Is It Possible to Eliminate Tech Debt by Going Cloud-Native?

Cloud-native computing combines domain-driven design with software best practices. Anupam Kulkarni, CEO & Co-Founder, Mauro Systems Pvt. Ltd shares the benefits of this approach to reduce technical debt.

Today, convenience is key in today’s world. Time is money. Tech intervention has made this possible. Information Technology is the most rapidly growing industry of all. Despite many changes in software development over the past few years, developer stress levels remain high. Tech debt is a major reason for this, and it affects all technology companies, regardless of their size.

Reversal of Technical Debt

Deloitte identifies the Reversal of technical debt as a crucial ongoing trend Technology architecture is a growing area of interest worldwide, particularly with the rapid modernization and expansion of applications. Although this is a broad term, it encompasses many challenges that CIOs or CTOs must address. Here are some examples:

• Friction between engineers’ teams and customer expectations
• Traditional and complex software development
• Reduced efficiency leads to higher costs
• Delivery of code that isn’t good enough
• Legacy systems that are already in use
• Failure to automate can lead to increased maintenance risks

The absolute liability of technical debt is high. Moving to new technology is a must, but understanding the supply chain for software development is essential. This is not a simple task. It requires a comprehensive understanding of the entire software development supply chain, including third-party software, developer tools, runtimes, testing frameworks, and application stacks. The risks of increasing debt as enterprises shift to the cloud are just as great as the opportunities for decreasing it. Cloud environments built with outdated architectural thinking can increase costs and slow down migration times.

One common misconception about modernized processes is that they become faster and more agile. However, high-level technology is required to maintain this agility. API-driven interfaces are stable but not static. Maintenance is the biggest contributor to technical debt.

Cloud-native Technology’s Benefits

Although the whole situation seems almost paradoxical, CIOs and Chief Technology Officers need to consider the many benefits cloud-native technology has to offer. This technology gives developers and leaders an opportunity to dig into the often-pervasive messes that pre-created infrastructure can create. Here’s how:

1. Get the right tools. More than 30% of developers’ time is spent on repetitive and mundane tasks that don’t require the proper tooling. PaaS is a public cloud offering that supports custom software requirements. It can scale quickly and work in multiple applications. Microservices are worth looking into as they have become a standard operating model in almost every tech-led business, regardless of size. An open, flexible system that is focused on business functions improves productivity and the delivery pipeline. It also helps with governance. This system can also be augmented with DevOps, which opens up the possibility to create super-apps. To achieve this balance, Dev teams must know which tools they should switch to. It is possible to create great experiences, quickly deploy apps, and take advantage of new-age innovation by orchestrating the right frameworks.
2. Refactoring is not enough. Trying to incorporate customer requests into code is no easy feat. Even simple upgrades, language runtimes, and essential maintenance can prove to be difficult. Automated code maintenance is, therefore, an urgent need. You can go beyond traditional code refactoring and break it down into smaller building blocks with the help of the open-source community. It is important to understand how these building blocks interact so that they can fit into the larger software ecosystem.
3. Use IaC: Infrastructure is code that will change the game. GitOps is also a great tool. A code change can trigger cloud infrastructure provisioning and configuration by using IaC and configuration management software. Popular Continuous Integration tools such as Jenkins, TeamCity, and CircleCI allow you to trigger the infrastructure required based on code artifacts. I principles are the best approach to fixing production problems and they are worth exploring.
4. Intent-based computing is possible. Educate your engineers and development teams about the purpose of the solutions that they are creating. Lack of understanding and clarity is often the root cause of half the problems. Clear domain-driven-design combined with an ‘on-demand availability” model can dramatically improve performance and resiliency, thereby steadily decreasing tech debt.

The Right Combination for Success

The future of computing will be driven by automation, modern architecture, and cloud-based governance. Although all this may seem daunting, having a team made up of domain experts can make it easier to manage technical debt and create positive business impacts.