A Winner’s Diagram

Yesterday was the show-down between me and my previously reported systems tutor. It was a face off, not unlike the film Face/Off, but without the forward slash. I haven’t worked out which is doing the John Travolta role. Probably me, because I’m not very fond of Nicholas Cage, and John Travolta is friends with Oprah, and just imagine the christmas haul you’d get from her. An Angel Network truck would probably deliver it. Woah.

Anyway, it was my turn to present the solution to a question to the class, who by this point were thoroughly uninterested and had already packed up their bags after the lecturer said “Well, I just told the other class they could leave if they hadn’t done their work.” As I stood up, I asked for a white board marker, but it would seem that there was none to be had. I was presenting a process decomposition diagram (with data flows!), and stood up to declare I would simply talk through it. The tutor, seemingly eager to criticise my work said “I’ll go get a marker for you”, and it wasn’t long before she came back offering me the tool of my own destruction.

I drew the parent process symbol and labelled it in the most perfect cursive writing you’ve ever seen. I continued the way through my graph, explaining it as I went along. My straight lines got a little interpretive and some of my child process symbols were a circular, but I finished it up and stood next to my piece of artwork awaiting my comments.

The tutor looked at the diagram. And looked. Mouthed closed. Flicked a few pages in her textbook. Read. Looked. Flicked a few more pages. Read some more. Looked. I eventually asked her “Is that okay?” Through her gritting clenched throat she managed a gutteral “Mmm hmmm”, nodded and I took my seat knowing that this battle was mine.