A New Approach
My first experience with release engineering was almost fifteen years ago: I did a stint with Netscape’s release engineering team for a summer. I know I didn’t quite get why at the time, but I was hooked immediately.
My professional focus has been on build/release engineering ever since.
At various times, it’s been a difficult road to walk. I truly believe release engineering and configuration management to be an incredibly important part of the software development process, that when done right, can provide an incredible amount of value, from the smallest startups to the largest multinational corporations.
But “RelEng” is often the last part of the process to be designed, and the last part of the team to be filled. It’s often under-resourced, and at that point, it’s usually interrupt driven, (by software that needs shipping). It’s also difficult to change this trajectory, because releng is one of those things that is generally unseen and unheard, until they (or the infrastructure they’re responsible for) become the blocking factor to a ship-date.
 How can we approach complex and obstacle-ridden processes safely and successfully every time? |
I think there’s a better way to approach these problems.
Friends and colleagues often giggle at me when I make repeated references to aviation in the context of release engineering. Being a pilot, I can’t help but call out the similarities as I see them. But I see so many similarities because I really do feel there is an aspect to that nature of work—whether it be air traffic control, 9-1-1 dispatch, or management of the utility grid—that we, as software engineering practitioners, can learn from and apply to make shipping software more simple, transparent, and predictable.
To that end, today, I’m launching a company: Release Engineering Approaches.
We provide a full range of build/release engineering consulting services including release engineering consulting, build engineering automation & tooling, and DevOps infrastructure support.
Our approach is to integrate those “operational” lessons and practices that so many other industries have (often painfully) learned, to make shipping whatever type of software you need to ship… as simple as possible. Every time.
If consistently and simply shipping your bits are something you struggle with, give us a shout out and let’s discuss how we can help!
To new approaches!
A great day for greatness to be born. Congratulations!!
I think last year I wished you a New York “Happy Birthday to Youze”. This year, I wish a Happy Birthday to Yous.
Since you’re not just the CEO, you’re the company pilot, you should lease a plane!
Congratulations and good luck!
Thanks guys!
It’s scary and exciting all at the same time.
And yes, Ron, I think leasing a Gulfstream and getting a turbine rating is a very important use of company funds.