[Sigia-l] "Study: Content Management Tools Fail"

[Jon Hanna]

> > My theory is that the biggest problem with CMS implementations is
> > that they fall under the category of what has been called wicked
> > problems. Wicked problems are those where "each attempt to create
> > a solution changes the understanding of the problem." See
> > http://www.cognexus.org/id29.htm for more ...in particular, I
> > love this:
>
> I love it! This is perfect, because many programmers call these problems
> "non-trivial" and salivate at the prospect of the chance to attack them.
> Which leads to CMS systems like the ones we're talking about.

Interesting. As a programmer that works on a CMS I do indeed love the fact
that it contains a good few non-trivial problems.

The real challenge though is to keep requirements that the solution be
inexpensive, simple, easy to use, reliable and efficient[1] in mind as part
of the non-trivial problem we're dealing with.

Each hacker has a range of problems that are neither too easy nor too
difficult that they like to work at. This, and biases towards particular
tech, can make it psychologically very easy to end up solving a slightly
more difficult or more easy related problem that isn't the real problem at
all.

Personally I find that keeping an non-work project (even a "cool" work
project that isn't urgent) going outside of work hours is a good way of
satisfying that urge enough that it doesn't interfere with what I'm actually
paid to do.

[1]"Efficient" in the sense of efficient to take content through its
life-cycle, rather than the traditional programming sense of requiring
little memory and processor time, though that's always good too.