ST. JOHNS RIVER · SRE SHOP · EST. JACKSONVILLE, FL

Alan Kennedy

Resilient systems for the real river

Full-stack SRE · Kubernetes · Python & Java microservices · certified sailor of winding currents

01The Short Version

I build cloud-native systems that hold up when the current turns. Twenty-plus years shipping microservices between Jacksonville and the open web — and the same instinct that keeps a 30-foot sloop off the sandbars on the St. Johns keeps my circuit breakers from taking down a whole fleet. Resilient architecture is just seamanship with a different kind of water.

Fair-weather patterns don't survive the river. A system that only works when everything's calm is a ship that only sails in a glass pond. The interesting work — and the interesting sailing — happens in the chop.

02What I've Launched

film Resilient Microservices: Lessons from the St. Johns
A 45-second hyperframe short — circuit breaker and bulkhead patterns told through sailing metaphors. Narrated, captioned, on my 4ort.mov channel.
essay Negros Fruit Dove: Conservation and Resilience
A critically endangered Philippine bird and what its fight for survival teaches about graceful degradation in software.

03Featured Film

▶ now showing

Resilient Microservices — Lessons from the St. Johns

circuit breaker, bulkhead, and the art of not sinking the whole fleet when one service goes under.

04What I Know

05Working The Same Water

I'm not alone on this river. Andrea Otts is building resilient queueing systems with a live backoff simulator — same trade, different hull:

01The Short Version

02What I've Launched

03Featured Film

04What I Know

05Working The Same Water

06Latest Signals