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The beginning of the end: pointing to staging

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Summary

In many companies today, engineers use "pointing to staging" in order to test their applications against a production-like environment and avoid "works on my machine" bugs. However, this is not a sustainable solution, as when multiple engineers start pointing to staging they can step on each other's toes and break the staging environment. For a more sustainable solution, companies can give engineers virtual machines in the cloud, use off-the-shelf solutions supporting some types of infra, or truly replicate production-like environments. This is beneficial as it eliminates "works on my machine" bugs and allows engineers to keep running their tools locally. Additionally, remote production-like environments can also be used for end-to-end and load tests, manual tests, and GitOps integrations.

Q&As

What is the inevitable result of a software's commercial success?
The inevitable result of a software's commercial success is that it will have to scale to process more transactions or hire more engineers to build ancillary features.

What is the point of no return when running complex software on localhost is no longer possible?
The point of no return when running complex software on localhost is no longer possible is when engineers create huge Google Docs or Markdown files with complex instructions for running the software reliably and run into all sorts of bugs they can only catch once the software gets deployed to staging.

What are the three ways to replace localhost?
The three ways to replace localhost are giving engineers big virtual machines, using off-the-shelf solutions supporting some types of infra, or truly replicating production-like environments.

What is the best way to effectively kill localhost and live to tell the story?
The best way to effectively kill localhost and live to tell the story is to provide a production-like staging for each engineer in the company’s cloud.

What are other uses for production-like remote environments?
Other uses for production-like remote environments include using them as targets for end-to-end and load tests, collaborating with others and doing manual tests, and integrating them into GitHub actions to get a new environment and preview link for every pull request.

AI Comments

👍 This is an incredibly detailed and informative article about how to effectively kill localhost and live to tell the story. It provides great insight into the pros and cons of different solutions, making it easier for developers to choose the right one.

👎 This article is too long and could be shortened significantly. It could also include more visuals to help illustrate some of the more complex concepts.

AI Discussion

Me: It's about the implications of moving from localhost to cloud environments for software development. It talks about how localhost is the inevitable victim of commercial success, and how engineers need to break monoliths into microservices in order to scale. It also covers the pros and cons of different cloud solutions, like giving engineers big virtual machines, using off-the-shelf solutions, and truly replicating production-like environments.

Friend: That's really interesting. It sounds like it could be a real challenge for companies to transition from localhost to a cloud-based environment.

Me: Absolutely. The article goes into detail about why the "pointing to staging" approach isn't ideal, because it can lead to bugs and conflicts among developers when too many people are using the same staging environment. It also talks about the pros and cons of different cloud solutions, like giving engineers big virtual machines, using off-the-shelf solutions, and truly replicating production-like environments. In the end, it's clear that the best option is to provide a production-like staging for each engineer in the company's cloud.

Action items

Research and evaluate solutions for creating production-like remote environments.
Create a plan for transitioning from localhost to a production-like environment.
Implement a system for sharing production-like environments with other team members for collaboration and testing.

Technical terms

Localhost: A localhost is a computer or server on a network that is used to access local resources. It is typically used to test software or web applications before they are deployed to a live environment.
PMF: PMF stands for Product-Market Fit. It is a measure of how well a product meets the needs of a particular market.
Monolith: A monolith is a large, single-tiered software application that contains all the code and data necessary to run the application.
Microservices: Microservices are a type of software architecture that breaks down a large application into smaller, independent services. Each service is responsible for a specific task and can be deployed and managed independently.
Lambdas: Lambdas are a type of serverless computing service that allows users to run code without having to manage any underlying infrastructure.
EKS: EKS stands for Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service. It is a managed service that makes it easy to deploy, manage, and scale containerized applications using Kubernetes.
Minikube: Minikube is a tool that makes it easy to run Kubernetes locally. It runs a single-node Kubernetes cluster inside a virtual machine on your computer.
S3 Buckets: S3 Buckets are a type of cloud storage offered by Amazon Web Services. They are used to store and retrieve data from the cloud.
SQS Queues: SQS Queues are a type of message queue offered by Amazon Web Services. They are used to store and process messages between applications.
Terraform Workspaces: Terraform Workspaces are a feature of Terraform, a tool for managing infrastructure as code. They allow users to create multiple isolated workspaces within a single Terraform configuration.
Layerform: Layerform is a tool for managing cloud infrastructure. It allows users to quickly spin up isolated workspaces on top of a shared cloud infrastructure.