Digest #192: Kubernetes at Scale, 1B-Row Migrations, Go Optimization, Terraform Governance and Podman vs Docker

Database migrations without downtime, Go optimization, Reddit architecture, AI agents for security operations, Terraform with OPA, ArgoCD at scale, Kubernetes troubleshooting and DevOps tooling.

Welcome to this week’s edition of the DevOps Bulletin!

Teams shared how they migrated 1B records without downtime, saved 70% CPU and 60% memory by optimizing Go services, and how Reddit moved its comments system from Python to Go. We also look at how AI agents perform in security operations, what good communication really means during incidents, and how Slack uses agents to speed up security investigations.

On the hands-on side: ArgoCD diffs at scale, governing Terraform with OPA, practical Kubernetes troubleshooting, generating QR codes with pure SQL in Postgres, building a full-stack React app on AWS, exploring SQLite’s JSON indexing superpowers, and breaking your brain with 4 billion if statements.

This week’s video dives into Podman vs Docker: why Podman’s rootless, daemonless design matters, how native pods map cleanly to Kubernetes, and why it’s a strong drop-in alternative most developers overlook.

Tools of the week include a hands-on security lab for real-world vulnerabilities, a Cloudflare-style error page generator, a malware-scanning Node.js toolkit, an embedded Rust SQL database, a web-based server admin panel, and a self-hosted identity platform.

All this and more in this week’s DevOps Bulletin, don’t miss out!

Newsworthy stories

• How we migrated 1B records from DB1 to DB2 without downtime

• How we saved 70% of CPU and 60% of memory with Go

• How Reddit migrated comments functionality from Python to Go

• Evaluating AI agents in security operations

• What I really mean when I say “Good Communication” in incident response

• Streamlining security investigations with Agents

Tutorials of the week

• ArgoCD diffs at scale

• Terraform governing with OPA

• Use Python for scripting!

• How to troubleshoot common Kubernetes errors

• Generate QR Codes with pure SQL in PostgreSQL

• Build a full-stack React application in AWS

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• Backdooring managed identities via Azure API Management

• 4 billion if statements

• SQLite JSON superpower: Virtual Columns + Indexing

Videos of the week

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📘 FinOps Tip of the Week

AWS CUR files are powerful but huge and challenging to read. You can process them with a small pandas script, then send a summarized version to an LLM to get a clear explanation of the cost drivers.

This converts hours of manual analysis into a few minutes of automation.

If you want more hands-on tips like this, check out my latest book, “Practical FinOps”.

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Projects of the week

• A hands-on security lab that reproduces real MCP vulnerabilities and shows both exploitable and hardened implementations using reproducible Docker-based scenarios.

• A generator that lets you create and embed custom HTML error pages that closely match Cloudflare’s default error page design.

• A Node.js toolkit for privately scanning uploaded files for malware and risky content before they are stored or processed

• An embedded SQL database written in Rust that supports in-memory or persistent storage with ACID compliance and MVCC transactions

• A web-based system administration control panel for Unix-like servers that lets you manage users, services, packages, and configuration files through a browser.

  

• A self-hosted identity management and authentication platform that acts as an identity provider for apps and services.

Meme of the week

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