But that's really just an aside. You just need a 3D map of the cathedral with the position of the fire detectors marked, blinking red when a fire breaks out. After all they already had a unique ID, according to the article. That's not hard. But they had too many years and too much money to implement a usable solution.
Absolutely.
The fire panels were banks of LEDs stuck on a wall in the guardian's house.
As you say, presumably over the years the system was added to, and they hit a point where changing the entire system would have cost "too much", so they kept adding to a legacy solution..
Always a good idea isn't it? Someone somewhere was certainly applauded for this brilliant business case and decision making. Everybody pointing out the flaws not so much I would assume...
> they had too many years and too much money to implement a usable solution