Seeing patterns

Patterns are important.

Seeing patterns allows us to simplify things by using common data structures, re-using code/design, finding solutions to common problems, etc.

Being able to see patterns also allows us to troubleshoot effectively.

But, to see patterns, we need to have history and data in a form that is easy to see and process.

For troubleshooting, this may be a common place to collect notes -- say every time a system fails, we record the incident in a single shared Google Doc.

Tagging is also effective -- we might tag a dataset for different types of events, and then be able to quickly filter on different combinations of tags.

To see patterns in source code, we need to have source code organized such that it is easy to see and navigate through all of it -- for most of this, this means a monorepo.

Transparency is critical -- can we easily see things other people are working on, or is each person or team working in walled-off silos?

Patterns are not invented, but rather discovered.

Platforms are all about identifying and leveraging patterns.

And seeing patterns requires transparency, thoughtful organization of our assets, and rigorous logging of what happens over time.

Do these things, and patterns will naturally emerge, for YOUR Platform.