By arussell@pathf.com
via blogs.pathf.com
Published: Apr 20 2007 / 15:50
In my first ever real grownup consulting engagement, back in 1990, I was called in to improve the data cleaning operations of a small testing company. This was back in the days when even companies heavily dependent on computer technology relied on a single "computer guy." This particular guy had rigged up a data cleaning system on a set of state-of-the-art 80386 machines. He had set up a folding table in one corner of the office ("Machine room? What's a machine room?") and taped "Do not touch!!!" signs to the monitors. The guy would take the tapes containing maybe 20-30MB of data and run then for 6 days through his cleaning environment. If something blew up or a new defect was identified in the source data, boom! another 6 days.



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