THE WHATIS.COM WORD-OF-THE-DAY January 15, 2003 design by committee
______________ TODAY'S SPONSOR: Free Systems Management whitepapers Download the key papers you need today to make better-informed decisions. Targeted categories include: Network Management, Security Management, Storage Management, and Systems Management Tools. Click here to access the free SearchSystemsManagement.com white papers section. http://searchsystemsmanagement.techtarget.com/whitepapers3/0,,sid20,00.html ______________ TODAY'S WORD: design by committee See our complete definition with hyperlinks at http://searchvb.techtarget.com/sDefinition/0,,sid8_gci874014,00.html Design by committee is a term sometimes used to describe a design that is flawed because too many people provided input. The phrase implies a lack of a coherent vision and, perhaps as a result, a failure to successfully solve the problems the design was intended to solve. In a software development context, design by committee is a controversial issue. According to some experts, design by committee leads to overly long specifications with an overabundance of features (sometimes called feature creep) and many inconsistent and/or redundant elements. In an interview in New Scientist, Donald Norman (author of the book The Design of Everyday Things) said "You don't do good software design by committee. You do it best by having a dictator. From the user's point of view, you must have a coherent design philosophy..." Norman believes that one reason people still have difficulty learning how to use computers, for example, is the poor results of design by committee. The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), on the other hand, has spoken out in favor of design by committee. W3C working groups typically consist of 10 to 20 members collaborating on a technical specification for a year or more. Furthermore, the working group also solicits input through a public mailing list. According to a W3C report, design by committee doesn't deserve its bad reputation. To the contrary, the organization's report claims that a greater number of people working on a design bring more experience and creativity to the project and also have the ability to catch more errors. RELATED TERMS: feature creep http://searchcio.techtarget.com/sDefinition/0,,sid19_gci860179,00.html World Wide Web Consortium http://searchwebservices.techtarget.com/sDefinition/0,,sid26_gci213331,00.html ______________________ SELECTED LINKS: The World Wide Web Consortium has an essay about their own "Design by Committee" principles. http://www.w3.org/People/Bos/DesignGuide/committee.html New Scientist offers an interview with Donald Norman in their article, "Design for Life." http://www.newscientist.com/opinion/opinterview.jsp?id=ns23631 ______________________ QUIZ #24 | Web Services What do SOAP, XML, and UDDI have to do with Web Services? Take our quiz and expand your knowledge. http://searchwebservices.techtarget.com/sDefinition/0,,sid26_gci811081,00.html ______________________ Learning Path | Customer Relationship Management Give yourself a quick tutorial in customer relationship management (CRM) by reading our series of related definitions in sequence. http://searchcrm.techtarget.com/sDefinition/0,,sid11_gci788453,00.html ______________________ REAL-LIFE CHALLENGE | Graphic images in HTML spam Company Y is looking for a way to block HTML spam in Outlook. One female employee is particularly upset about the inappropriate graphic images she sees in her Outlook preview window. Can you advise? http://whatis.discussions.techtarget.com/WebX?[EMAIL PROTECTED]@.1dcfae0e/205!viewtype=threadDate&skip=&expand= ______________________________ RECENT ADDITIONS AND UPDATES [1] Information Awareness Office http://searchsecurity.techtarget.com/sDefinition/0,,sid14_gci873293,00.html [2] petaflop http://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/0,,sid9_gci212778,00.html [3] FOLED http://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/0,,sid9_gci873217,00.html [4] ASAP http://searchsap.techtarget.com/sDefinition/0,,sid21_gci871489,00.html [5] Online Service System http://searchsap.techtarget.com/sDefinition/0,,sid21_gci871202,00.html ____________________________________________________________________ ::::::::::::::::::: WHATIS.COM CONTACTS ::::::::::::::::::: LOWELL THING, Site Editor ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) ____________________________________________________________________ MARGARET ROUSE, Associate Editor ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) ___________________________________________________________________ :::::::::::::::::::: ABOUT THIS NEWSLETTER ::::::::::::::::::::: Published by TechTarget (http://www.techtarget.com) TechTarget - The Most Targeted IT Media Copyright 2003, All Rights Reserved. Unsubscribe from 'Word of the Day' - Simply Reply to this Email with REMOVE within the Body or Subject > or - Go to: http://WhatIs.techtarget.com/register - Log in to edit your profile. - Click on the link to Edit email subscriptions. - Uncheck the box next to the newsletter you wish to unsubscribe from. - When finished, click "Save Changes to My Profile."
