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Deploy on Fridays

Derek Hammer on October 05, 2019

Developers should aim to deploy on Fridays. Not as some Platonic ideal that only big companies (or small companies) can reach, but as an active pro...
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Derek Hammer

If I had joined your team, I'd have been advocating for Friday deploys from the beginning for all of the reasons I stated in the post. The team would be better off if the policy to deploy on Fridays was eliminated.

"data, platform, other factors" are always present whether you deploy or not. They don't go away or become less meaningful because the changeset in production is from Thursday and not Friday.

 
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Jason C. McDonald • Edited

...because it was the day before?

The problem with Friday deploys is found in the lack of people to respond to problems with said deployment until Monday, leaving prod dangling in an uncertain state for two days. That's not a good idea.

And yes, I saw your article talked about setting things up so that never happens, but I'd sadly have to call all of that fairly empty optimism. No matter how careful you are, how meticulous your processes, how diligent your team, software is weird. Stuff blows up for the strangest reasons, many of them having absolutely zilch to do with flaws in team workflow.

Deploying on Friday is playing Russian roulette with prod. It's irresponsible at best.

 
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Derek Hammer

What makes you think that friday deploys cause this?