Archive of UserLand's first discussion group, started October 5, 1998.

Never demo on a development server

Author:Dave Winer
Posted:5/21/1999; 8:27:27 AM
Topic:Never demo on a development server
Msg #:6538
Prev/Next:6537 / 6539

Yesterday I violated one of my own rules for demoing. "Learn what makes your software crash, and avoid doing those things! Run through the demonstration over and over, each time you get a new version from development. If the new version doesn't demo without crashing, use an older, more reliable version instead."

Well, when I was demoing the editorial system yesterday I was using the live server. While I was doing that, one of the UserLand engineers was working on a new feature and there was breakage. The system didn't crash, but there was no way to edit an article! This was the key feature!! Ohhhhhhh. One more time. Relearn the lesson.

Of course the whole thing was a disaster. With my key feature disabled, no amount of handwaving could save the demo. And the server was miles away. I couldn't even contemplate trying to do a quick workaround.

So in the age of HTML-networked user interfaces, the lesson needs to be restated slightly.

Never demo on a development server.

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