Area Engineer Builds 47-Node Visual Workflow to Avoid Writing 12-Line Script
The workflow works. It is beautiful. Nobody, including its author, can say what node 31 does.
BOISE, IDAHO — Local software engineer Caleb Rasmussen, 34, spent six hours Tuesday constructing a 47-node visual automation that watches a folder, reads a spreadsheet, filters rows, posts a summary to a chat channel and emails a manager, a task colleagues estimate would have taken 12 lines of code and "about as long as making coffee."
"I know," Rasmussen said, gesturing at a canvas of boxes connected by gently curving lines. "I know. But look at it."
The workflow, which is displayed on a monitor in the team's shared space, has drawn admirers from other departments. "It looks like a subway map for a city that has its life together," said one product designer. A member of the finance team asked whether it could be printed.
Rasmussen acknowledged that he does not remember what node 31, labeled "Transform (2)," does. "It was important at the time. I am afraid to delete it. Everything after it works." Asked whether he had tried deleting it, he said he had duplicated the workflow, deleted the node in the copy, and closed the copy without running it.
Team lead Hana Sørensen said she supports the effort. "He is not wrong that the ops team can now change it without asking us. Yesterday they added a node. Now it also posts to a second channel. I did not approve that. I did not have to. That is the dream, apparently."
The 12-line script that the workflow replaced still exists in a repository. It has not been run since August, though Rasmussen said he opens it "sometimes, to remember."
At press time, the workflow had begun to email the manager twice, an outcome Rasmussen attributed to node 31.