The Lotus Merry-Go-Round

[Dave Eastwood (Gadgetman) - Club Chairman]

But when you're the boss, you don't care who's looking over your shoulder!

Ah, but you do when the client's wandering round while you're working on site!

It can take, on site, depending on number of changes/complexity, anywhere from seconds to - if it's a databus rather than TCP/IP connection, fourteen/fifteen minutes for me to upload a panel layout/design.

During that time, the editor software is effectively locked out. So, I hop on to the Boardroom. Trouble is, even explaining how the desiging/upload/test process works, the client never believes you and thinks you're just wasting time! (me, never)

[Norman Verona]

Capt'n I read your comments with interest.

As you may know I was a member of the dark side for nearly twenty years.

I cannot remember why but I asked one of my programmers who was experienced in web/forum code to look at the Blatchat code.

He came back the next day and gave me a short report.

It went something like "You'll never be able to do xyz [whatever it was I wanted done] as this code has been written by a kid in his bedroom."

I didn't say anything because the chap who wrote and maintains it is a founder member and does it all in his spare time.

I've just remember what it was. I wanted to see if a sophisticated password control could be utilised (like here) so we could restrict non-members to chit chat only.

When I wrote our Dealer Management System (DMS) the first thing I did was design the password control system which gave full control for programme use and even facilities within programmes. The system was first written in 1981 and took a year working 18 hours a day, 7 days a week. It's still in use today. I wrote it all again after selling the first company but a similar password control system was first. On BC the password checking comes at the end of the process, so anyone can create a posting but then it rejects it at the posting stage. In my world the check should come first.