Path: utzoo!utgpu!attcan!uunet!ncrlnk!ncr-sd!hp-sdd!ucsdhub!ucsd!sdcsvax!beowulf!riley
From: riley@beowulf.ucsd.edu (Christian Riley)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: Inside Mac
Message-ID: <5481@sdcsvax.UCSD.EDU>
Date: 3 Nov 88 06:02:13 GMT
References: <19358@apple.Apple.COM> <10330069@eecs.nwu.edu> <10785@cup.portal.com>
Sender: nobody@sdcsvax.UCSD.EDU
Reply-To: riley@beowulf.UCSD.EDU (Christian Riley)
Organization: EE/CS Dept. U.C. San Diego
Lines: 40

Mike_G_Newman@cup.portal.com writes in <10785@cup.portal.com>:

>Here we go re-inventing the wheel on this topic.  There must be many
>organizations who have dealt successfully with the problem of presenting
>instructional or operational material that changes from time to time.

Yes, others have worked on similar problems.   For example, when IBM was 
working on the OS/360 project, they had about 1000 people working on the
design  and technical aspects. (these facts and quotes are from "The 
Mythical Man-month", essays on Software Engineering, Frederick Brooks). 
Anyway, this is essentially the same problem: trying to keep >>1000
people needing to see all the material.

Here are a few applicable quotes:
" Of critical importance is timely updating.  The workbook [or Technical
description] must be current.  This is very difficult to do if whole
documents must be retyped for changes.  In a looseleaf book, however,
only pages need to be changed." ... "The recipient of all these updated
pages has an assimilation problem, however.  When he receives a changed
page, he wants to know, 'What has been changed?'...and 'What is the
definition today?'"

"Our project had not been under way six months before we hit another
problem.  The workbook was about 5 feet thick!" ... "Furthermore,
the daily change distribution averaged 2 inches, some 150 pages to be
interfiled in the whole.  Maintenance of the workbook began to take
a significant time from each workday."

One difference was they had revisions much more often, but it was
to a smaller number of people, closer together geographicly.  So maybe
it balances?

Well, he goes on to discuss other solutions such as microfiche (and its
problems).  He also discusses how he would do it today.  So, yes, there
are people who have dealt with this and I'm sure there probably are
many other books discussing similar problems, and perhaps Apple will
come up with a nice solution!
"Free scientific inquiry?  The first adjective is redundant."
Chris Riley
riley@cs.ucsd.edu