Fourth-generation programming language
Back around 1993, plus or minus, I was working for a company whose name you&#x27;d recognize but I won&#x27;t mention. We had an essentially failed project that they wanted to get back on its feet by changing to a more conventional platform.<p>But which platform? We had a few contenders: PowerBuilder, Gupta SQLWindows, and good old C++ (using Borland&#x27;s OWL framework, iirc). So they divided us up into separate teams, each to try a small proof-of-concept with our respective assigned platform, seeing who could accomplish the most in a month.<p>I was on the SQLWindows team, and we managed to implement the most of the PoC project. But when us developers got together and compared notes, we found that although my team had won at the finish line, the details told a different story. The C++ team finished 2nd, but if you looked at the specifics of our progress, my team got off to a running start, while the C++ team had to build a bunch of infrastructure first. After that, their velocity was much higher than our own, so if the PoC test had been extended for another week, they&#x27;d have wound up the winners.<p>We had drawn this all out on a whiteboard, with the intention of explaining this to management the next day. But when we got into the office that morning, our whiteboard had been erased, replaced with just &quot;SQLWindows&quot;, and management told us that whatever the results, it had been decided to go with SQLWindows.<p>I cannot deal with office politics.