed regarding
Process, Practice, Status.
My guess is that you moved Status out because it is volatile. I would
keep it because I think it helps organize and group the projects. I'd
propose cutting back the VALUES of Status to:
Pending, Active, OnHold, Terminated, Completed
Any other status information belongs, quite rightly, in the project notebook.
I would advocate replacing Process and Practice with different entities.
I feel that Process and Practice are too IS-centric, and do not capture
the essense of what is needed. The problem is in getting consensus on
what is needed. I can understand how it REALLY simplifies the
short-term work if we just leave them as they are, try to clarify as
best we can, and move on. I'll throw out ONE alternative:
Remove Process and Practice, and replace it with "Director". If the
director is not set, the project is informal, and has no committment of
resources. If the Director is set with the ID of one of Jim, an Process
Director, or a Practice Director, the project is formally committed and
the director named is the primary director to talk to regarding issues
of resourcing and prioritization.
I'm a little uncomfortable leaving Priority and Committment in the db,
simply because they've been so poorly used in the past. I'll not
formally object, but I'd just ask that we try and improve upon
Priorities of "Low, Medium, and High". I fear here, that priorities
will end up being of the form "Project A is a prerequisit for Project
B", and "Project X is of lower priority than Project Y, specifically."
I think that that kind of information MAY be able to go into the longer
term Projects Database Tool. I also ask that we try and be serious when
we choose Formal and Informal committment levels.
