Apologies for the time required to reply to this.
> Your argument is based on the fact that the architect's design goals
> differed from those who comissioned him and who use the building.
In fact, this is incorrect. The original commission did indeed
emphasize the openness of the space as the most important
consideration in the design.
It was only after they realized the impact this had that the panel that
commissioned the building realized that there was another goal that
all longhouses had to achieve that was perhaps even more important
than openness: Functionality.
This is very common in system analysis, that you don't adequately
understand the problem space until you have created several
solutions. There is an analysis pattern called the Used-Three-Times
or Rule-Of-Threes that reflects this.
The problem here was that the architect was not willing to throw out
the original design assumptions and reanalyze the situation. If he
had, he would have created a solution that maximized functionality
while maintaining as much openness as was possible. Of course, in
some cases the two goals are mutually exclusive so he would have
had to strike a balance between them. Sadly, he was willing to do
none of this and the users of the building suffered.
> Fortunately that difference does not exist in the case of CVS.
Uh huh. Perhaps you should take another look at my last paragraph.
I think many of those calling for no change to CVS suffer the same
fate as the architect.
