Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips

Events occur in a set order, unless they don’t. Thought is encouraged.

The title is from a nursery rhyme (origin unknown by me). The third event is a baby in a baby carriage.

Events occur in a set order. Breakfast-lunch-dinner. Entree then desert. Eat breakfast, then brush your teeth (or is that one backwards?).

The troublesome reality is that events usually don’t come the the order prescribed by some folks. In building systems, we have:

1. Requirements
2. Design
3. Build
4. Test
5. Deploy

Wouldn’t that be nice? Well, actually, we can do things in this order and have a nice solution. Then again, we can have a better solution if… Now comes the thinking. Let’s do steps 1. through 5., pause, think, and do steps 1. through 5., several more times.

Of course we do step 1., start step 2., go back to 1., try a little of step 3., go back to 2., and so on. Work a little, learn a little, work a little, learn a little, or is the “learn a little” just a natural part of working?

In my experience, I find that things go better in one way or another if I plan for learning. Of course, I don’t want to learn too much or I will never reach some end. Then again, is learning the end?

The more I think about this, the more I want to stop and take a nap. There we go:

1. Think
2. Nap
3. Work
4. Think
5. Eat
6. Nap
7. Work

Did I get that order right? Let me think about that one.