I spend a lot of time talking about the need for automation within your databases, especially in support of development, deployment, and through process management. It’s because I learned the hard way just how important this stuff is. It took a pretty strong developer (in the sense of abilities, he didn’t beat me up) to convince me that I was doing database development the wrong way. However, once he made me see the light, I was like one of the Blues Brothers, on a mission.
However, I think this is one of the hardest parts to get people to understand. If you have a mostly, or completely, manual deployment process, you’re experiencing pain from the inefficiencies that causes. However, it’s a pain that’s just embedded into the organization so much, that you either don’t notice it any more, or you don’t believe that the pain can go away. It really can. But, don’t listen to me.
Here’s an excellent discussion about how a company went from deploying once every 4-6 weeks to 95 times a day. If you don’t think that radically reduces pain within the organization, let alone make them more agile in support of the business… well, you’re wrong.
But hey, that’s just me and one other organization… well, and these guys who are changing their deployments from a cycle of months to a cycle of days. As he says in the video, they’re moving at speed, they’re delivering software quickly for the business, and that’s what it’s all about.
Oh yeah, and these guys, who are talking about the time and money they’re saving because of their deployment automation.
In short, this is a thing that organization are doing, and you can as well.
Your manual processes are taking time, causing outages and preventing you from moving quickly in support of your business. You absolutely need to get on the Data Lifecycle Management/Application Lifecycle Management/DevOps band wagon. We’re changing how we develop and deploy databases and software in order to move with the business. Come on in, the water is fine.
Oh, and if you really do want to dive into DLM, I’m working on a new book that we’re delivering using an agile process. You can check it out here.
Grant, should we expect to see daily releases/updates to the book, or does that only work for software?;-) Looking forward to the final product.
Daily? That would entail me working on it daily. We’re putting them out WAY faster than our editor wants to. It’s an experiment.