Re: GUI Scripting applications?

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From: Al Dunbar [MS-MVP] (alan-no-drub-spam_at_hotmail.com)
Date: 02/08/05 

Date: Mon, 7 Feb 2005 20:45:54 -0700

"Steve Seguis [MVP]" <steve_NO_SPAM@scriptmation.com> wrote in message
news:CfVNd.298$534.107@twister.nyc.rr.com...
> I understand your situation exactly. I've become quite frustrated with
> managers who think that "everyone is replaceable". Although that may be
true
> to some extent, you wouldn't replace an experienced script writer or
> programmer with a regular admin who doesn't know an "IF" statement from a
> "FOR" loop. After all, scripting and programming languages are just
> that...languages.. but the creativity and knowledge that allows us to
create
> useful things with these tools are nothing short of an artform that no GUI
> tool can simply replace.

Agreed. And yet if there is little transfer of practical knowledge from one
admin scripter to another, it becomes more of a "black art" than any other
kind ;-)

> Sorry for the rant ;) ...back to your question. I would suggest to your
> manager that he purchase a list of books that the person who would replace
> you would need to read inside and out. Also, you may want to bring some of
> your junior team members into the loop by giving them small scripting
tasks
> to learn basic fundamentals. Once they know that, everything else will
fall
> into place.

... if it doesn't fall *apart* first!

But seriously, one point that Steve didn't cover was documentation and the
development of inhouse scripting standards. OK, make that two points.

My experience in this and related newsgroups is that, coding that is
considered quite acceptable by some (or readable, or understandable) is not
so by others - and I am talking about people who should all be considered at
the expert level. But more important than determining which is the best
style or methodology, is to devise company standards, where feasible, to
foster a consistency of approach. As painful a task as it may be, this
likely means having to provide internal documentation for your own code, in
terms of such things as symbol naming conventions, source layout and
commenting standards, and etc.

If your experience is anything like mine, you have become the company expert
because you were interested in scripting and taught yourself. I have a very
few colleagues at work with whom I can discuss scripting concepts, however,
the vast majority are simply not motivated to the same extent. I have loaned
out my WROX books to a number of them , but have yet to see any indication
that the knowledge contained has rubbed off on them. In fact, I have seen
very few scripts that were not of my own making. This is not to malign their
intelligence in any way, just that their areas of interest do not include
scripting.

One of our senior techs took the MS scripting course (I forget the course
number) and let me look through the student manual binder that he got there.
I didn't find any glaring errors, but the whole thing was light on detail,
and quite beginner oriented. I guess that is a good thing, however, the
person in question has, not surprisingly, not become an actual scripter as a
result. To be fair, the course seemed more geared to giving an overview of
what might be possible with scripting, along with some clues as to which
components and methodologies apply to which types of problems. You want to
modify some configuration aspect of all of your workstations - just use WMI
for that. Thanks, but until one finds out *how* to do this, the knowledge is
of very limited use.

Much the same can be said of the books, even the good ones. I'd agree that a
small collection of some of the better references would be worth the price.
Having too many "how to" books on the shelf would not be a good idea,
though. You do want to make sure you have good references on various
document object models (IE, and whatever else you typically use), ADSI,
WinNT, LDAP, and whatnot.

I'd also agree that settling on a single set of development tools (I'd vote
for PrimalScript) would be useful, as it would tend to produce some
commonalities of style.

But just making a collection of such resources, along with instructions to
"read this in the case of my death", would not go very far to resolve your
company's problem. Depending on your company's IT culture, you could do
things like have a contest where you post some of your code and ask for a
walkthrough explanation. Anyone scoring high would then become a good
candidate for an apprentice. You might also need to get management support
for such things as workshops where you would deliver some inhouse training
and lead discussions to determine where the deficiencies are, and what the
strengths of your team members are.

/Al

> --
> Steve Seguis - MCSE, MVP Windows Server, SCJP
> SCRIPTMATION, INC.
> Automating the Enterprise
> http://www.scriptmation.com
>
>
> "Philzilla" <p_austin@hotmail.com> wrote in message
> news:1107822303.582847.187760@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com...
> > Hi all! I'm the only Systems Engineer on our IT staff with any
> > significant scripting knowledge and therefore I've written all of the
> > various VBScripts and batch files that are currently in production at
> > my company. My manager wants to make sure that if I get hit by a
> > cement truck that the rest of the team can pick up where I left off and
> > continue to develop and manage scripts. The first things that came to
> > mind were of course the Scriptomatics and Tweakomatic tools. A good
> > IDE like PrimalScript also came to mind.
> >
> > I know that there is no substitute for experience, but do you know of
> > any other good beginners script writing tools or applications (GUI
> > based would be great) that would help the less experienced folks on my
> > team?
> >
> > I've already looked at script logic but it's limited to desktop type
> > scripting...I'd like them to also be able to create server management
> > and other types of scripts as well...Thanks!
> >
>
>

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