Overcoming IT Complexity—My Latest O’Reilly Book
The complexity of modern IT systems can impact your application’s quality and security.
It’s that simple.
Business pressures have caused IT organizations to focus on creating new applications as well as adding new features and capabilities to existing applications in order to meet the increasingly competitive demands. The result is insufficient time to work on managing, operating, and maintaining existing applications and capabilities. Ignoring ongoing issues increases technical debt, which in turn increases the complexity of modern systems. Increased system complexity makes adding new features and capabilities harder, and the vicious circle continues.
Addressing the IT complexity dilemma is essential, but it is not easy. And this is the inspiration behind my latest O’Reilly Media book, Overcoming IT Complexity.
In this book, I begin by examining this IT complexity dilemma and how it impacts you, your applications, and your organization. Then I talk about identifying and measuring complexity in your organization today. How can you measure complexity without introducing complex measurement systems? Since you can’t improve a system until you can measure it, this ability is critical to managing IT complexity.
Next, I examine solutions for reducing IT complexity and the cognitive load it induces. I discuss the role of adaptive architectures in modernizing applications, considering both how they can reduce complexity and the risk of increased complexity they may carry.
I then explore how knowledge management techniques can assist in reducing cognitive load and IT complexity, and how your strategy for investing in your infrastructure impacts complexity.
Finally, I provide some advice on how to begin conversations within your organization about the impact of IT complexity on your company, your products, and your applications.
My intent with this book is to help you understand how IT complexity negatively impacts you, your company, and your applications, and how you can break the cycle to manage its effects effectively.
This book is available for sale now on Amazon.com. The Kindle edition is available immediately; the print version is available for pre-order.
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