Day Two DevOps D2DO313: Operations is a Reconciliation Loop (Sponsored)
Sep 16, 2026
Paul Delory, Gartner research vice president and former virtualization engineer, explores operations as a reconciliation loop. Topics include continuous operations, GitOps, immutable infrastructure, and managing everything from servers to network devices. He also examines how AI agents need deterministic guardrails, policy as code, and safer Terraform and Ansible workflows, plus the rise of platform engineering and Kubernetes.
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GitOps Cannot Cover Every Operational System
- GitOps creates a closed-loop state machine, but operations also includes desktops, network switches, and factory-floor equipment.
- These systems require reconciliation even when they cannot fit neatly into Git-based workflows.
Operations Is The Reconciler Box
- Paul Delory applies continuous delivery to a digital twin, then reconciles the physical device against its desired state.
- He describes an entire infrastructure department as the small “reconciler pattern” box on cloud-native diagrams.
Immutable Infrastructure Has Hard Limits
- Reconciliation requires defining good, testing for it, and changing bad state into good state.
- Immutable infrastructure works well where systems can be rebuilt, but desktops, databases, and domain controllers often demand careful mutation.