[HP4GU-FAQ] Re: Call For Opinion on Database Updates

[eloiseherisson at aol.com]

Elkins:
> So what do people think?  Workable?  Not workable?  Any objections to 
> handling the database updates this way?

I like the principle, though I'm becoming less sure of the feasibility. (I 
*did* know about the printable record thing, although I hadn't appreciated 
the neat little tricks, so perhaps I'm not quite the Luddite I thought, but I 
just find pieces of paper easier to work with. More tangible and all that - 
you know?)

I have to say that I tend to post things in the *middle* of my day, as that's 
when you guys are up and about, but then if I post mine at the beginning of 
my day, they're already waiting for you.

OTOH, (and Pip has just mentioned the time difference problem) I may have 
done a morning's cataloguing (may...I said *may*) and have been using new 
terms (which I then won't post until the next morning) when you guys are 
posting your new terms which might clash...

If we *do* go for set times, I'm just wondering if it might not be better if 
those in the US upload theirs at the end of the day and those of us in the UK 
upload ours at the beginning? Then, when I get up, I'll have all your 
previous day's new terms and when you get up, I will have posted mine.

I don't think it matters *hugely* and there are bound to be times when its 
just not practical to do it at the start of the day anyhow. There is such a 
thing as RL, with all those annoying things like school runs and work and 
stuff which get in the way. I confess that I don't really want to get up and 
have to think about uploading my new terms before I get the children out to 
school and sometimes run errands or have other commitments which mean I won't 
be back here until lunchtime. 

In some ways, given that we do have the scrollable, searchable 'Printable 
Record' at our fingertips, one could argue that it more efficient if new 
terms are inserted into the table *immediately*, the onus being on each of us 
to check the table before inserting, or even using, a new term. We have to do 
this eventually, anyway. This way, we should avoid coining a new term, then 
the next morning going to upload it, finding that someone else has used 
something different for the same thing and having to replace it in our own 
documents. It also means you don't suddenly realise, as I did this evening, 
that you missed out a couple of terms when you did upload.

It just means that we Luddites have to be resigned to reading from the screen 
a bit more!

> 
> Right now, Cindy and I are trying to consolidate the guidelines that 
> we've established so far into one Big Fat Document, so if we could 
> agree on a protocol for database updates soon, that would be great.


That would be wonderful. Then I can have one Big Fat Document printed out, 
rather than rifling through various bits of paper and desperately trying to 
remember just which of Cindy's messages gave instructions about what where 
and when.

Eloise
Now, where did I put my quill?




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