Alex Kaserbacher
@alexksbr.bsky.social
Consultant and Trainer for Software Architecture at https://www.embarc.de/
I write regularly at https://www.shapingshifts.com/
I write regularly at https://www.shapingshifts.com/
Platform teams shouldn't predict the future but observe the present.
When multiple teams build similar solutions, commoditize the pattern. Make it the default, keep escape hatches.
Good ideas spread upwards through platforms, not downwards through rules and mandates.
When multiple teams build similar solutions, commoditize the pattern. Make it the default, keep escape hatches.
Good ideas spread upwards through platforms, not downwards through rules and mandates.
November 4, 2025 at 3:15 PM
Platform teams shouldn't predict the future but observe the present.
When multiple teams build similar solutions, commoditize the pattern. Make it the default, keep escape hatches.
Good ideas spread upwards through platforms, not downwards through rules and mandates.
When multiple teams build similar solutions, commoditize the pattern. Make it the default, keep escape hatches.
Good ideas spread upwards through platforms, not downwards through rules and mandates.
Teams anchored to solutions defend them even when their context changes. Teams anchored to problems evolve.
'We manage Jenkins' (rigidity)
'We enable continuous delivery' (adaptability)
When your identity is the solution, you protect it. When it's the problem, you solve it.
'We manage Jenkins' (rigidity)
'We enable continuous delivery' (adaptability)
When your identity is the solution, you protect it. When it's the problem, you solve it.
November 2, 2025 at 12:12 PM
Teams anchored to solutions defend them even when their context changes. Teams anchored to problems evolve.
'We manage Jenkins' (rigidity)
'We enable continuous delivery' (adaptability)
When your identity is the solution, you protect it. When it's the problem, you solve it.
'We manage Jenkins' (rigidity)
'We enable continuous delivery' (adaptability)
When your identity is the solution, you protect it. When it's the problem, you solve it.
Internal platforms aren't infrastructure tools. They're organizational memory. Each capability encodes a problem multiple teams already solved. Platform teams aren't only service providers, but curators of collective learning.
November 1, 2025 at 11:50 AM
Internal platforms aren't infrastructure tools. They're organizational memory. Each capability encodes a problem multiple teams already solved. Platform teams aren't only service providers, but curators of collective learning.
Reposted by Alex Kaserbacher
My latest YouTube short for the Modern Software Engineering channel, "Does Your Software Development Prioritize Business?": www.youtube.com/watch?v=cRut...
Does Your Software Development Prioritize Business? #agile
YouTube video by Modern Software Engineering
www.youtube.com
July 8, 2025 at 8:50 AM
My latest YouTube short for the Modern Software Engineering channel, "Does Your Software Development Prioritize Business?": www.youtube.com/watch?v=cRut...
Don't focus on engineering prompts, focus on engineering context instead.
"[...] as applications grow more complex, it’s becoming clear that providing complete and structured context to the AI is far more important than any magic wording.
blog.langchain.com/the-rise-of-...
"[...] as applications grow more complex, it’s becoming clear that providing complete and structured context to the AI is far more important than any magic wording.
blog.langchain.com/the-rise-of-...
The rise of "context engineering"
Header image from Dex Horthy on Twitter. Context engineering is building dynamic systems to provide the right information and tools in the right format such that the LLM can plausibly accomplish the…
blog.langchain.com
July 8, 2025 at 7:27 AM
Don't focus on engineering prompts, focus on engineering context instead.
"[...] as applications grow more complex, it’s becoming clear that providing complete and structured context to the AI is far more important than any magic wording.
blog.langchain.com/the-rise-of-...
"[...] as applications grow more complex, it’s becoming clear that providing complete and structured context to the AI is far more important than any magic wording.
blog.langchain.com/the-rise-of-...
I remember Adrian Colyer publishing a post about David Parnas’s work in the context of modern microservice architectures a few years ago. Unfortunately, his blog is no longer online, but thanks to the Wayback Machine, I was able to dig it up.
web.archive.org/web/20240424...
web.archive.org/web/20240424...
Information distribution aspects of design methodology | the morning paper
Information distribution aspects of design methodology Parnas, 1971
web.archive.org
July 1, 2025 at 7:27 AM
I remember Adrian Colyer publishing a post about David Parnas’s work in the context of modern microservice architectures a few years ago. Unfortunately, his blog is no longer online, but thanks to the Wayback Machine, I was able to dig it up.
web.archive.org/web/20240424...
web.archive.org/web/20240424...
Seriously? How awesome is this? Rick Rubin, the legendary producer of artists like Neil Young, U2, Metallica, Adele, System of a Down (and many more), wrote a book with Anthropic on Vibe Coding!
June 26, 2025 at 7:21 AM
Seriously? How awesome is this? Rick Rubin, the legendary producer of artists like Neil Young, U2, Metallica, Adele, System of a Down (and many more), wrote a book with Anthropic on Vibe Coding!
@hollycummins.com 's discussion in the Engineering Culture podcast about developer productivity reminds me a lot of Cal Newport's notion of "seudo productivity" vs "slow productivity" in his newest book (buff.ly/VBBEZBi)
Btw, give the podcast episode a listen, it's great:
Btw, give the podcast episode a listen, it's great:
Productivity Through Play: Why Messing Around Makes Better Software Engineers
In this podcast, Shane Hastie, Lead Editor for Culture & Methods, spoke to Holly Cummins about productivity in creative knowledge work like software engineering. She talks about how "messing around…
www.infoq.com
June 25, 2025 at 7:21 AM
@hollycummins.com 's discussion in the Engineering Culture podcast about developer productivity reminds me a lot of Cal Newport's notion of "seudo productivity" vs "slow productivity" in his newest book (buff.ly/VBBEZBi)
Btw, give the podcast episode a listen, it's great:
Btw, give the podcast episode a listen, it's great:
This is actually one of the best-structured arguments for using feature flags that I've seen in a long time: buff.ly/dgOdKlV
Separate deployments (continuously delivering code to production) from releases (switching code "live" for users).
Separate deployments (continuously delivering code to production) from releases (switching code "live" for users).
Deploys Are The ✨WRONG✨ Way To Change User Experience
This piece was first published on the honeycomb.io blog on 2023-03-08. …. I’m no stranger to ranting about deploys. But there’s one thing I haven’t sufficiently ranted about…
charity.wtf
June 23, 2025 at 7:21 AM
This is actually one of the best-structured arguments for using feature flags that I've seen in a long time: buff.ly/dgOdKlV
Separate deployments (continuously delivering code to production) from releases (switching code "live" for users).
Separate deployments (continuously delivering code to production) from releases (switching code "live" for users).
Great advice and best practices for AI-assisted coding by @djpardis.com djpardis.com/blog/2025/06...
Vibe coding a data room app
Building an intuitive data room app to streamline investor access to startup information
djpardis.com
June 21, 2025 at 11:21 AM
Great advice and best practices for AI-assisted coding by @djpardis.com djpardis.com/blog/2025/06...
I listened to @gergely.pragmaticengineer.com interview with GitHub's CEO @ashtom.bsky.social today. What amazes me is that GitHub is mostly still a monolithic Ruby on Rails application and that it works so reliably at that scale.
June 20, 2025 at 6:02 PM
I listened to @gergely.pragmaticengineer.com interview with GitHub's CEO @ashtom.bsky.social today. What amazes me is that GitHub is mostly still a monolithic Ruby on Rails application and that it works so reliably at that scale.
While I'm bullish about LLMs and use them widely myself, this issue is something I've been worried about for a long time. Now, some empirical evidence seems to be emerging about this.
arxiv.org/pdf/2506.08872
arxiv.org/pdf/2506.08872
June 20, 2025 at 7:52 AM
While I'm bullish about LLMs and use them widely myself, this issue is something I've been worried about for a long time. Now, some empirical evidence seems to be emerging about this.
arxiv.org/pdf/2506.08872
arxiv.org/pdf/2506.08872
Synchronous communication in distributed systems is a leaky abstraction. My new article shows how asynchronous design helps in building resilient, decoupled systems. Discover more: www.shapingshifts.com/p/network-co... #SoftwareArchitecture #DistributedSystems
Network Communication And Leaky Abstractions
Synchronous communication in distributed systems is a leaky abstraction. Discover how asynchronous messaging builds resilient systems that decouple services from unpredictable network failures.
www.shapingshifts.com
February 18, 2025 at 1:29 PM
Synchronous communication in distributed systems is a leaky abstraction. My new article shows how asynchronous design helps in building resilient, decoupled systems. Discover more: www.shapingshifts.com/p/network-co... #SoftwareArchitecture #DistributedSystems
I just published a new article on the dynamics between platform and application teams. Discover how to build platform teams which enable teams instead of becoming a bottleneck. Read the full article here: www.shapingshifts.com/p/designing-...
Designing Effective Cross-Team Dynamics For Platform Teams
Discover how to transform platform teams from bottlenecks into powerful enablers.
www.shapingshifts.com
January 26, 2025 at 2:47 PM
I just published a new article on the dynamics between platform and application teams. Discover how to build platform teams which enable teams instead of becoming a bottleneck. Read the full article here: www.shapingshifts.com/p/designing-...
Reposted by Alex Kaserbacher
UnConference "Software-Entwicklung und Menschen - Team-Topologies, sozio-technische Systeme, Conway's Law und mehr"
Montag 2024-02-26 17:30
Kostenlos!
Registrierung: zoom.us/meeting/regi...
Montag 2024-02-26 17:30
Kostenlos!
Registrierung: zoom.us/meeting/regi...
Meeting Registration - Zoom
Team-Topologies, sozio-technische Systeme, Conway's Law und mehr
Menschen entwickeln Software für Menschen - Zeit, dieses Thema und seinen Einfluss auf unsere tägliche Arbeit zu diskutieren. In einer UnConference gibt es keine Vorträge oder Folien, sondern wir diskutieren die Themen, die ihr einbringt und die Euch interessieren! Welche Erfahrungen habt ihr gemacht? Welche Lösungen haben für euch funktioniert? Oder wo sucht ihr noch Lösungen? Wir freuen uns darauf, diese Themen und mehr mit euch zu diskutieren!
Die Teilnehme ist kostenlos.
zoom.us
February 7, 2024 at 7:58 AM
UnConference "Software-Entwicklung und Menschen - Team-Topologies, sozio-technische Systeme, Conway's Law und mehr"
Montag 2024-02-26 17:30
Kostenlos!
Registrierung: zoom.us/meeting/regi...
Montag 2024-02-26 17:30
Kostenlos!
Registrierung: zoom.us/meeting/regi...
Danke an alle, die beim Vortrag von Stefan Toth und mir auf der @OOP Konferenz dabei waren. Wir haben über Herausforderungen im Microservices-Umfeld gesprochen und diskutiert, wie evolutionäre Architektur dabei hilft. 👉 Folien-Download: www.embarc.de/microservice... #oop2024 #OOPMuc
January 31, 2024 at 2:56 PM
Danke an alle, die beim Vortrag von Stefan Toth und mir auf der @OOP Konferenz dabei waren. Wir haben über Herausforderungen im Microservices-Umfeld gesprochen und diskutiert, wie evolutionäre Architektur dabei hilft. 👉 Folien-Download: www.embarc.de/microservice... #oop2024 #OOPMuc
Heyheyhey, let's try this Bluesky thing
November 22, 2023 at 6:31 AM
Heyheyhey, let's try this Bluesky thing