Seth Roby

UCEN - SB Harbor Room
Wed, Jul 17 11:00am - 11:45am

Spend a decade running a Ruby on Rails site for all prospective academics coming into the University of California and you're bound to mess up sometimes. In this talk we'll go over a few places where we fell down, what we learned from it, and how we incorporate our mistakes into our process.

We'll talk about an architecture mistake that haunts us to this day. We'll look at the deploy that broke our email system and the recovery that sent out thousands of extra emails. We'll examine the decision that slowed our development and almost splintered our team.

But we'll center on how you accept mistakes as an inevitable feature, and build a team that will withstand it all. We'll weigh technology problems and people problems, talk about the different approaches you need to tackle each, and how to build the muscles needed to be ready when they come, because they will. And with a little preparation, you'll be able to sail through adversity and launch again tomorrow.

Previous Knowledge
No prior experience is necessary; the discussion will feature technical examples but will not require a deep understanding of them. If you're part of a team that's in it for the long haul, come and talk about how to build a culture that welcomes experimentation.

Software Installation Expectation
None

Session Skill Level
Intermediate

Session Track
Innovating IT Solutions