I once explained GitHub to my mom as “WhatsApp for developers.”
She nodded. “So you send each other work?”
Close enough.
But then came the day I tried to explain DevOps.
Big mistake. Huge.
“DevOps? Sounds like a virus.”
My mom, bless her heart, is brilliant in many ways. She can cook a killer Sunday lunch meal, and somehow knows when the grandchildren are about to cry before anyone else does.
But she doesn’t trust anything with a weird tech name. “DevOps” sounds like either a car part or a disease. So when she asked what I was working on and I replied, “I’m configuring CI/CD pipelines and tweaking deployment automation for a DevOps environment,” she squinted at me like I’d betrayed the family.
And that’s when I knew: I had to make this make sense.
What is DevOps? (No Buzzwords, I Swear)
At its core, DevOps is just a mashup of two worlds:
- Development (Dev): The people writing the code
- Operations (Ops): The people making sure that code runs smoothly in production
In the olden days (circa 2000s), these two teams were not friends. Developers would build an app, toss it over the fence to operations, and say, “Good luck deploying that, bruh.” Then when it crashed at midnight? Ops would send hate mail.
DevOps says: Let’s stop fighting and start working together.
It’s not a tool, not a software; it’s a culture shift. A way of thinking. A set of practices and tools that bring Dev and Ops into a shared workflow, so releases are faster, safer, and less drama-filled.
How I explained it to my mom (kinda successfully)
Let’s say my mom owns a bakery.
She makes bomb scones; buttery, soft, slightly crunchy on the outside. (If you know, you know.)
Before DevOps:
- She bakes 100 trays of scones and hands them over to delivery guys.
- If the delivery guys mess it up? Late deliveries. Cold scones. Angry customers.
- Mom blames delivery guys. Delivery guys blame mom.
With DevOps:
- Mom and the delivery team work together from the start.
- They test new scone recipes together, figure out packaging and routes before launch day.
- They use tools to track everything, automate repetitive tasks, and improve based on customer feedback.
Smoother process. Fewer surprises. Happier scone-eaters.
“Ohhh,” my mom said. “So it’s teamwork… but automatic?”
Exactly. DevOps is teamwork with tools.
Why DevOps matters (even if you’re not a dev)
Here’s why this isn’t just dev-world drama:
- It helps teams ship new features faster. (Think updates that take days, not weeks.)
- It makes systems more reliable. (Less downtime, fewer late-night alerts.)
- It boosts innovation. (Because you’re not constantly putting out fires.)
Companies like Netflix, Amazon, and Google rely on DevOps principles to deliver seamless, high-quality experiences to millions of users daily.
According to Puppet’s State of DevOps Report, high-performing DevOps teams deploy code 208 times more frequently and have 7x lower change failure rates than low-performing ones.
So yeah, it’s a big deal.
Tried explaining DevOps (or literally any tech thing) to someone outside the industry?
How did your mom react?
Tell me your best “tech explanation gone wrong” moment; or your go-to metaphors for complicated concepts.
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Days in the Life of Mo 
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