Release It!, 2nd Edition

Chapter 12Case Study: Waiting for Godot

It isn’t enough to write the code. Nothing is done until it runs in production. Sometimes the path to production is a smooth and open highway. Other times, especially with older systems, it’s a muddy track festooned with potholes, bandits, and checkpoints with border guards. This was one of the bad ones.

I turn my grainy eyes toward the clock on the wall. The hands point to 1:17 a.m. I’d swear time has stopped. It has always been 1:17. I’ve seen enough film noir that I expect a fly to crawl across the face of the clock. There is no fly. Even the flies are asleep now. On the Polycom, someone is reporting status. It’s a DBA. One of the SQL scripts didn’t work right, but he “fixed” it by running it under ...