Originally Posted by
anteater
It is very easy to bypass the UG waitlist, and sadly this seems to be as intended by AS.
AS’ website says upgrades will be processed immediately when space is available but the UG processor doesn’t usually run in a timely manner nor does AS seem to run an integrity check (eg IF OLCI offer THEN the UG professor verifies U space is open, that the waitlist has been cleared, etc).
If one contacts Reservations to help when there is space but the UG professor isn’t running, one is told to wait and it’s automated.
With the posted UG policy saying one thing and the system operating in a different and deficient manner, it’s difficult to think that this isn’t as designed.
As a software engineer, I doubt that it was intentionally designed this way. It just sounds like two different systems that interact in ways that weren't thought of.
In other words, it's not so much that it's as designed; it's that it wasn't really designed (at a high level). Two different systems were built for two different business needs, most likely at different times, and no one took the time to ask how they would affect each other. At some point someone probably noticed but they don't really care enough to prioritize fixing it. It will probably never get fixed unless they are working on something else and it gets fixed as a side effect.
In other words, it's apathy, not malice. The end result for you is the same, though.