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<p>Not trying to sidetrack us here, but <br>
</p>
<p>you wrote "but the often very old, underground water system that
serves your house is basically inaccesible---you'd have to dig up
the street with a bulldozer, cut all the trees down, and deal
with huge pipes which are decades old. "</p>
<p>You are forgetting the new machines that were developed for doing
this very task with minimal street-digging and tree-razing. They
use them all the time in my city (Atlanta) to replace underground
pipes and conduits. The need or desire for maintenance can act as
a stimulus for the development of new technologies of maintenance
and can become the basis for a new "industry." This case also
suggests that it might be enlightening to study the fields where
maintenance is alive and active for insight, in addition to asking
about something that is _not_ happening ("Why Do People Neglect
Maintenance?"). <br>
</p>
<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trenchless_technology">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trenchless_technology</a></p>
<div class="moz-signature">David Morton <br>
</div>
<div class="moz-signature"><br>
</div>
<div class="moz-signature">
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<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 8/7/2019 6:12 AM, Ishi Crew wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:CACQCUwf4RsvsXDN899sAUGhiLSXyNEH2zx90mYvenEcFmNV+1A@mail.gmail.com">
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<div dir="ltr">Regarding Julie K's comment --- I've talked to
people who do scientific computing (ie use computers to solve
scientific problems) and they tell me that while the most
current software is all things like R , Python, or C (which is
old) , they also have alot of their old standard software
written in Fortran which was written in 1970's-1980's. And if
something happens with that --- a problem-- they basically don't
really know how to fix it. <br>
<br>
It seems like an issue of being able to use new technology for
fixing plumbing in a house, but the often very old, underground
water system that serves your house is basically
inaccesible---you'd have to dig up the street with a bulldozer,
cut all the trees down, and deal with huge pipes which are
decades old. </div>
<br>
<div class="gmail_quote">
<div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Wed, Aug 7, 2019 at 5:24 AM
Julien Kirch <<a href="mailto:archiloque@archiloque.net"
moz-do-not-send="true">archiloque@archiloque.net</a>>
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px
0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
<div style="overflow-wrap: break-word;">
<div>Hi,</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>I'm working in IT where maintenance is a big topic, for
example in banks and other large organisations the core
systems may be decade-old and sometimes use technologies
that are becoming obscure.</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>In IT people are more easily promoted for creating new
systems, and newer technologies are often seen as more
performant and easier to use so maintenance is not seen as
cool or as a good career choice.</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>And as maintenance is often not seen as important or
difficult by management, at any moment your job can be
moved to a subcontractor -- for example an offshore one --
when budget cuts are required. The secure path is to jump
from a project as soon as it reach maintenance to go to
another project that is just starting.</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>Finally, in my experience, maintenance in IT is often a
more complex / difficult work than creating new systems:
you have to deal with existing constraints, documentation
is often lacking with important knowledge lost, and
breaking the system has real consequences.</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>So in many places things are pretty dire, and I don't
think they will improve soon.</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>Julien</div>
<div><br>
<blockquote type="cite">
<div>Le 7 août 2019 à 10:13, Ishi Crew <<a
href="mailto:mediaentropy@gmail.com" target="_blank"
moz-do-not-send="true">mediaentropy@gmail.com</a>>
a écrit :</div>
<br
class="gmail-m_6430851788690984325Apple-interchange-newline">
<div>
<div dir="ltr">I think of farming and food production
(my grandparents were small or family farmers though
they actually had or used huge tracts of land
because few people lived in that area--north dakota)
and i knew people who lived partly by hunting ,
gathering and gardening in WV. At one time a large
fraction of US population was involved in
farming--like 50%. Now they say its just 3% (though
there is a much larger population). However you
have a huge supply chain for food---trucking, road
maintenance for all these trucks, energy industry
for transport, processing food (sometimes into junk
or conveniance food, bottled water, coca cola,
plastic, huge stores with cleaning , stocking ,
clerks and security personnel and more) . <br>
<br>
So the 3% figure which makes things seem simpler,
like GIS, involves another kind of complexity. I
used to have order paper topographic maps for my
hiking trips---now i can get them on my smart phone
in like 5 minutes (if i can remember the
websites)--very simple. But making a smart phone
and websites is complex. And even having a
smartphone makes my life more complex---have to
learn how to use it, and not lose or break it, or
have it stolen. </div>
<br>
<div class="gmail_quote">
<div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Wed, Aug 7,
2019 at 2:45 AM Hanlie Pretorius <<a
href="mailto:hanlie.pretorius@gmail.com"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">hanlie.pretorius@gmail.com</a>>
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px
0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid
rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">I found this
article very thought provoking - thank you for
compiling<br>
it. I wrote down some of my thoughts here, perhaps
not much new for<br>
people on this list.<br>
<br>
Often people assert that the 1980s marked a
turning point in the<br>
economy with regard to spending priorities,
implying that before then<br>
maintenance was more of a priority. Does this mean
that economic<br>
reasons are the major ones for lack of
maintenance? I suspect so.<br>
<br>
Was anything else different in the past or was
maintenance a problem<br>
throughout human history?<br>
<br>
What about the boredom factor? I sometimes find it
difficult to<br>
motivate myself to brush my teeth because it's
such a repetitive and<br>
boring activity.<br>
<br>
I believe people start appreciating maintenance
when they have to do<br>
it themselves or if they have to pay directly to
have it done<br>
(provided it's done properly). Perhaps payment for
maintenance should<br>
not be part of general taxes, it should be a
specific levy that can be<br>
traced back to actual maintenance performed.<br>
<br>
The more complex our society gets, the more
extensive and intensive<br>
the maintenance requirements get. Under the guise
of simplifying our<br>
lives, technology has pushed maintenance to the
back stage where other<br>
people have to think for us. In my industry
(Geographic Information<br>
Systems), the move away from desktop software to
the web has<br>
simplified (the quality of the simplification is
debatable) GIS for<br>
users not trained in GIS. But behind the scenes,
my work has become<br>
far more complex.<br>
<br>
Perhaps we humans just can't help ourselves when
it comes to<br>
maintenance, just like we can't help repeating the
cycles of<br>
civilisation rise, complication and collapse.<br>
<br>
I live in South Africa where the visible evidence
of no maintenance or<br>
incompetent maintenance is just downright scary.<br>
<br>
Regards<br>
Hanlie<br>
<br>
<br>
> Date: Wed, 31 Jul 2019 10:09:55 -0400<br>
> From: lee vinsel <<a
href="mailto:lee@themaintainers.org"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">lee@themaintainers.org</a>><br>
> To: <a
href="mailto:Themaintainers@lists.stevens.edu"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">Themaintainers@lists.stevens.edu</a><br>
> Subject: [Themaintainers] Why Do People
Neglect Maintenance?<br>
> Message-ID:<br>
>
<CAFfY7rEZbMyYg1jr2dWYtubzU5-j1JniB1PAZj+MP2==<a
href="mailto:GmfSwA@mail.gmail.com"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">GmfSwA@mail.gmail.com</a>><br>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"<br>
><br>
> Hey, everybody.<br>
><br>
> The three Maintainers co-directors - Andy
Russell, Jess Meyerson, and<br>
> I - pulled<br>
> together a blog post laying out the
factors/explanations we often hear<br>
> about why maintenance is neglected.<br>
> <<a
href="http://themaintainers.org/blog/2019/7/30/why-do-people-neglect-maintenance"
rel="noreferrer" target="_blank"
moz-do-not-send="true">http://themaintainers.org/blog/2019/7/30/why-do-people-neglect-maintenance</a>><br>
> As is often the case these days, this post
attempts to echo back what we've<br>
> been hearing from others - including all the
folks on this list!<br>
><br>
> And as always, we are especially keen to hear
feedback from you all. We're<br>
> hoping this post kickstarts discussion about
how to think and theorize<br>
> about and empirically study these issues.
Please give us feedback in anyway<br>
> you see fit - in the blog comments, on
Twitter, via private/direct<br>
> messages, such as email, and ESPECIALLY on
this list!!! :-)<br>
><br>
> Hope everyone is doing well.<br>
><br>
> Lee<br>
><br>
> --<br>
> Co-Director<br>
> The Maintainers<br>
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