Commentary

Nate’s take on AI in production, reliability metrics, and how engineering teams work.

Design incident channels, bot actions, evidence links, and a fallback path that still works when the chat system is unavailable.

March 25, 20253 min read

Compare detection, correlation, investigation, and automation using your incidents, review costs, and failure paths.

March 24, 20253 min read

Locate the delay, choose a bounded intervention, and measure recovery quality alongside elapsed time.

March 23, 20254 min read

Use language-model assistance for evidence review, draft communication, and practice, with a clear boundary around production decisions.

March 20, 20253 min read

Use models for test suggestions and change analysis while keeping artifact identity, promotion rules, and rollback checks enforceable.

March 19, 20253 min read

Understand where detection, correlation, forecasting, and language models can help, and the operational work each introduces.

March 18, 20253 min read

Separate incident coordination from mitigation authority, compare competing actions, and use a worksheet that preserves decisions and verification.

October 16, 20235 min read

Define who does the work, who decides, and who accepts risk so ownership remains useful during incidents and follow-up.

October 7, 20233 min read

Examine what people knew and could do, then assign improvements that address the conditions behind the incident.

September 30, 20233 min read

Prepare evidence, reconstruct the timeline, examine contributing conditions, and choose follow-up proportionate to the incident.

September 30, 20233 min read

Use operational state, visible defaults, and reversible transitions to evaluate complexity without discarding necessary capabilities.

September 30, 20233 min read

Translate incident findings into funded changes with an owner, a test, and evidence that the relevant failure mode became less likely or less costly.

September 29, 20233 min read