Monday, September 27, 2004

GM's reuse strategy. This article about GM's efforts to increase reuse of part designs, touches on several very timely topics. First, software designers are not alone in preferring to design unique parts, rather than use existing ones. I find it the epitome of irony that the industry that IT seeks to emulate in its use of interchangeable parts, itself struggles with the issue! Second, to enable reuse, even of physical part, requires substantial IT investment to enable designers to simply find a part to reuse. Third, it touches on the "monoculture" issue being debated with regard to widespread use of Windows. In GM's case, when more product lines share a common part, design flaws in the part have wider repercussions. 5:25:19 AM