Opinion: Seven wonders

Thus we have the Seven Deadly Sins, and the Seven Wonders of the World. Taking a wild stab in the dark, we're guessing the seven days of the week have something to with our fascination for this humble prime number. Then again, were we being faithful to our various faiths, we should be looking at six of everything, and then having a day off to get over it. But nobody would be interested in only six sins or just six wonders.

Thus it came to pass that some Gartnerus dreamed up the seven Gartner IT Grand Challenges. This list of things that don't exist in the world of IT are supposed to occupy the minds of forward thinking CIOs, according to the guns for hire at Gartner. But which ones? Here at CRN we know that CIOs are actually far too busy to make such decisions, so we've solved the challenges on their behalf. This will also give Gartnerus something else to work on, now that their challenges are no longer challenging.

First on their list is "never having to manually recharge devices." Well we've already solved that one. Just go out and buy a huge box of 1000 AA batteries at Crazy Clark's and chuck them in the bin when they go flat. No recharging required. That was obviously a trick challenge. Challenge number two is "parallel programming". Sigh. Yet another no-brainer. Still don't know the answer? Hire some female programmers. It's only men who can't multi-task. Women don't call this a challenge.

Let's move along to number three which is "non tactile, natural computing interface". For those who've just joined, this is consultant-speak for being able to control your PC by flapping your arms madly while shouting loudly in the general direction of the screen. Let me tell you right now, if you've ever worked at a call centre you already know how to do this. And, trust us on this, it won't make a jot of difference whether the PC can understand what you're on about, since you usually have no idea yourself.

That brings us to Grand Challenge Number Four – "automated speech translation." Seems a tad unnecessary, since the main languages used on the planet are English and Chinese and our Prime Minister Rudd speaks both fluently. No point in the rest of us wasting time on challenges our Dear Leader has already solved. What's lurking at number five? "Persistent and reliable long-term storage." Ahhh, long-term memory problems, eh? Yeah, well this happens when you get old. It makes you forget stuff. Like paper. You know, that stuff they wrote on before we invented computers. Last time we checked it lasted considerably longer than the twenty years Dr Berman is worried about.

We're nearly done, it's time to solve challenge number six, which is "increase programmer productivity 100-fold." This is another of those trick challenges. The answer is the reverse, you need to "decrease random requests from end-users 100-fold." Make them decide what they actually want in the first place and nail the specifications list to their foreheads. Then, when they tell you that your code needs another re-write, just tell them to look in the mirror. It will take them ages to read their own requests in reverse, giving you ample time to complete the back nine holes before afternoon tea.

And now, the final challenge looms – "identifying the financial consequences of IT investing." We must admit this one had us stumped for quite a few nanoseconds. Then we got it. You need to convince your boss that blowing wads of cash on IT toys is good value and makes the business run better, and might even make the business more profitable. Now that we know the question, the answer is obvious. Yank the power cord out of the server stack. Count to thirty. Answer the red phone. Ask your boss if he understands the value of IT to the business. Of course he does. Plug the power back in.

Right, that's our contribution to world peace and the meaning of life taken care of for another day. Time to work on our handicap.

hardware seven wonders