[HN Gopher] Make Boring Plans
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       Make Boring Plans
        
       Author : kelseyhightower
       Score  : 66 points
       Date   : 2021-01-24 17:56 UTC (5 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (skamille.medium.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (skamille.medium.com)
        
       | jldugger wrote:
       | What developers think when they hear 'aggressive timeline':
       | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y8OnoxKotPQ
       | 
       | What managers think: https://youtu.be/-TKjwblp1XI?t=1373
       | 
       | Point being, nobody gets a documentary about themselves made for
       | delivering against a boring deadline.
        
       | filereaper wrote:
       | Boring doesn't work if the solution you've picked has flaws that
       | the new technology addresses out-of-the-box.
       | 
       | You'll constantly get into arguments about why we're not
       | deploying the new upcoming thing that obviously fixes the issue.
       | 
       | At some point you'll need to switch over anyways, its better to
       | get production battle experience by trying the new tech early and
       | rolling it out where it makes sense.
       | 
       | It avoids internal factions and the "shadow infrastructure" that
       | was mentioned.
        
         | xyzzy123 wrote:
         | I read your comment as "boring is hard if your existing
         | platform is on fire" and I totally agree with that.
         | 
         | The advice is that you take the new tech and do a boring thing
         | with it first, like deploy or build something non-critical and
         | gain the production experience that way.
         | 
         | The least interesting thing to do would still be to stabilise
         | $old while carefully getting $new ready.
        
           | npunt wrote:
           | Yep, in hardware this is picking a new material to work with,
           | try it out in some smaller part that's easier to work and
           | isn't critical, and then see its failure rate in the wild.
           | Get used to using it before you bet on it.
        
         | tobr wrote:
         | > Boring doesn't work if the solution you've picked has flaws
         | that the new technology addresses out-of-the-box.
         | 
         | Problem is, the old thing has known benefits and known flaws,
         | while the new thing has known benefits but unknown flaws.
        
           | zdw wrote:
           | This happens to be one outsized point of the earlier "Choose
           | Boring Technology" piece that is linked:
           | https://mcfunley.com/choose-boring-technology
        
       | loceng wrote:
       | Creating a buffer for the unexpected allows for pleasant surprise
       | - or possibly magic.
        
         | xwdv wrote:
         | Also known as lowering your expectations.
        
           | mandelbrotwurst wrote:
           | That's one way of looking at it. It could also be described
           | as being realistic - there are always "unknown unknowns" and
           | all else equal, no matter how motivated and capable your
           | team, estimates that consider this will be more accurate than
           | those that do not.
        
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       (page generated 2021-01-24 23:00 UTC)