[dragonwriter]

> Further, everything I know that was designed to be "English-like", cut out the programmers, and let the business people program directly has been a total and utter failure, on that metric.

I would agree, though in many cases (SQL particularly is a strong example) that's often more a failure of the organizations using the technology than the technology itself.

It doesn't matter if you have business-side analysts that can use SQL if you by policy don't let anyone outside of the IT side of an organization have access and tools that allow the user to use SQL directly against the database.

The IT-as-high-priesthood cult in organizations is strong, and resistant to any application of technology that challenges the priesthood. And this is, IME, especially true in organizations where the IT organization (and particularly its leadership) isn't particularly technically strong to start with.