System Implementation and Operation
System Implementation and Operation focuses on moving software safely into production and keeping services available, measurable, and recoverable.
Core rules
- Separate environments (development, test, staging, production) and keep a configuration baseline. Package releases reproducibly; automate deployment with scripts or infrastructure as code.
- Use controlled release patterns: blue-green switches traffic between identical environments; canary sends a small percentage of traffic first. Define rollback triggers before deployment.
- Operations follows service management: incidents restore service quickly; problems find root causes; changes are assessed, approved, and reversible. SLAs define commitments; SLOs and SLIs measure them.
- Monitor metrics, logs, and traces. Watch error rate, latency, saturation, and capacity; alert on symptoms users feel, not only on CPU.
- Plan backup and recovery: full, incremental, and differential backups; test restores. RTO is maximum tolerable downtime; RPO is maximum tolerable data loss.
Worked example
An online store expects a holiday peak. Deploy the new checkout to 5% of users with canary release. Monitor error rate, p95 latency, and conversion. Roll back automatically if error rate exceeds 2% or latency doubles. With RTO 30 minutes and RPO 5 minutes, use frequent incremental backups plus log shipping to a standby site, and rehearse restoration.
Traps
Swapping RTO and RPO; treating an incident as a problem record; approving changes without rollback; assuming backups are valid without restore tests; monitoring only infrastructure.