Rational Software Seminar - 05/06/2003 - Four Seasons Hotel

Belvedere Jehosophat - Thursday, June 5, 2003 - Print Version

"A use case describes a sequence of actions a system performs that yields observable results of value to a particular actor"

Why can't I go three weeks without hearing a new definition for use cases?

I was convinced that I'd left that shit behind at uni forever. Yet, here I was, alone because my friends piked on me, at a seminar for Rational: the software development company.

When I first walked into the auditorium I almost freaked out because the guy looked and sounded like Michael Turk, and he was talking about COBOL.

For the uninitiated, Turk was an absolute asshole of a lecturer at my uni who taught me how to code COBOL, the worst, ugliest piece of shit language in the history of programming. I had many a run in with Turk that I know I will be relating to a psychotherapist sooner or later.

I decided that I might as well stick it out. This was partly because I was still entertaining the idea that Ethan might be lurking around and partly because I had just been given a name tag that declared that I was the System Analyst for The Wax Conspiracy, which was, in turn, a United Press Organisation. I can't go a day without pretending that I'm someone I'm not.

There was a little information kit at my desk, which contained:
- the business card of the guy delivering the seminar, a Ryan Morrell;
- a survey;
- a pen;
- a post card;
- a two-sheet description of the program;
- a guide to legacy system integration with Rational; and
- a booklet, A4, -Overcoming Chaos in Software Development,- which included the slogan "Be Liberated."

About half an hour after I had arrived Morrell giving the seminar called for a break and welcomed them to refreshments outside. This was my chance to burn these people.

However, by a stroke of luck—or sloth—I happened to be the most underdressed person in the whole auditorium. I think I thought that people would be casually dressed, but I'm not exactly sure why.

Whichever way, there I was in a sea of suits and slacks, collars and ties, wearing pants and a t-shirt. I cut a thoroughly disreputable figure, albeit an unashamed and unrepentant one.

Given that I stood out so violently from the crowd the possibility of casual conversation seemed remote. Not that I actively wanted to speak to them; business people, an anathema to one trying to cultivate the meaningless, though healthier, existence of the disheveled poet-punk.

I still felt a need to burn these people, even if it was in the smallest way.

While everyone else was getting their tea and coffee and bickies I noticed that some porters were refilling the jugs of water on the table. It was at this point that I decided that while the others were distracted I would endeavour to drink all of the water in the jug leaving my table as dry as a desert.

I started to drink. I drank too much water, and too quick. I must have drunk a litre and a bit of water in the space of a few minutes.

I started to shiver and I got the awful impression that I was going to throw up. Why the hell was I shivering? I must have looked like a junkie. Thank God for the complimentary Mentos. They managed to settle my stomach though I was still shivering like William S. Boroughs, itching for a hit of rat poison.

I wander what the people sitting around me were thinking on being confronted with this guy shaking like a leaf and frantically writing notes; the notes that became this here review.

Soon after the people sat down again, those that were immediately to my left didn't bother coming back, they "unplugged." They didn't even bother to take their complimentary pen.

The seminar itself reminded me of a lecture at uni, complete with a PowerPoint presentation and a demo on his laptop, and I didn't like that.

I understood bits and pieces of what the guy was saying, nothing that I could explain now. It was like, (what I imagine at least) a fever dream is like, cold, sweaty, shivering and understanding little of what was being said around me.

Buzz words did abound though. Apparently, the key phrase, that which if we remember anything from the seminar I should be that, was "just enough." That is, when working off legacy systems don't re-document the whole thing, do "just enough" to know what the hell is going on... or something.

I realised that there were at least two glasses of water left in the communal jug so I set to work. I tried to get the water without attracting too much attention but, as I grabbed the jug, Morrell started directing comments to the guy right next to me, the guy whose water I was slowly but surely depleting; his name was Dennis.

I think Dennis knew what I was up to.

After the water was done I couldn't really think of a reason for me to stay, after all, the word "synergies" had not been mentioned once.

Also, I wasn't quite comfortable with my situation, I was surrounded by Systems Analysts and I really needed to pee. I couldn't think of a reason to stay, so I left.

Just after I left, I was standing near a desk labeled "Concierge," next to who I assume was the concierge. Unfortunately, he looked kinda goofy, and certainly not at all like Michael J. Fox from the smash hit comedy The Concierge.

There was an American couple there trying to decide whether they would go and a harbour bridge walk. They reminded me of the couple who buy a conversation at a restaurant in Monty Python's The Meaning of Life.

Incidentally, the bathroom at the Four Seasons Hotel is nice, though not as nice as it probably could have been. I dug the black tiled look. Just outside of where the toilets are there's a pay phone. Near the pay phone there is a pad of paper and a pencil so that you can make little notes.

I wrote "WWW.THEWAXCONSPIRACY.COM" in the middle of the pile and walked off. A nice bit of propaganda-ing done, if I say so myself.

I hope that what I have written will be of some assistance.