Tree swing cartoon

Product design joke From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A tree swing cartoon or tire swing cartoon is a humorous graphical metaphor that purports to explain communication pitfalls in the division of labor in the development of a product.[1][2] It depicts how different departments implement or describe a tire swing attached to a tree, in various impractical ways: for example, "as designed by engineering" shows the swing tied to the trunk and slack on the ground.[3] The punchline is that the customer actually wanted a tire swing, when all of the previous implementations show a plank seat.[3]

A tree swing with three impractically stacked seats
"What marketing suggested"
A tree swing where the swing collides with the trunk
"What was manufactured"
A tree swing where a section of the trunk has been removed and propped up with supports, to accommodate the swing
"How maintenance installed it"
A simple tire swing
"What the customer wanted"

The origin of this cartoon appears to be from at least the late 1960s, and possibly earlier. The original date and author are unknown, as is the exact original form.[4][5][3] Many variants of it appeared later in several books on education, software engineering and management.[6]

The cartoon has also been used to illustrate the waterfall model of software development.[7]

References

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