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"General Orders for Sentries" as an operations document

sebastianmarshall.com

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Re: "General Orders for Sentries" as an operations document

#3
I like the author's careful descriptions of what is good about the document, but it seems like common-sense pragmatism. Surely there are other, equally pragmatic and sensible, documents? (I admit that I don't have any examples, but I am not often exposed to good or bad procedures documents.) Why does this one deserve particularly to be singled out?

EDIT: As dragonwriter (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9682195) correctly points out, it would be wrong to demand that everything written about be the unique best object in its class, and I do not mean to do so. I mean instead that the author literally singles out this document as "one of the finest written processes of all time", which seems to be more than the analysis demonstrates.

Also, because I am that guy, this:

> there's thousands of permeations of things that can go wrong

should be 'permutations' (or, more likely, probably 'combinations'), not 'permeations'.

Re: "General Orders for Sentries" as an operations document

#4
post #3

I like the author's careful descriptions of what is good about the document, but it seems like common-sense pragmatism. Surely there are other, equally pragmatic and sensible, documents? (I admit that I don't have any examples, but I am not often exposed to good or bad procedures documents.) Why does this one deserve particularly to be singled out? EDIT: As dragonwriter ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9682195…

"there's"?

Re: "General Orders for Sentries" as an operations document

#5
post #3

I like the author's careful descriptions of what is good about the document, but it seems like common-sense pragmatism. Surely there are other, equally pragmatic and sensible, documents? (I admit that I don't have any examples, but I am not often exposed to good or bad procedures documents.) Why does this one deserve particularly to be singled out? EDIT: As dragonwriter ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9682195…

Surely there are other, equally pragmatic and sensible, documents?

I was reminded of the Four Rules for Firearms Handling. I think you're selling this sort of thing short, however. It's not as if some junior officer just sat down one afternoon and wrote these rules. Rather, they are the end result of a long process of trial, error, disaster, and rewriting.

Re: "General Orders for Sentries" as an operations document

#6
post #3

I like the author's careful descriptions of what is good about the document, but it seems like common-sense pragmatism. Surely there are other, equally pragmatic and sensible, documents? (I admit that I don't have any examples, but I am not often exposed to good or bad procedures documents.) Why does this one deserve particularly to be singled out? EDIT: As dragonwriter ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9682195…

It is permutations if the order of events is relevant to the outcome. Theoretically, every single step you take may look "correct", but still end up badly if performed in disorder.

Re: "General Orders for Sentries" as an operations document

#7
Most formal order documents are like this. You can find tons of operations, warning, and fragmentary orders online, including orders used in combat theaters previously. But be ready for an increasing amount of entropy as you move from formal operations orders to warning orders to fragmentary orders. Often, FRAGOs aren't even typed up in a document, especially in combat arms.

Re: "General Orders for Sentries" as an operations document

#8
post #2

I wonder if this being posted here is in any way related to the events which took place on the latest episode of Game of Thrones...

First of all, no, it isn't.

Secondly, this could be construed as being on the same continent as a spoiler, which, well, don't do that.

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