In this episode of DevOps Chats we talk with Donald Lutz, Principal Software Architect, specializing in systems integration and creating large, scalable cloud applications. Occasionally DevOps Chats is fortunate to spotlight DevOps and cloud native developers doing trailblazing work in contemporary software architectures. Donald fits that bill to a "t.", as an entrepreneur and employee at startups like Faction, BoldTech Systems, and his own company Technetronic Solutions, and established companies including Via West.
Our discussion focuses on creating cloud native applications in startups and large enterprise IT. Donald’s currently working with one of the world’s largest financial institutions to move from legacy applications directly to cloud native apps, bypassing any interim lift-n-shift moves. His work spans many Microsoft technologies, including .NET Core, runtime framework Dapper for RDBMS mapping, Service Fabric, and Azure, and opensource Kubernetes, Terraform, and Puppet (and Enterprise).
During our discussion, we cover the challenges of architecting and scaling very large cloud native applications, implementing DevOps in less mature software organizations, how established software patterns benefit DevOps and cloud app developers, and the importance of giving back by hosting meetups to share knowledge and mentor others. Donald also gives back as an active leader and mentor of the FIRST Robotics Team 1410 since 2005. Join in on our conversation as we explore the complex and sophisticated inter-workings of a cloud native software architect.