Sounds similar to experiences inside sensory deprivation chambers.
In the SF Bay Area, there’s a company called reboot floatation spa , where you can book time floating in body temperature epsom salts inside a box that blocks noise and light.
I also experienced intense visual imagery and extraordinary ability to concentrate on thoughts while my other senses were deprived. And then I got sleepy
I tried an Epsom salt deprivation chamber and while it was nice I did not experience any visual imagery or anything that wowing. I felt very relaxed and I became sleepy as well. I think it was for about an hour, maybe I should have booked a longer session?
I have also done a sensory deprivation chamber/float tank, but I mostly experienced nausea, from the miniscule amount of water movement. Otherwise it felt like a really bad night of insomnia - lying in bed and feeling trapped.
When they're obstructing the transition from road/air to rail, then yeah, I'd say those are indeed detrimental to the society at large. They shouldn't have to be detrimental, of course, but their routine abuse is something that needs acknowledged and mitigated.
My boss used to try and make clients understand they could do minor adaptations of their workflows, and adapt a few labels of the product and they’d be done and productive in a few days, and they’d requests weeks of system customisation instead.
Yep - seems clients have a knack for asking for the most complicated way of doing things.
Frustrating as a developer that is already slammed, but good for the business overall. But how many times have we all built extremely complex features that never ever get used.
Clients also don't want to be told they'll have to adapt their workflows/processes. A long time ago the COO of our very small company was adamantly opposed to replacing Exchange (which went down with some regularity) with a SaaS because they'd have to make changes to the filing system for their contracts (was before Google had nested labels). The CEO overrode them but the issue was clearly that they didn't want change.
A client that adapts their workflow to a readily available software and customizes the rest isn't a client at all.
First: I think you guys misunderstand the very nature of business. All customers have problems they want YOU to solve in exchange for money. The rest of the people just don't contact you. It's kind of the "survivorship bias."
Secondly: Within an organization, if a project manager has a budget and is tasked with solving a problem, "let's make IT adapt our systems" is not an acceptable solution. Most of the time all you have is money, not software developers or IT staff. They are hopefully working on their core product and not on billing or sending emails.
Thirdly: Don't underestimate the ongoing support that stems from point two. If you ever make adaptions to someone else's software, you know what's going to happen when there's an incident and you call support: They are going to blame your customization, they are not going to understand your needs or customization and they'll kindly string you along until you fix it yourself using precious staff ressources. It is much easier to let someone else do everything from start to finish and pick up the phone when there's a problem.
> seems clients have a knack for asking for the most complicated way of doing things
Sometimes clients don't know what they want. Sometimes you have to show them. “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses” ~ Henry Ford.
The enterprise buying process is geared to achieve consensus and reduce the risk of purchasing the wrong thing. As a result, dozens of groups get invited to participate and all throw their requirements into the ring. Vendors then do contortions to try and sell to these customer, and you end up with software that tries to be everything to everyone.
Why will a new system make the trains run better? It could also make it run worse, if they don’t cover all the current cases.
I’ve ridden Muni in SF for years, drivers control most of the decision making.
There’s a handful of single track tunnels/sensors/necessary software-based coordination, but as another commenter pointed out, the doors cause more issues than signal problems.
I’ve ridden Muni in SF for years, drivers control most of the decision making.
All of the tunnels are under automatic operation, and the majority of the switches (street or tunnel) are computer controlled.
the doors cause more issues than signal problems.
While doors are a real common failure/abuse point, I'd want to see some actual numbers on that. Train control failure may not always be self-evident to a rider, especially if the remedy is to run things manually (such that things aren't ever stopped completely).
Historically the cab signaling system would glitch in wet or damp weather. Transponders for the switches had a near 100% failure rate. Trains chewed up the inductive loops, forcing emergency braking. That was common enough that they had to dial back the emergency deceleration. Twenty years on they've mostly worked out the kinks but it hasn't always been that way.
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