47: Agent of Desertification

Here’s a snippet of the next Letters column for the FreeBSD Journal.

We’ve all seen the propaganda on configuration management. Deploy dedicated-purpose, highly tuned servers with a single command! Adjust computation clouds with a simple playbook! Seamlessly and transparently migrate from server to server! Containers! That’s fine for people starting from a green field in the last few years, but most system administrators work in environments best described as “baroque” if not “antediluvian.” I find myself with a green field only when I myself raze the earth and wait for the clover to grow. Not grass. Lawns are a climate atrocity. Unless you own sheep. Or goats, but if you own any kind of goat you won’t have a lawn for long, which demonstrates that any force for good is also an agent of desertification. Besides, who wants to wait for clover before installing a datacenter? Build in the ruins of that razed kindergarten and get on with your work.

I wonder if anyone noticed I missed last week?