Sustaining through change — learning from 20 years of AEM history

Presented at Monki Gras 2018 in London

Transcript

1. Sustaining AEM
2. or…
3. or… 15 Minutes of Survival Bias
4. Hi. ! @trieloff
5. Hi. ! trieloff@adobe.com
6. —Opinions are my own
7. —Opinions are my own —Ideas aren't.
9. Not Photoshop.
10. Not Acrobat. Not InDesign. Not Flash. Not Lightroom. Not Illustrator. Not Dreamweaver. Not Premiere Pro. Not Fireworks. Not After Effects. …
11. Not Acrobat. Not InDesign. Not Flash. Not Lightroom. Not Illustrator. Not Dreamweaver. Not Premiere Pro. Not Fireworks. Not After Effects. … AEM.
13. # of web content management systems since 1991: 200,000 (low-ball estimate)
14. Top 8 CMS from https://trends.builtwith.com/cms 1. Wordpress 2. Joomla! 3. Squarespace 4. Blogger 5. Drupal 6. CPanel 7. Google Search Appliance 8. Adobe Experience Manager
15. Top 7 CMS (among top Million sites) from https://trends.builtwith.com/cms 1. Wordpress 2. Drupal 3. Blogger 4. Joomla! 5. Squarespace 6. CPanel 7. Adobe Experience Manager
16. Top 3 CMS (among top 10,000 sites) from https://trends.builtwith.com/cms 1. Wordpress 2. Drupal 3. Adobe Experience Manager
17. @trieloff's Adobe First 1st Day on employee Monki Gras Website the job #9861 2018 │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ ┌───────┬───────┬─────────────┬─────────▼────┬───────▼────────────────┬─────────────────────────▼ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │OpenWeb│ CQ2 │ CQ3 │ CQ4 │ CQ5 │ AEM │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ ──▼───────────────────────┴───────┴─▲─────┴─────────────┴──────────────┴────────────────────────┴─────────────────────────┴▶ │ 1991 1994 1997 │ 2001 2004 2007 2010 2013 2016 today │ CQ is short for communiqué AEM History
25. 9 Lessons learned from sustaining AEM.
26. Lesson 9
27. Step 1: Research ! David │ ! Tobias │ │ ! Raphael │ │ │ ! Felix │ │ │ │ ! Jean-Michel │ │ │ │ │ Alex │ │ │ │ │ │ Lars │ │ │ │ │ ││ │ │ ┌───────┬─▼───▼─▼─────────────┬────────▼▼────┬────────────────────────┬─────────────────────────┐ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │OpenWeb│ CQ2 │ CQ3 │ CQ4 │ CQ5 │ AEM │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ ──────────────▼─────▼─────┴───────┴───────┴─────────────┴──────────────┴────────────────────────┴─────────────────────────┴▶ 1991 1994 1997 2001 2004 2007 2010 2013 2016 today
28. Step 1: Research ☑ Step 2: Yak- Shave ☑ Step 3: Do your slides
29. Step 1: Research Step 2: Yak-Shave Step 3: Do your slides Step 4: Don't get side- tracked during your talk
30. Grey Beards are Sustainability Santas
31. «When you know that every mistake you make can follow you for years, you start to question your own ‹brilliant ideas› a bit harder.»
32. Lesson 8 !
33. ! Pick up your garbage.
34. «Your API surface is bigger than you think.»
35. Process and tooling can help —Collect data to find configurations no-one uses —Use better defaults for those that get used —Integration tests for API compatibility Manage technical debt —payday loans vs. collateralized debt obligations —technical debt vs. product debt
36. Treat deprecation like any other hostage situation: No sudden moves!
37. Lesson 7
38. You can't start a fire You can't start a fire without a spark — Bruce Springsteen, on integrating creative tension
39. Integrate Tension, don't Externalize it. —Monoliths vs. Modularity —Static vs. Dynamic —Scripting vs. Compiling —Configuration vs. Convention There is no universal truth except: Tension leads to innovation, consensus leads to stability.
40. Lesson 6
41. Chicken
42. Technology adoption is a game of chicken. Use standards to guarantee compatibility.
43. Lesson 5
44. Ohh, beautiful baby / I was very lonely till I met you on Sunday / My passion's never-ending and I'll love you till Tuesday — David Bowie, on the topic of JS frameworks
45. These are a few of my favorite things (to change) —Programming language: C to Java —Persistence: .any, ContentBus, Jackrabbit, Oak —Templating: ECMAScript, JSP, HTL/Sightly —Web Server: home-grown, Tomcat, home-grown again, Jetty —UI: CFC, ExtJS, Coral 3, Coral 4, …
46. Lesson 4
47. Nothing last forever, Except for architecture.
48. Geography is Destiny (and so is architecture) —frying vs. baking —author & publish —version control —extensibility & scripting —focus on users
49. Lesson 3
50. «God bless the re-inventers.» — Dave Winer, upon learning about JSON
51. «The good thing about reinventing the wheel is that you can get a round one.» — Douglas Crockford, in response
52. «Old wine in new wineskins can be fun, if you are in the wineskin business.»
53. Lesson 2
54. Avoid the rollercoaster and take the stairs
55. Stepwise Innovation Rules 1. Don't put in a hardwood floor while replacing the roof 2. Don't make the steps too large, so your users can't follow 3. Do provide accessible on-ramps or elevators
56. Lesson 1
57. Sustainable Culture
58. Follow these simple rules (there is no rulebook) —Empathy: know your users as humans, not personas —Curiosity: take on large-scale risks, but treat them as experiments —Transmission: soft stories & hard goals
59. What's the inverse of Conway's Law? Build teams around what's eternal (architecture), not what's transient (technology).
60. «Sustainability is about the future, not about the past.»
61. Lesson 0
62. «Nobody had a master plan.» Thank You!