The bestiary · The Dashboard Necromancer
Specimen · catalogued monster
The Dashboard Necromancer
Keeps refreshing reports nobody has opened since 2019
A devoted keeper of the dead, it tends a vast crypt of charts with candles that never go out. Ask it to retire a single report and it will clutch the server to its chest, hissing that a meeting might one day need it.
Symptoms
- Thousands of reports, most rarely opened
- Duplicate dashboards answering the same question
- Refresh, licence and support costs for dead content
- Users can't find the right report
- Every request becomes a new dashboard
Weakness
Usage telemetry. Archive anything nobody has opened in 90 days, consolidate what's left into a few certified dashboards, and the dead stay buried.
Overheard in the corridor
- “Just build me a dashboard for it.”
- “Don't delete that one, someone might need it.”
- “We've got a dashboard for that. Actually, we've got eleven.”
- “We spend more time maintaining reports than answering questions.”
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Spotted in the wild: The Dashboard Necromancer. I know at least one data team it's haunting. Which monster is lurking in your data? Confess and find out below. #WhatHauntsYourData
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The antidote · prescribed by DataArt
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