Jack Ganssle's Blog This is Jack's outlet for thoughts about designing and programming embedded systems. It's a complement to my bi-weekly newsletter The Embedded Muse. Contact me at jack@ganssle.com. I'm an old-timer engineer who still finds the field endlessly fascinating (bio).

On Checklists

May 26, 2020

I blew it.

The last Embedded Muse newsletter (# 398) had a goof in it, one that was entirely my fault. The emailed version had, as usual, a link to the on-line newsletter, but the link was incorrect. It referred to an earlier Muse.

I've made this same mistake in the past. That link is embodied in the template I use to create the newsletter. My checklist, used to ensure Muses go out correctly, has this item:

2.3 At the beginning, in the code window, around line 5, make sure the "Click <a href="https://www.ganssle.com/tem/tem326.html">here</a> to go to the on-line version" has the right Muse number in the link.

Muse 398 went out in haste, and I didn't carefully follow the checklist.

Shortcuts lead to long delays. This is an all-too-true aphorism attributed to JRR Tolkien.

Which gets me to the point of this posting. When something cannot be automated but is a task that must be done more than once and correctly, we need a detailed checklist. Memory is too fallible.

My checklist to send a Muse and post it to www.ganssle.com has 57 steps. Miss some of those and the result might not be much of a problem; sort of like having a bug in a program that doesn't cause a crash. But that missed step might reduce the quality of the effort.

Other steps are absolutely vital to get right.

I'm a list maker. Memory is just not reliable. My email client is Microsoft Outlook and one of the features I'm slaved to is the "task list", a daily-updated list of things that must get done. Here's an example:

(Obviously, the item "Go to movies" is not going to happen in these Coronavirus days. This is a task that appears every Friday which is indicated by the annotation "RW", for "repeats weekly").

Some of those tasks, like "Rotate external HD" have associated checklists. That task refers to swapping external hard disks with one stored elsewhere (the computers back themselves up to this disk, and another internal drive, every night), and other, associated backup activities. It's a critical task that must be done correctly to avoid losing data. The itemized checklist insures I perform every step correctly.

As long as I don't rush through the process.

I have a checklist for creating and posting this blog.

As pilots, we were taught to always go through each step of each checklist. You may have done this hundreds of times, but we were still required to slavishly stick to the written items, step by step. Commercial pilots are even more fastidious. The copilot reads a step and the pilot confirms it.

Checklists are boring, are perhaps even considered anal. But they are effective. I don't like screwing up so am happy to use whatever works.

I even use them when needed for fun activities. Before we head on a long offshore sail in Voyager, our 32 foot sailboat I run through our Sea Checklist. So, a thousand miles from land, we never slap our heads and complain "I wish I had remembered to bring…"

Feel free to email me with comments.

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