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This isn't true at all, though. Many organizations, especially smaller ones, seem to have taken it this way. Everyone is responsible for everything. But that wa

This isn't true at all, though. Many organizations, especially smaller ones, seem to have taken it this way. Everyone is responsible for everything. But that wasn't the DevOps thesis. The idea was for eliminating silos in the sense that dev and ops would talk to each other continuously throughout the software lifecycle, with developers understanding operational challenges and creating software that didn't just meet functional requirements, but was easier and faster to deploy, change, rollback, and troubleshoot. Ops would understand the pressures of development and create automation systems catered to the specifics of their software stack. It wasn't supposed to mean no more division of labor. Division of labor is a key innovation in human society that enables civilizations to exist. It was supposed to mean the teams in different categories of labor interact throughout and consider each other's needs, and not throw shit at each other over a wall and only ever interact through a ticketing system.

twic 5y ago
I believe that it was supposed to mean no more division of labour, and i believe that based on conversations with people who were early adopters of it ten years ago. This waffly "breaking down the silos" stuff is a later redefinition, i believe reacting to the fact that the original meaning was extremely unpalatable to existing organisations, with existing employees and hierarchies who would be severely disrupted by it.
- darkwater 5y ago
  But I still challenge the fact that it can really work well for normal performers and not only top notch developers. Taking care of all the phases of a software lifecycle is not an easy task, it has a big enough cognitive load. I understand that this is supposed to be done in (small) teams, but within those teams you still need some degree of separation of labour, you cannot have everybody having wide and deep knowledge of everything software. Well, you can do it, if you are Google and the like and set the bar for hiring really, really high. But that doesn't apply to most organizations and engineers. Not all of us are wicked smart.
- vajrabum 5y ago
  Here's a link to an interview with Patrick Debois who is one of the two guys who came up with the concept of DevOps. https://blogs.oracle.com/javamagazine/how-dev-versus-ops-became-devops https://blogs.oracle.com/javamagazine/how-dev-versus-ops-bec... From Patrick Debois in the interview "Later, I saw a talk by Jean-Paul Sergent about developer (Dev) teams and operations (Ops) teams working together." So no, breaking down the silos was baked in from the beginning.
robertlagrant 5y ago
You're missing the fact that a team can have different specialisms. It doesn't have to be each individual can do everything.

twic 5y ago

I believe that it was supposed to mean no more division of labour, and i believe that based on conversations with people who were early adopters of it ten years ago. This waffly "breaking down the silos" stuff is a later redefinition, i believe reacting to the fact that the original meaning was extremely unpalatable to existing organisations, with existing employees and hierarchies who would be severely disrupted by it.

darkwater 5y ago
But I still challenge the fact that it can really work well for normal performers and not only top notch developers. Taking care of all the phases of a software lifecycle is not an easy task, it has a big enough cognitive load. I understand that this is supposed to be done in (small) teams, but within those teams you still need some degree of separation of labour, you cannot have everybody having wide and deep knowledge of everything software. Well, you can do it, if you are Google and the like and set the bar for hiring really, really high. But that doesn't apply to most organizations and engineers. Not all of us are wicked smart.
vajrabum 5y ago
Here's a link to an interview with Patrick Debois who is one of the two guys who came up with the concept of DevOps. https://blogs.oracle.com/javamagazine/how-dev-versus-ops-became-devops https://blogs.oracle.com/javamagazine/how-dev-versus-ops-bec... From Patrick Debois in the interview "Later, I saw a talk by Jean-Paul Sergent about developer (Dev) teams and operations (Ops) teams working together." So no, breaking down the silos was baked in from the beginning.

robertlagrant 5y ago

You're missing the fact that a team can have different specialisms. It doesn't have to be each individual can do everything.