In article <v03020958af54feb797e0@[199.245.241.37]>, "F. Alfredo Rego"
<[log in to unmask]> writes
>Carl Hughes <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
><< Many excellent comments >>.
>
>>...  (On a side note, I believe data
>>drives a business.  There is no such thing as "Legacy Data" -- either a
>>business needs the data to operate or it doesn't.  There is such a thing as
>>a "Legacy Application" -- an application is comprised of the choices a
>>business made in programming language and other tools to "use" the data.)
>
>This is a very perceptive description!  You get my heart-felt
>congratulations for your superb (and appropriate) use of language.
>Unfortunately, this has become a rarity nowadays.
>

And I can surely go along with a lot of what Carl said. But I have a
problem with the above, because it can be re-arranged as follows:-

(On a side note, I believe applications drive a business.  There is no
such thing as a "Legacy Application" -- either a business needs the
application to operate or it doesn't.  There is such a thing as "Legacy
Data" -- such data is comprised of the choices a business made in what
to keep and what to throw away when archiving or data warehousing.)

And it's just as true, and just as false. I guess a 'Legacy App' is one
you *still* have to use, but wish you had something newer, or different,
to use instead. While 'Legacy Data' is the stuff you have to go on from
the past, but wish that you had stored more, or different, than you
chose to.
--
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