So, there is a bit of a meme going around the web development world called Getting Real. Some people think it might be dangerous. This seems like the dangers of success, which I understand quite well. With the exception of a few hiccups here and there, the new portal has been a success, which has raised expectations greatly.
But I think, even retroactively, we can apply some “Getting Real” to the portal. It will be a big challenge considering that we didn’t pick software that makes change easy and iteration is anything but constant. Now, before you get the idea that I think we picked the “wrong” software, nothing could be further from the truth. It’s a J2EE app, like every other portal on the planet these days, which means that you are bound by the laws of J2EE app development. I suppose a person more skilled in J2EE development could bend it to work this way, but it doesn’t feel like it was born to do it, unlike Rails.
All that being said I’m very excited about the future development path of our other projects because we did pick software that lets us change our applications in an easy way. I no longer fear iterations.
In any statement that sounds too good to be true, there is a catch and our catch is “The Enterprise.” Campus has wholly embraced the idea of enterprise applications. Enterprise applications fear change and iteration. Some might even say that “The Enterprise” is the antithesis of “Getting Real” because change and iteration means that at some point there will be interruption in service and “The Enterprise” is about three things: Uptime, uptime, and uptime. J2EE is very good at this. The platform is very stable at this point. We have instances of tomcat that run for months on end that hardly need the slightest bit of attention.
So, “Getting Real” on campus has to balance change and iteration with uptime. It’s not going to be easy, but we’re going to try.