---
id: KB-CN-035
url: https://app.codecontract.io/help/construction/measuring-every-day-that-nobody-looks-at
idioma: en
categoria: sector-construccion
subcategoria: hidraulicas
audiencia: usuario
nivel: avanzado
actualizado: 2026-08-13
tambienEn: [es]
relacionados: [KB-CN-033, KB-IU-013, KB-CN-034]
citadoPor: [KB-IU-026]
---

# Measuring every day that nobody looks at

_Your installation generates data continuously and most of it nobody reads. The day it is requested, it is worth exactly what was retained._

**Responde a:** how long to keep operating records · continuous measurement data and its evidence · asked for readings from two years ago · what to do with the records the installation generates

An operating installation produces records continuously: flows, levels, readings, operating logs, incidents. **The vast majority are never read by anyone**, and that is precisely why they are managed badly: it is hard to look after something nobody uses. Until a specific request arrives about a specific day, and then the whole value of the system concentrates on whether that day was kept or not.

## The life cycle of a record nobody reads

| Moment | Who uses it | What usually happens to it |
| --- | --- | --- |
| The day it is generated | The operator | A quick glance |
| The following week | Nobody | Filed, or not |
| The following year | Nobody | Lost in a system change |
| **The day it is requested** | **Everyone** | **It gets hunted for** |

> [!IMPORTANT]
> **A record nobody ever uses still has a perfectly calculable value: that of the day it is requested.** It is the whole argument in this position, and it needs stating explicitly because intuition says the opposite. The cost of keeping is small, constant and visible; the cost of not having is enormous, occasional and invisible until it happens. Systems designed looking only at the first always end up in the second.

## What to decide once

1. **What is kept and for how long** — Decided, not inherited from the previous system by inertia.
2. **Where it lives, and not on a local machine** — System changes are where histories disappear.
3. **What happens to anomalies** — An odd reading with no explanation beside it is worse than no reading.
4. **And who can consult it without asking permission** — If someone has to be phoned, in practice it does not exist.

> [!WARNING]
> The moment these archives are lost is not a deletion: **it is a migration**. The control system changes, the supplier changes, the server changes, and the previous history «stays there for now» — until that machine is retired. Nobody decides to lose it and nobody notices it is gone, because by then nobody was consulting it. Any system change should explicitly cover what happens to the old data, and almost none do.

> [!NOTE]
> What operating records are mandatory for your installation, at what frequency, for how long they must be retained and who may require them **is determined by the applicable rules and your authorisation, and settled by your adviser or the competent body**. Here we cover the organisational part: how to retain and find records nobody consults until the day they are needed.

**Is keeping what nobody reads worth it?**

It is worth exactly what not having it will cost the day it is asked for.

**What do I do with an anomalous reading?**

Keep it with its explanation beside it. Deleting is the worst option.

**And when changing systems?**

Decide explicitly what happens to the history. That is when it is lost.

## Ejemplos

**Readings from a specific day two years ago are requested.**

- Keeps records dated and accessible

→ It is answered by searching rather than reconstructing.

**A system change leaves the history on a retired machine.**

- Stores records off local machines

→ The migration does not take the previous years with it.

**An anomalous reading appears with no explanation.**

- Allows noting the context alongside the record

→ The anomaly is explained rather than raising suspicion.

**Consulting the history means phoning whoever manages it.**

- Keeps the archive available to whoever needs it

→ The query does not depend on one person.

**Nobody knows what must be kept or for how long.**

- Applies a uniform retention policy

→ The decision is taken once and applies itself.

**Operating logs stay on paper at the installation.**

- Captures the log on site and stores it at once

→ The record stops living in a physical folder.