Fabric-based computing puts IT operations jobs at risk

Those working in IT operations tend to see themselves as "heroes" because they keep enterprise networks and applications going by tackling day-to-day problems, said Gartner Research Vice President Cameron Haight in his keynote address at the Gartner IT Infrastructure & Operations Summit here. However, those in IT operations continually battle with those on the development side of the house, whom they think of as "the ones creating all the fires they have to put out."

The more painful reality is that IT operations can be seen as "hostage takers," said Haight, because they will push off changes they're asked to consider, redirecting tasks to committees with lengthy lists where new ideas are simply added to the bottom. Thus the term "deployment-prevention committee," said Haight.

But the old DevOps battles between development and operations need to come to an end through creation of more small teams, says Haight. "Small teams are agile teams," he said, noting operations has to work with development to shorten release cycles and lower costs.

"The infrastructure is now software," Haight pointed out. "We're using configuration metadata to match the velocity of our infrastructure customers." This means configuration data should be treated carefully, like any other kind of important code, and perhaps stored in repositories.

"And get rid of the dogma," Haight told his audience of hundreds of IT operations managers attending the event to hear Gartner analysis related to new technologies. "Have that sign say, 'We're open. We're open to new ideas.'"

Some of the newer ideas, such as fabric-based computing for storage, servers and networking, usher in the distinct possibility that no longer will the same number of operations and administrative staff be needed to keep an enterprise network going. That's because fabric-based computing works to increase automation of functions, relying less on manual changes.