PN,
No disrespect but I think it comes down to “Hind sight is a wonderful thing”.
Since the IT revolution in the RAF (when it finally sunk in to officers that computers were a good thing) there has been paranoia about holding data.
There has been an attitude of “the more we hold, the better it must be”.
The amount of un-usable or not required data on computers has grown and grown since that revolution in the early nineties.
Sadly the processes to keep, and control data has not really changed since those early days and more importantly processes have not even changed with the recent loss of data in other Government departments.
The system was there to evolve as time went on but let’s face it when it comes down to IT (In the RAF) it does not happen until it is too late. We are not good at it.
In the job I used to be in a few years ago, a couple of quotes I remember :
“We have no reason to move from MS DOS to Windows 3,1 and we have no requirement for colour monitors.
More recently:
We will stay with Windows NT as we have no need for Windows 2000 or XP.
I have no idea what the policy is on Vista but I have no doubt that the RAF will get it 3 years after the rest of the world.
The point I am trying to make is that while there is such a negative attitude towards change within IT there will always be complacency and ultimately mistakes will be made.
Last edited by SRENNAPS; 8th Feb 2008 at 21:36.