For anyone that has been engaged in the big trend towards the containerisation of software applications, and the move to elastic, on-demand infrastructure, you'll know how important getting skilled up in the technology is. It's not just Docker and Kubernetes that needs mastering; there's a whole 'landscape' of tech that needs to be mastered in order to successfully run production-grade containerised workloads.

In his 1979 book, The Timeless Way of Building, Christopher Alexander tells a wonderful story of two barns. The first was extremely long, over 240 feet, and instead of having doors at the end (where you usually find them) they were in the middle on both of the long sides. The second barn was nestled into the side of a hill, had three stories instead of two, and five doors. The barns were unique, completely different, and yet instantly.

As Cloud Native continues to grow in popularity, with more organisations than ever adopting the tech and all that comes with it, let’s take a look at what we are expecting to see in 2020.

As we close out the final days of 2019, the Container Solutions teams pause to take a look back at our accomplishments over the past year. It’s a built-in part of our process: following the Hermes strategic execution framework, created by our chief executive officer, Jamie Dobson, means that we take regular breaks to reflect upon our progress. The insights and realisations (sometimes uncomfortable ones, if we happen to be falling short.

It is with great pride, and no small measure of relief, that we announce the publication of our new book from O’Reilly Media. As of this week, copies of ‘Cloud Native Transformation: Practical Patterns for Innovation’ are available for digital download, though if you prefer the analog version those won’t be available until 24 December. (Apologies if that messes up your holiday gift list. In the meantime, you can get a free excerpt here).