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Mass Fatality Identification System

Posted by timothy on from the strange-necessites dept.

Shipud writes " Bio-IT World is running a story on how Gene Codes corporation created the Mass Fatality Identification System (M-FISys) in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks. The story goes into the details of processing large amounts of data, aiming for a 99.9% accuracy rate, and extreme programing."

13 of 137 comments (clear)

  1. am I the only one.... by MarcoAtWork · · Score: 5, Insightful

    who absolutely positively -HATES- the idea of 'paired programming'? While I wholeheartedly agree with having lots of meetings and discussions during the design phase (requirements, functional spec, detailed design) and during the review phase (post mortem, code reviews) I feel that having two coders on one computer is extremely wasteful and unbelievably stressful.

    When I'm in the 'zone' I can't talk with somebody else, I can't verbalize why I'm writing a code fragment the way I am writing it without getting yanked out of it. If the design is done well, and programmers are fairly equally competent, pairing two of them is going to probably be LESS productive than having only ONE, let alone two.

    The only time I can see paired programming being useful would be in a tutoring way, where coder A that has lots of experience with the codebase is paired with coder B that has never seen it, but this is more for getting coder B up to speed rather than to improve productivity and code quality.

    --
    -- the cake is a lie
    1. Re:am I the only one.... by B3ryllium · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I think that extreme programming really only works when people are having a hard time initially getting in to 'the zone'. It helps to have someone to bounce ideas off of, when you hit stumbling blocks on the code. Using the same computer is stupid, but extreme programming over, say, a ping-pong table - that works great.

    2. Re:am I the only one.... by ralico · · Score: 2, Insightful

      And here I thought paired programming was a way for a company to save on hardware.

      --

      SCO to Hell
    3. Re:am I the only one.... by lawpoop · · Score: 3, Insightful
      Extreme programming was designed for a team of developers. It takes a while to get in the 'zone', eh? What does your 'zone' code look like? Is it well-commented? Readable? If so, you are alright without extreme progamming.

      The idea of extreme programming is that it forces you to make readable code, simply because of the fact that you're in the presence of someone else.

      If you're in a project where you won't be responsible for the code you write later on, it would be a waste of time to have you write any code at all, if it takes that much time to decipher it.

      --
      Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
      -- Pablo Picasso
    4. Re:am I the only one.... by panaceaa · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I hate paired programming too but my roommate is a proponent of it. He says that average coders have a hard time staying on focus and are often lured by quick hacks rather than doing needed redesigns. When you pair two of these programmers together, with a stated goal of following extreme programming practices, they're ultimately more productive because they have to explain their decisions and not slack off.

      But my roommate agrees, that for competent and motivated coders, who actaully know what they're doing and take pride in their work, extreme programming's paired programming fails. However, the software industry is not filled with competent and motivated coders. Most software developers graduated in CS for the money, without writing a lick of code before CS 101, and they could use a good deal of oversight.

      --
      my blog
    5. Re:am I the only one.... by monkeyboy87 · · Score: 3, Insightful
      Why do you find it stressful? because you have to share space with another carbon unit? yes, there are situations where pairings can lead to friction - for me if the "pair" is a slow or hunt/peck typer i insist on driving.

      on the upside you get the following benefits:

      0) two people looking/reviewing the code as its written you get a review/concensus of two people thinking the code as written was a good idea. vs a guy alone in an office who creates something only they can understand/debug/modify which then has to be justified to the group after the time/cost/effort have been expended. I am sure you have reviewed code after it was written and walked away saying "WTF was Ken thinking when he wrote this POS!" With pairing you can keep Ken from polluting the code base or if nothing else be his accomplice in his misdeeds.

      1) you aren't likely to "launch make" to justify surfing with someone in your office. while you might be dedicated to being productive you can probably name 2-3 people in cubes/offices around who are more "wired" than working.

      2) As someone pointed out it can help facilitate rehabilitating weaker team members who (if they have a clue) will gain from the experience locked away inside the stronger more gifted programmers.

      On the otherside if you hate the "working in pairs bit", you can still adopt the other things XP advocates like test driven/test first programming you and can get a quantum leap in reliablity. I always look at XP as the manfestation of Demmings TQC/TQM applied to programming.

    6. Re:am I the only one.... by torpor · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Well, then you wouldn't be a 'programmer', you'd be more like a ... husband, or something.

      But seriously: SubEthaEdit rawks hardcore. Put two people together to work on the same code together, and it can make for some really nice results ... you have to think of it more as a team scenario, constantly communicating and discussing things -as needed- and then working around/with each other too. It can go like this:

      Programmer Bob - "Okay, I'll do all the util code today for module_XXX - load/save/parse/etc."

      Programmer Jane - "As you start to get that stuff working, I'll do the structural work for the major logic."

      You can really work efficiently this way, because by having another person to talk things through you can get a structure/organized state very rapidly.

      Many programmers have a difficult time laying out their app structure individually, choosing to 'evolve' the framework of their app as they figure things out - paired programming is designed to overcome the 'flaying around blindly' aspect of design, by giving you another pair of eyes.

      Done right, it can be very, very, very efficient. But, of course, as with anything: it can also be a pain in the ass.

      --
      ; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
  2. Re:Cash, Howard Cash by gazoombo · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Approaching the second anniversary of Sept. 11, 1,521 of the 2,792 people who perished in the WTC disaster have been identified.
    It does take time. Rember that every single positive ID that is made is a life that has been lost. Imagine the familes associated with these 'numbers' and mass ID. I do not appriciate your comment.

    --
    John Hancock
  3. Science? by 1984 · · Score: 1, Insightful

    So you don't like Extreme Programming. That's not the same thing as "Extreme Programming doesn't work" in general. You're generalizing excessively.

  4. Shouldn't it be extreme design ? by tuomoks · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Programming is the phase when you write the functional ideas to code, i.e. engineering ( IMHO ). On design phase I have found it wery useful to have one or more people around but when the desing is done, please, stay away. Programming is art but should not be creative art ( most of time, there are exceptions ), you just make ideas to work and it requires both skill and consentration that is difficult is you have to stop and argue..

  5. Mission Creep by LuYu · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Could this not be used on the living as well? It would bring us closer to that frightening world we saw in Gattica.

    Should we be creating identification systems that can ID people with scraps of DNA?

    --
    All data is speech. All speech is Free.
  6. Re:not a joking matter by ctaylor · · Score: 2, Insightful

    "There are several good posts about the programming issues etc., but why are so many mods wasting their mod points modding up so called "funny" posts?"

    Because humor is one way for humans to deal with tragedy.

  7. Re:To the moderator who thought this was funny: by kelnos · · Score: 2, Insightful

    i'm sure i'll get modded as flamebait like the others, but so be it.

    have a little perspective! the attacks of 9/11 were terrible, to be sure, and i'm both sorry for those that lost friends and family, as well as thankful i didn't lose anyone i know. but one of the worst tragedies ever? hardly. look at history - the holocaust comes to mind. think of those that have died in slavery - no, i don't have exact numbers. how about natural disasters? a single earthquake, flood, etc. has often resulted in much larger loss of life. how about people - children, even - that die in less-developed countries every day due to malnutrition and easily-curable diseases?

    the 9/11 attack has had so much spin put on it it's ridiculous. a terrible, horrifying occurrence, yes. the worst thing to happen ever, no. and i'm sure saying that makes me "unamerican" or some silly thing like that. my country disappoints me sometimes.

    --
    Xfce: Lighter than some, heavier than others. Just right.