
Ask HN: DevOps as service - marenkay
So the past weeks I&#x27;ve been working on a product for startups and companies transitioning out of the startup mode.<p>Many probably remember being in &quot;one big server&quot; mode or &quot;just bash and install mode&quot;.<p>And that&#x27;s where the product comes in: it let&#x27;s you import existing servers and transform that into a beautiful DevOps version.<p>Now roast me<p>On a serious note, for those just crafting a new startup my project can also spin up fully working infrastructure for running a modern Dev company.<p>Personally I love it because it is what I would have wanted in all the startups I founded but what do you guys think?<p>Honest opinions please.
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borplk
These kinds of products are extremely hard to get right.

You likely end up in an awkward position where big or serious companies don't
take you seriously because they have their own ways and methods and teams and
baggage and don't want someone else's magic touch.

And on the other end of the spectrum you have noobs who need way more hand
holding than your stuff provides so your product is too technical for them.

Another problem is a case of "death by a thousand cuts". You inherently end up
dealing with an infinite combinations of environments and requirements and you
can't fully satisfy any one group of customers because each one is just
different enough to cause a problem.

So put simply I would say something like this is too abstract and too general
for a small operation.

Perhaps companies like Amazon can afford to dump resources into projects of
this nature because they have the resources and they have the eco-system to
put it into. But I would recommend against trying to bootstrap projects of
this nature.

As a generic advice I would suggest attempting more concrete problems that
have bright and clear boundaries and a finite and small domain so that you
have a very clear "finish" point (and you will still never be finished).

A completely made up example to demonstrate generic vs specific, instead of
"DevOps as a service" think "Hosted Redis as a service".

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marenkay
Thanks, this has really been helpful input!

