The InfoQ Podcast

Your Software Will Fail, It is How You Recover That Matters: A Conversation with Randy Shoup

Feb 14, 2025
Guest
Randy Shoup
In a compelling conversation with Randy Shoup, Senior VP of Engineering at Thrive Market, they delve into how to create resilient software systems amidst inherent fragilities. Randy shares insights on the importance of acknowledging software's vulnerabilities and the necessity of designing for failure. They explore the dynamics between architecture and team performance, highlighting the balance between orchestration and choreography in workflows. Additionally, the discussion touches on modern security challenges and the critical role of trust in online marketplaces.
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INSIGHT

Fragile Systems

  • Critical systems are fragile due to software interactions and real-world complexities.
  • Engineers and the public often underestimate this fragility and its consequences.
ADVICE

Design for Failure

  • Design systems for resilience by considering potential failures.
  • Focus on handling failures gracefully rather than striving for an impossible perfect system.
ADVICE

Handling Errors

  • Focus on the general classes of errors, not every specific instance.
  • Design patterns to handle these classes, like retrying or showing an error message to the user.
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