Re: OT - Opinions on workload

The security stuff is an issue, just one that they (previous project management) was just too happy to ignore (separation of duties amongst other things). I am THE Oracle DBA and developer, along with running the servers and the OAS installation. So, if I was re-assigned to the 'new' variation of the project, the Oracle stuff would be taken care of, but at a minimum we'd need somebody that knew what they were doing to get the ARC Server installed, setup and configured to access Oracle, then perform whatever programming was required on the ARC side of things and keeping that system running as well.

The guy proposing this has no experience running IT projects, but has used the single-user version of ARC, and since that was easy, everything else HAS to be easy as well, right? I've been down this path many times before in the past, but evidently my opinions and experience do not carry the same weight as someone with no IT experience.

I've been trying to express my opinions about staffing, but I just keep getting told that I'm either "being to negative", or "not being a team player", etc. Been there, done that, I'm finally (temporarily) done with the 80 hour weeks (while only paid for 40), and I am not too keen on the very likely possibility of suddenly jumping to 120 hour weeks. Maybe if I got paid for it, it might be a different story, but tripling the workload and still only getting the pay of a 40 hour week IS NOT going to entice to me want to be part of the project. If I got stuck with it as the only IT person and no other IT backup, then I wouldn't be able to achieve my performance goals for the year, which in turn has a negative impact on my perfomance appraisal, and any promotion possibilities.

I just need some proof or other evidence from folks that have seen (or done) this implementation before and can give some valid time estimations based upon actual experience, not what a scientist read in a magazine or what an ARC user has said could be done fairly easily. As you can probably tell, in this part of the organization, IT is an afterthought and not totally supported the way most organizations do. Most IT folks are simply regarded as the "IT Nazi's" and their opinions are mostly ignored, even after time after time they were proven right, but the 'scientist' in charge suddenly gets the credit for identifying the issue and putting the sole IT guy in charge of fixing it at the expense of other work.

I may be coming across as being negative, but if I can foresee potential problems and don't metion them, along with consequences, workarounds, etc., then it becomes my fault and not the fault of the non-IT person proposing this project. I merely see it as being an inherent part of my job whether they want to hear it or not.

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• Bill Ferguson -- http://www.freelists.org/webpage/oracle-l