# What processes are unbelievably antiquated? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [June 26, 2011, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920 "2011-06-26T17:34:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Enderw24](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ba9def/32.png) [@Enderw24](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enderw24)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2011, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920/61 "2011-06-27T19:33:31Z")
> [@CitizenPained](#): > > I’m sure this sounds incredibly trivial, but am I the only one bothered by pencils that require sharpening? So your complaint is that when you use things, they get used? I’m not sure any technology is going to solve that problem. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Excellent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f19dbf/32.png) [@Mr.Excellent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Excellent)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2011, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920/62 "2011-06-27T20:54:22Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > I worked in a prison. Let me tell you about the wheel. > > You’ve probably seen some movie or TV show set inside a prison. You have a long hallway of cells with a control panel at the end. And you probably saw a control panel that worked electronically - one that had electric motors to open and close the cell doors and all the guard had to do was flip switches. > > Most prison units do work like that. But as I noted, prisons existed before there was electricity. And they had a system called the wheel. > > There’s this long steel bar that runs the entire length of the unit. At the end of the unit there’s a bunch of levers with one marked for each individual cell. The guard flips the switch for each cell he wants to open or close and a small bar at the cell drops down and connects the long bar to the cell door. > > And then he goes to the heart of the system, which is a massive cast iron flywheel. It’s about four feet across and weighs a few hundred pounds. It’s set in a vertical frame and the guard pulls on it and gets it spinning as fast as he can. Then he pulls a lever next to the wheel and that drops in a gear which connects the wheel to the long bar. And then the momentum of the spinning wheel will pull the long bar and the cell doors connected to the bar open. > > I worked at a prison where this sytem was installed when the prison was built in the 1850’s and this was state of the art. But a hundred and fifty years later it’s still being used. Which perhaps puts e-mailing Word documents in perspective. I know this must be a giant pain in the ass to use, and possibly even unsafe - there must be some poor bastards who’ve banged themselves painfully on the flywheel. But it also sounds really, really cool - not technically steampunk (no steam power), but not far removed from that aesthetic. I’d like to see that system in operation. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2011, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920/63 "2011-06-27T21:41:13Z")
> [@](#): > > Slight hijack – in THE ROCK, is that what Sean Connery turns to escape from his cell? I don’t know. I haven’t seen _The Rock_. > [@](#): > > Still being used as in new prisons are being built with it? God, no, I don’t think anyone makes them anymore. (Although there are still companies that manufacture barred doors and windows and you’d be surprised how much those cost.) > [@](#): > > But it also sounds really, really cool - not technically steampunk (no steam power), but not far removed from that aesthetic. I had actually thought about making the steampunk comparison myself. It’s surprising how high-tech some purely mechanical systems were in the pre-electric age. ---
**Author:** ![markm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9de053/32.png) [@markm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/markm)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2011, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920/64 "2011-06-27T22:03:45Z")
[QUOTE=Sailboat] re: the OP – I kind of think dentistry is unbelievably antiquated. I mean, they can do laparoscopic surgery using a computer-controlled laser and camera through a tiny incision; they can correct some conditions using gene therapy…and they removed my bad tooth with pliers and leverage and some swearing. Why does so much of dentistry involve things that look like meat hooks, and scraping, and yanking, and drilling? It’s like if they made a short child taller using a medieval rack instead of precisely-measured doses of human growth hormone. [/quote] This is exactly what I wanted to come in and say. With variable intensity lasers, all sorts of gee-whiz gadgets and techniques used in ‘real’ medicine, why is dentistry just barely one step above “bite this bullet and don’t yell too loudly”? ---
**Author:** ![Beware\_of\_Doug](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/278dde/32.png) [@Beware\_of\_Doug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beware_of_Doug)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2011, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920/65 "2011-06-27T22:06:38Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > it’s not the Latin terms that make law hard for a layman. […] It’s the _English_ terms of art that are complex. Exhibit A: the term “term of art.” There isn’t even a _name_ for the phenomenon that doesn’t require a special definition. Its very _existence_ is none of our damn business. :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![johnpost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f17d59/32.png) [@johnpost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/johnpost)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2011, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920/66 "2011-06-27T22:53:31Z")
> [@markm](#): > > This is exactly what I wanted to come in and say. With variable intensity lasers, all sorts of gee-whiz gadgets and techniques used in ‘real’ medicine, why is dentistry just barely one step above “bite this bullet and don’t yell too loudly”? burning teeth stink i think. also it might take longer so it would cost more. it might be useful in some situations though i don’t think it could be a total substitute. ---
**Author:** ![pravnik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8edcca/32.png) [@pravnik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pravnik)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920/67 "2011-06-28T00:31:32Z")
> [@Beware\_of\_Doug](#): > > Exhibit A: the term “term of art.” There isn’t even a _name_ for the phenomenon that doesn’t require a special definition. Its very _existence_ is none of our damn business. :dubious: Assuming you’re not kidding, use of a settled term of art is a perfect example of clarity and conservation of words rather than an attempt at obfuscation. In drafting a will, a lawyer could say that the person decrees that the estate should be distributed: > [@](#): > > through each of the bloodlines of my children so that each bloodline recieves an equal amount to be divided and/or subdivided so that among each of my offspring that predecease me, the amount to be distributed among their progeny represents the predeceased offspring’s heirship distributed in equal shares relative to the deceased offspring’s share. or he could say that the estate is to be distributed: > [@](#): > > per stirpes. Thereby using an easily and commonly understood shorthand way of saying exactly the same thing, preventing the reader from having to reinvent the wheel and redefine and reinterpret the meaning and intent of every rewriting, preventing endless reargument and quibbling over intent. Terms of art are intended to make complicated but nonetheless settled and understood concepts clear to the reader familiar with them. It wasn’t some secret cabal of crazed, handwringing law professors trying to figure out how they could make legal drafting as hard to understand as possible - used correctly, terms of art make drafting easier to parse, not harder. ---
**Author:** ![what\_do\_I\_type\_here](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a5b964/32.png) [@what\_do\_I\_type\_here](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/what_do_I_type_here)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920/68 "2011-06-28T01:43:16Z")
Anything that needs to be done with snail mail. I rolled over my New York Life 401(k) to a T-Rowe Price IRA. I remember seeing commercials (not neccessarily by NYL or TRP) talking about how “easy” it is to roll over your 401(k). I assumed by “easy” they meant that the two banks could get together and work it out for me. I was surprised when I learned that I had to have a check mailed to me and then I had to mail it out. I didn’t expect that I would have to get envelopes and mail trucks involved in order to take numbers off of one computer and put them on another. The schedule for the part-timers at my work was previously stored on the boss’s computer as an excel file and it was communicated to the part-timers by printing it out and leaving it laying around randomly somewhere. and I mean randomly. No bulletin board, no fixed place to find it. It just floated around the place. The only copy. It’s all online now but that was only implemented a few months ago. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 1:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920/69 "2011-06-28T01:45:02Z")
Now, they’re not always (or even often) used correctly, so in that they can be confusing. But that’s a problem with the practitioner, not the practice. ---
**Author:** ![RaftPeople](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6f9a4e/32.png) [@RaftPeople](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RaftPeople)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920/70 "2011-06-28T03:20:03Z")
> [@TimeWinder](#): > > I’ll take it one step further. I have worked for three Fortune 500 companies and two smaller ones. I have never seen a flat database in anything _other_ than Excel for any business use at any of them. Web Backends, relational systems, off the shelf purchased stuff and the like, sure, those are SQL or some rough equivalent. But just flat-format lists of records? Always Excel. Always. > > Most people just roll their eyes and sigh when I use my trademarked “You know a spreadsheet is not a database, right?” line. And they correctly rolled their eyes at you. What would you propose they do for the 15,000 new spreadsheets with lists that get created in a typical company every month - write a custom app??? ---
**Author:** ![Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/cc9497/32.png) [@Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capt.Ridley_s_Shooting_Party)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 10:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920/71 "2011-06-28T10:01:04Z")
> [@Simplicio](#): > > Wait, your saying Word and EndNote and Office are antiquated compared to Tex and Subversion repositories? Tex was first released in 1978 and has been more or less frozen except for bug fixes since 1989. Office was released in the early 80’s and has major changes with every version up to last year. I agree Tex is a superior way to do academic papers, but I think part of that is because _it_ is antiquated, and therefore very stable and well understood compared to newer programs that are constantly being tweaked by Microsoft and the like. What has release date got to do with anything, anyway? If the damned thing just works, then why do you expect it to be continually tweaked? Further, what you wrote is completely and utterly incorrect. Nobody writes papers in TeX anymore, it’s all written in LaTeX, the major distributions of which (TeXLive, for instance) are regularly updated. The last TexLive distribution was released on 28th May this year; it’s simply incorrect to assert that (La)TeX is “frozen”. A recent major addition was the microtype package, for example, which performs micro-typographical changes to the document as it’s typeset (font expansion in lines, character protrusion, etc). > [@Calculon](#): > > For tables my issues were twofold: > > 1. I had lots of trouble getting things to center vertically in the table cell. Doing that is non-obvious and a huge pain. Something that Word does reasonably easily > 2. Creating and if need be editing the code for the table is also very difficult. It is just so hard to keep everything lined up and sensible. I do my data processing in Excel, and so what I used to do was lay out the code in excel, and then just paste that into the Latex document. Hardly an elegant solution. It also meant that to do most changes I had to find the excel file, change the code in the excel file, and then paste it back in again. Being able to just paste data into a Word table from excel or orders of magnitude simpler. > > Images were also a problem getting the right formats for things. I work in Microsoft Windows (and no, I can’t switch to Linux. I use programs that are Windows only), and the postscript support in Windows is poor at best. That’s ridiculous. You centre cell entries using the column descriptor when you declare a table. And EPS? Why are you using EPS? pdflatex (which is what everybody universally uses now, unless stuck in the 1980s) accepts PNG, JPG, and virtually every other modern image format just fine. ---
**Author:** ![Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/cc9497/32.png) [@Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capt.Ridley_s_Shooting_Party)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 10:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920/72 "2011-06-28T10:07:35Z")
> [@amanset](#): > > Regarding LaTeX, is there a decent GUI for it yet? I used it when studying Maths at University in the 90s, but I’m a computer guy. I could handle a complex formatting language. I’m just not sure that the majority of people can. LyX is a decent GUI for LaTeX, or so I’m told. ---
**Author:** ![GoodOmens](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/d26b3c/32.png) [@GoodOmens](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GoodOmens)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 10:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920/73 "2011-06-28T10:40:19Z")
> [@billfish678](#): > > IIRC the New York sewer system (or some other major city) or maybe even other major cities in general litteraly roll a giant wooden ball down the passagways to clean them out. No, I am not making this up. I would pay to see that. From a safe distance, of course. ---
**Author:** ![Mean\_Mr.Mustard](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mean_mr.mustard/32/3865_2.png) [@Mean\_Mr.Mustard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mean_Mr.Mustard)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 12:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920/74 "2011-06-28T12:43:50Z")
> [@jabiru](#): > > I’m a nurse. One of the requirements of our job is to check the Schedule 8 drugs at each change of shift. There’s a large, maroon coloured book in each medication room with a separate page for each S8 drug. One nurse has to write up the book, using a red pen, while the other counts each drug: “morphine 10mg/ml - 32, oxycodone 5mg - 78, Fentanyl 500mg/10ml - 95 …” > > This happens three times per day. It’s slow and extremely tedious and I can’t believe that there’s no better, more efficient way to keep track of these medications. Behold, the [Pyxis](http://www.carefusion.com/medical-products/medication-management/medication-technologies/pyxis-medstation-system.aspx). mmm ---
**Author:** ![jabiru](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/bbce88/32.png) [@jabiru](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jabiru)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920/75 "2011-06-28T14:04:16Z")
> [@Mean\_Mr.Mustard](#): > > Behold, the [Pyxis](http://www.carefusion.com/medical-products/medication-management/medication-technologies/pyxis-medstation-system.aspx). > mmm Looks good. I doubt NSW Health would spring for several thousand of those, unfortunately. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920/76 "2011-06-28T15:43:02Z")
One of the all-time winners has to be watering fields using a _shadoof_, which is still done in the Middle East. The process is demonstrably at least 4,000 years old, and very likely much older. > **[Shadoof](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadoof)** > > A shadoof or shaduf (from the Arabic word شادوف, šādūf) is an irrigation tool. It is highly efficient, and has been known since 3000 BCE. > The shadoof is used to lift water from a water source onto land or into another waterway or basin. The mechanism comprises a long counterbalanced pole on a pivot, with a bucket attached to the end of it. It is generally used in a crop irrigation system using basins, dikes, ditches, walls, canals, and similar waterways. > It is also called a lift, well pole, wel... In defense of its use, it works. You wouldn’t want to starve because your newfangled digital shadoof was down. ---
**Author:** ![Beware\_of\_Doug](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/278dde/32.png) [@Beware\_of\_Doug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beware_of_Doug)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920/77 "2011-06-28T16:02:34Z")
> [@pravnik](#): > > Assuming you’re not kidding, use of a settled term of art is a perfect example of clarity and conservation of words rather than an attempt at obfuscation. I agree. It’s an example of what [Russel Hirst](http://baywood.metapress.com/app/home/contribution.asp?referrer=parent&backto=issue,1,5;journal,31,160;linkingpublicationresults,1:300326,1), a technical writing professor, would call Good Jargon - it saves time, space, and energy for the initiated. (His example is scientific terminology.) Bad Jargon is spin or smoke-blowing, meant to disinform or mystify. What I meant by criticizing _the expression_ “term of art” is that it conveys a slight elitism: the non-specialist isn’t even supposed to understand \*what a term of art is \*until it’s explained. One might think at first that it referred to the visual arts, not legal artfulness. ---
**Author:** ![chaoticbear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f07891/32.png) [@chaoticbear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chaoticbear)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920/78 "2011-06-28T16:05:51Z")
Pyxis machines aren’t actually as expensive as you’d think. I mean, compared to paying extra staff, anyway 😛 My vote is for checks and all the things that go along with them. I have a student loan through Chase that I HAD to use a checking account for (had to open one specifically for it, since I’ve been using a pre-paid debit card for years as my primary “checking” account), then to sign up for auto-pay, they wanted me to MAIL them a CANCELLED CHECK. I wasn’t about to order checks just to send out a cancelled check, so I never did get enrolled in auto-pay. :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![ultrafilter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/3d9bf3/32.png) [@ultrafilter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ultrafilter)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920/79 "2011-06-28T16:31:54Z")
> [@chaoticbear](#): > > My vote is for checks and all the things that go along with them. I have a student loan through Chase that I HAD to use a checking account for (had to open one specifically for it, since I’ve been using a pre-paid debit card for years as my primary “checking” account), then to sign up for auto-pay, they wanted me to MAIL them a CANCELLED CHECK. I wasn’t about to order checks just to send out a cancelled check, so I never did get enrolled in auto-pay. :dubious: As I hear it, the practice of writing a numerical amount and spelling it out on checks is a holdover from when the Hindu-Arabic number system was first introduced to Europe. ---
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2011, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920/80 "2011-06-28T17:03:06Z")
According the Cartoon Museum in London, most British comic artists still send their work in by snail mail. Since some of them don’t (they would usually create the work by hand but then scan it in), there obviously isn’t a problem with degradation of quality, but some of those artists are pretty damn old and this is what they’re used to. But actually I’ve been surprised at how quickly institutions over here are catching on; for example, most of the time if I ask ‘does email count as a written request,’ the answer is yes. I’ve used a fax two or three times ever and haven’t written a cheque for at least a decade. > [@ultrafilter](#): > > As I hear it, the practice of writing a numerical amount and spelling it out on checks is a holdover from when the Hindu-Arabic number system was first introduced to Europe. Isn’t it also a useful check (heh) too? To make sure you didn’t put the decimal point in the wrong place or put the wrong number of zeroes? There’s a term for this doubling of input to lessen errors, isn’t there? And I’m pretty sure Europe was using Arabic numerals for a long time before cheques came into use. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-processes-are-unbelievably-antiquated/586920.md?page=5)