« The Hindenbook Report Update | Main | Wired News: The Ultimate Blog Post »
August 29, 2006
Is IT in a world of its own?
The IT world is always in a frenzy. That's the nature of the industry. One minute, they're talking up Windows Vista, the other, they're saying that Linux Desktops should rule and then, the Macs speak up and say their platform is the grandest.
Or they could be saying how cool Office 2007 will be vs how cool it is that Open Office frees the world from the domination of proprietary document formats.
Back in Small Business Land however, folks are still writing lots of Word documents and hacking databases in Excel. Small Business Land has come a long way from those days of the paper tape calculator and the electronic typewriter. But the tools they're using have stagnated again.
When we had a ledger sheet of ruled paper, we could write into cells. It was considered revolutionary when the spreadsheet program came along and allowed us to record information without reaching for more paper. We could automate all kinds of calculations or simply append more and more rows of information.
But life moves on. That is, as the business and the job grows, we find we need to enter more than one thing in a cell - either we put commas between the words or we make more columns or we make rows. That solved, respondents and bosses want more and more reports - laid out this way and that way, summarising based on different criteria and layouts. Thank goodness for Cut and Paste. And lots of elbow grease. And days when it's not the end of month.
A multi-table relational database with a screen designer, report writer offering multiple views to the same data would greatly improve overall administrative efficiency. Sure, such a system requires conscious and upfront design. And commitment to walking away from that simplistic Excel grid which worked when life was simpler. These tools have been in our midst for ages, as the tech heads will tell you. But when will someone in Small Business Land wake up to this? When they creep into Medium Business Land?
Posted by Anandasim at August 29, 2006 09:49 PM
Trackback Pings
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://bleedingedge.com.au/cgi-bin/mt/mt-tb.cgi/1023
Comments
You have just mentioned the software but then there is the hardware to cope with as well, core duo, quad duo etc the list never seems to end.
Posted by: Wes at September 1, 2006 12:17 AM
Actually Wes, hardware *isn't* a problem (with provisos of course). Several corporates are running Windows NT 4, Office 97 on reasonably laid back machines. I would venture a guess that the machines are 2 years old at least circa Pentium 1.+Ghz or slower with say 256 or 512Mb of RAM. Excel 97, Word 97, Access 97 would run on it and I don't want to talk about Windows NT 4. My point is, that they are using Word and Excel for things that are outside of these programs basic strengths.
You don't need a 3D card, 1Gb of RAM, Core or quad CPUs to carry out core business activities and improve business edge - these apps are not pushing the envelope - games and video editing are.
Posted by: anandasim ![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://bleedingedge.com.au/blog/nav-commenters.gif)
at September 1, 2006 01:45 PM
While we're upgrading Middle Business, how about we also get them to start using some of those new-fangled 'electronic payments' options. I have't used a cheque book for almost 10 years, and I'm certainly not going to carry that much cash around; direct credit, BPAY, credit card - surely there is a cost-efficient method of using these options??
Posted by: Angsty at September 1, 2006 02:40 PM
Hey CW, I'm not too sure exactly which small business requirements you may have had in mind when you wrote this blog, but surely MS Access has been providing the means to go beyond the 'simplistic Excel grid' for quite some time now.. And if you're not too keen on Access, have you had a look at Filemaker Pro recently? Lots of small businesses that I'm aware of are using either one or the other of these two products to produce some very impressive & useful results.
Posted by: arizon at September 3, 2006 04:54 AM
Hi Arizon,
Charles didn't write the article. There are a few of us who sometimes lend a hand nowadays, Jeremy, Stephen and myself, Ananda.
My intent was certainly that Access has been around for yonks, over 10 years, but it positively pains me that say 90% of end users cannot / have not / prefer not to grasp the mechanics of growing out of the simplistic Excel grid.
I remember teaching a middle aged lady Excel once, an example of how to use a spreadsheet to calculate the grocery bill - Spreadsheets 101, so to speak and she announced "oh, it seems so much work, I don't need to do that, my husband does that kind of thing". I had similar feedback from a member of the other gender as well - "oh, I don't need to calculate, my job is just to process the cheques".
Posted by: anandasim at September 4, 2006 12:11 AM
Not the biggest fan of access, but I agree 100% with filemaker pro. My Dad is self employed, and has been using it for yonks. It doesn't add the unnecessary complexity that I've found access does, in fact its hardly more complex than excel, it runs fast (even on old 68k macs) and you can have differing front ends and reports looking at the same data.
Posted by: TinBane at September 7, 2006 01:04 PM
I've just deleted a long and rambling response, and will say it thus:
Excel is easy to use and unravel - even if you are not the person that created the spreadsheet.
Databases require more knowledge and are far less transparent.
I've cleaned up too many messes created by databases that were not properly maintained after development to be a fan of their use.
No doubt my view is coloured by my experience of the IT departments of large corporates, which appear to be managed by reference to the greatest convenience of the IT departments of large corporates.
Posted by: geoffg at September 8, 2006 01:18 PM