Ironically I can't see the images at the bottom of that page.
Software Developers Should Have Sysadmin Experience
101–110 of 424 posts
Re: Software Developers Should Have Sysadmin Experience
#102With the rise of devops (docker, puppet, ansible, etc...) , and cloud VMs, how often are sysadmins different from software devs?
With the rise of devops system engineering knowledge is being lost.
I often see developers trying to replace it with bloated, complex piles of hipster software. While a devops team is attempting to build a toy Google-like infrastructure on 50 nodes for weeks, another company is deploying code just fine using some 15 years old setup with netboot + disk imaging system + OS packages.
Re: Software Developers Should Have Sysadmin Experience
#103The post has a valid point even if the example is more about system architecture than system administration.
In my experience a developer doing one year in an Operations department gains some insight in what is going to be important in the longest phase of the software life cycle, that is when it's exposed to customers and the company has to react quickly to problems. Proper logging, anything that can help pinpointing the cause of problems and even hot patch them at 3 AM.
The usual lean startup might have little thoughts for that (is it even going to have customers?) but established businesses do.
If it's 6 months to develop and it runs for 10 years (with maintenance and new features), which phase is more important to a company, development or production? I'm a developer which did a couple of years of operations and I've little doubts about it. It's where the company makes the money from.
Re: Software Developers Should Have Sysadmin Experience
#104With the rise of devops (docker, puppet, ansible, etc...) , and cloud VMs, how often are sysadmins different from software devs?
with the rise of cargo cult style management, how often are managers different then a script that purchases items from Amazon randomly and bulk emails randomly generated business plans?
Re: Software Developers Should Have Sysadmin Experience
#105This might be controversial, but I don't think you get to be a half decent developer without being a reasonable sysadmin. Maybe my experience is unusual, but I've never worked anywhere that the sysadmins knew more than the developers about how best to run their code in production. And when things go wrong with it how best to find the cause of the issue. And I've never thrown code over a wall without having tested it…
I've done the dual sysadmin/developer thing for a small company, and the problem I experienced there was completely incompatible working modes. Sysadmins must deal with interrupts (requests, crises, things driven by external schedules etc) and then in the rest of their time build systems to manage or reduce the interrupts. Developers are expected to produce work on a predictable schedule. This is disrupted by interru…
AMEN!!! In my current job, I am wearing both hats, and while I like that there is a certain variety in my work, users calling for help is highly disruptive when programming or doing some other stuff that requires deep focus.
The upside that in a three-person IT department there is very little bureaucracy to fight, just the odd "organically grown" legacy system.
Re: Software Developers Should Have Sysadmin Experience
#106Should sysadmins have software development experience (e.g. DevOps)? For what values should 'X have Y experience?' Should we go as far as... "A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new proble…
I've been thinking a bit about my own lack of specialization lately...and, its negative impact on my value to a larger organization than my own company. I suspect I'd have a hard time finding employment doing the kind of work I'd want to do at the kind of salary I'd expect to earn. I'm a decent programmer with broad but rarely deep experience, a better than average sysadmin with ridiculously broad experience, a passa…
+100.. if I could. I find myself in the same boat. I've refused to move to management, and along with that my ability to earn has taken a hit(for someone in mid-thirties). Now realizing, I don't want to take the risk of building a business, and wondering if I should just focus on expertise in one specialization.
Re: Software Developers Should Have Sysadmin Experience
#107Just a small nitpick with the article: it probably meant "backend software developers". Because a graphics developer who mostly writes shader code would surely benefit more from artist experience.
It's incredible how apparently 99% of HN are web developers who don't even bother considering that other things exist. It's not at all representative of the larger industry.
Re: Software Developers Should Have Sysadmin Experience
#108With the rise of devops (docker, puppet, ansible, etc...) , and cloud VMs, how often are sysadmins different from software devs?
There are a lot of parts of ops that handle things that aren't easily scriptable. What do usage patterns look like so you can better manage when to bring servers up/down to handle normal usage flow and have servers warmed up when they're needed? Are you using the best build options for your VMs? Are you using the best VMs for your application? Are you at the best datacenter for your application? Even with certain build options having better automation tools than before, there are still a lot of places where it the world is far from a few scripts.
Re: Software Developers Should Have Sysadmin Experience
#109Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've worked with all kinds - from windows devs who can't figure out how to install visual studio - to people who understand Windows, Linux, and macOS - as well as basic system administration for each platform. The people who are most successful at rapidly developing good high quality software are more in the later group. Would you trust a RF engineer who couldn't troubleshoot his own radio designs? why would you trou…
I recently questioned someone about this very subject. They wanted to hire a "CSS expert" because the "developer" didn't have a grasp of css after having developed the project in JS/HTML. I was so confused as to how that's possible.
There's a large gap between basic understanding of CSS and actually creating good CSS. Personally I avoid touching CSS as much as possible.
Re: Software Developers Should Have Sysadmin Experience
#110This might be controversial, but I don't think you get to be a half decent developer without being a reasonable sysadmin. Maybe my experience is unusual, but I've never worked anywhere that the sysadmins knew more than the developers about how best to run their code in production. And when things go wrong with it how best to find the cause of the issue. And I've never thrown code over a wall without having tested it…
I believe in small cross functional teams but that you need to be a sysadmin to develop I don't agree with. Perhaps it's more your opinion of what a good developer means, most teams benefit from variety in my experience. It sounds like your biased to certain types of organisations where there's a big gap between departments.