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How 'DevOps' Is Killing The Developer

jeffknupp.com

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Re: How 'DevOps' Is Killing The Developer

#211

Post by coolsunglasses »

dllthomas wrote: post #155
coolsunglasses wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nah, in dependently typed functional programming languages you can prevent this at compile-time.

Yes, "every language" was glib. In any language we could avoid it, actually, by hiding division behind something that gave a Maybe or Option or similar. My point, though, was that his "Imagine..." was actually representative of virtually all of the languages that virtually all of us work in virtually all of the time. It is therefore a poor example of a way in which HW is different.

I went to dependent types specifically because I figured we meant static avoidance without resorting to checked arithmetic. (better performance)

Re: How 'DevOps' Is Killing The Developer

#212

Post by dllthomas »

coolsunglasses wrote: post #211
dllthomas wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, "every language" was glib. In any language we could avoid it, actually, by hiding division behind something that gave a Maybe or Option or similar. My point, though, was that his "Imagine..." was actually representative of virtually all of the languages that virtually all of us work in virtually all of the time. It is therefore a poor example of a way in which HW is different.

I went to dependent types specifically because I figured we meant static avoidance without resorting to checked arithmetic. (better performance)

Sure, that would be a good reason to go there. I didn't mean to cast aspersions at dependent types. I was just confused/amused at the typical case being cast as a hypothetical.

Re: How 'DevOps' Is Killing The Developer

#213

Post by area51org »

copergi wrote: post #173
area51org wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Better automation than cfengine, with any luck. But in most companies, Operations does not mean automation; that's the very reason the DevOps movement started.

Usually worse, it seems most people use chef or puppet. I understand what you are saying, but I am saying I believe otherwise. Operations has always relied heavily on automation. We managed several thousand unix machines with 3 or 4 people back in the 90s and it was totally normal. Devops started for the same reason cloud started: to put a new buzzword on what people have done forever, so that it can be sold as a new…

I'm just not that cynical. We're all tempted to grow cynical after a number of years in this business, but you don't have to let it color your whole world. :-)

Yes, we had automation in the '90s — I wrote quite a bit of it myself! — but the landscape has drastically improved. For one thing, the industry is now embracing it, and with the embrace, a name. The name is not being "sold" in any way that I can see — no one is getting rich by bandying around the buzzword. It's not being sold by anyone I'm aware of as some kind of silver bullet, and anyone who believes in an IT panacea deserves what he gets. It is however being used to sell an idea, that automation in the '90s and before was a good thing, and that we should probably do more of it. DevOps means more than just automation, and in large part, these are also improvements in the industry. We're better now, partly because we have to be.

For that matter, the cloud is just a name that describes the commodification of computing resources (whether that be actual compute, storage, whatever). Yes, yes, the marketing blowhards of the world have misused and bastardized the word, but that doesn't mean they've ruined it, or that it never meant anything.

Re: How 'DevOps' Is Killing The Developer

#214

Post by copergi »

area51org wrote: post #213
copergi wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Usually worse, it seems most people use chef or puppet. I understand what you are saying, but I am saying I believe otherwise. Operations has always relied heavily on automation. We managed several thousand unix machines with 3 or 4 people back in the 90s and it was totally normal. Devops started for the same reason cloud started: to put a new buzzword on what people have done forever, so that it can be sold as a new…

I'm just not that cynical. We're all tempted to grow cynical after a number of years in this business, but you don't have to let it color your whole world. :-) Yes, we had automation in the '90s — I wrote quite a bit of it myself! — but the landscape has drastically improved. For one thing, the industry is now embracing it, and with the embrace, a name. The name is not being "sold" in any way that I can see — no one…

It has nothing to do with cynicism. This is literally taking an existing industry, and slapping a new name on it to sell products, consulting, etc. Go look at any of the current product's websites. Which ones demonstrate an understanding that automation is as old as computers? Cause they certainly all look to me like they want to give the impression that they invented the concept, so you should buy their broken pile of ruby scripts instead of the other guy's broken pile of ruby scripts.

Re: How 'DevOps' Is Killing The Developer

#215

Post by Aqueous »

jiggy2011 wrote: post #146
Aqueous wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your time is priceless to a startup - it can't afford to pay you your value and yet entirely depends on your output. The startup literally can't exist without you.

That depends though on the current value of the start up, which could very well be close to zero. Say you could be paid $100 p/h at some other company, but instead your start up is paying you $5 p/h because that is all it can currently afford. Say you can save yourself a weeks work by going with one hosting option that is twice as expensive but the total additional cost would allow you to work for $5 p/h for an addit…

1:1X dyno on Heroku is free, with a postgres server, and a free redis instance.

So even at $5/hr I can't justify doing this work myself at this point, since I can get the infrastructure for my minimum viable product going for free. I can and should spend my time focusing on developing the features.

Re: How 'DevOps' Is Killing The Developer

#216

Post by itamarhaber »

Aqueous wrote: post #215
jiggy2011 wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That depends though on the current value of the start up, which could very well be close to zero. Say you could be paid $100 p/h at some other company, but instead your start up is paying you $5 p/h because that is all it can currently afford. Say you can save yourself a weeks work by going with one hosting option that is twice as expensive but the total additional cost would allow you to work for $5 p/h for an addit…

1:1X dyno on Heroku is free, with a postgres server, and a free redis instance. So even at $5/hr I can't justify doing this work myself at this point, since I can get the infrastructure for my minimum viable product going for free. I can and should spend my time focusing on developing the features.

+1 :)

Re: How 'DevOps' Is Killing The Developer

#217

Post by dllthomas »

dvanduzer wrote: post #202
dllthomas wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love Brazil , I'm just not tracking how all of that fits into the above.

The article is about how DevOps is killing the role of the Developer by making the Developer be a SysAdmin. Chuck points out that abstracting the Developer's work too far away from the system in question means the Developer doesn't really understand the system as a whole. Jeff refers to "purely development roles" and other "pure" roles that aren't necessarily natural boundaries. The example of VHDL is not about hardw…

I've read this a few times and it still doesn't really have any bearing on the aside I was making, which was that something was presented as a hypothetical (Imagine ...) that is the overwhelmingly typical case, and in some measure that amused and confused me.

Re: How 'DevOps' Is Killing The Developer

#218

Post by dvanduzer »

dllthomas wrote: post #217
dvanduzer wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article is about how DevOps is killing the role of the Developer by making the Developer be a SysAdmin. Chuck points out that abstracting the Developer's work too far away from the system in question means the Developer doesn't really understand the system as a whole. Jeff refers to "purely development roles" and other "pure" roles that aren't necessarily natural boundaries. The example of VHDL is not about hardw…

I've read this a few times and it still doesn't really have any bearing on the aside I was making, which was that something was presented as a hypothetical (Imagine ...) that is the overwhelmingly typical case, and in some measure that amused and confused me.

Well, it helped that I'd been discussing the topic out of band not that long prior to the original comments...

The initial detail was that VHDL, unlike "software" languages, has very different consequences. Can you imagine a language where (1 / 0) wasn't defined away as a DIVERR, but otherwise managed to remain mostly self-consistent? Where something can be logically / syntactically coherent, but not physically possible?

And if that example didn't hit home for you, so it goes, but there was plenty of detail unrelated to the specific example that I thought was more important / interesting to discuss. :shrug:

Re: How 'DevOps' Is Killing The Developer

#219

Post by area51org »

copergi wrote: post #214
area51org wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm just not that cynical. We're all tempted to grow cynical after a number of years in this business, but you don't have to let it color your whole world. :-) Yes, we had automation in the '90s — I wrote quite a bit of it myself! — but the landscape has drastically improved. For one thing, the industry is now embracing it, and with the embrace, a name. The name is not being "sold" in any way that I can see — no one…

It has nothing to do with cynicism. This is literally taking an existing industry, and slapping a new name on it to sell products, consulting, etc. Go look at any of the current product's websites. Which ones demonstrate an understanding that automation is as old as computers? Cause they certainly all look to me like they want to give the impression that they invented the concept, so you should buy their broken pile…

The IT operations industry is not dying. Automation is old, but this isn't being billed as "new." What's new is 1) it being widespread, which despite your contention, has not been the case, and 2) automation via open source frameworks and tools, of which there has previously been a dearth.

I have no idea why you think Chef and Puppet are broken piles of ruby scripts, but for the record, they're free. Also, in neither case is anyone implying or saying that they invented automation. Having a nice framework to use is a definite improvement, though.

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