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When will people realize that slapping yet another startup's tech stack onto yours isn't going to magically fix anything and in fact just adds complexity and po
by mxskelly 6y ago
When will people realize that slapping yet another startup's tech stack onto yours isn't going to magically fix anything and in fact just adds complexity and points of failure.
I've always done my best to err on the side of "let's try not to add yet another level of complexity" and this strategy has yet to fail me.
- hobs 6y agoSolarWinds isn't another startup, its been around for over 20 years, I have used their software half a decade ago and it did the job just fine. Age doesn't imply its good either, but blaming startups isn't the problem here.
- onetimemanytime 6y ago>>I have used their software half a decade ago and it did the job just fine. Russia agrees.
- falcolas 6y agoWhen the financial costs of exposing yourself to such risks outweigh the time saved. So, never. At least, not in our current software development industry.
- nrmitchi 6y agoSolarWinds is a 21-year-old publicly-traded company. They're not really "yet another startup". I also don't think that the departments of the US Government are all going around all willy-nilly dropping tools from "yet another startup" into their core infrastructure. While your overall point may be valid, it's tough to come to the conclusion that it is applicable here.
- mcguire 6y agoWilly-nilly dropping tools into core infrastructure is largely how government IT works. Corporate IT, too, from what I've seen.
- notabee 6y agoThat's very true, In my limited experience, they are tools sold to non-technical leadership that are either thrown to technical staff to deal with and implement or require letting yet another vendor have network access to manage. It adds up to a hot mess.
- mcguire 6y agoMy favorite comment from a (authentication system) vendor, during a meeting where we were trying to figure out why users were having trouble logging into an internal app: "Do I have a charge code for this?"
- reaperducer 6y agoSolarWinds is a 21-year-old publicly-traded company. They're not really "yet another startup". Today it is. If we knew when SolarWinds was added to the government systems, his comment might stand.
- mgreenleaf 6y agoAnd yesterday's startup is tomorrow's billion dollar company, often with nothing changed except the number of customers.
- rplnt 6y agoStartup or not, government contracts require certain certifications.
- falcolas 6y agoI believe that you have mis-read their comment - they aren't saying Solar Winds is "yet another startup", they're saying that SolarWinds is incorporating 3rd party technology (the so-called supply chain attack on their build) without vetting it. And, if we're being honest, those technologies probably are based off startup tech; SolarWinds purchases and incorporates startup companies (such as Vivid Cortex recently).
- nrmitchi 6y agoThat is entirely possible.
- wglb 6y agoNo longer publicly traded: https://www.solarwinds.com/company/press-releases/solarwinds-completes-takeprivate-acquisition-by-silver-lake-and-thoma-bravo#:~:text=%E2%80%9CAs%20a%20private%20company%2C%20we,its%20next%20phase%20of%20growth.%22 https://www.solarwinds.com/company/press-releases/solarwinds...
- Karunamon 6y agoI agree with the point, but that's not what happened here. SolarWinds Orion isn't some VC-backed panacea sold by SV hucksters to cure all your infrastructure's ills, it's a monitoring stack like Zenoss or Zabbix or (...) and is correctly marketed as such.