Andrew Jones
@andrew-jones.com
Principal Engineer. Created Data Contracts and wrote the book on it. Father of 2. Brewer of beer. Aphantasic. Newsletter 👉 https://andrew-jones.com/newsletter
In this week's newsletter I write about what ownership is (it's complicated!). There's also links to articles on closing the context gap, getting your data team a seat at the table, and creating data & AI use cases. a-j.io/n260814 #DataBS
What is ownership?
It's not just what the spreadsheet says
a-j.io
Roman numeral puns are great and I for one will continue to make them. #SundayPunday
This week I write about how, when our data output needs to be reliable, so does our input. There's also links to posts on using data contracts to build a shared language, federated data architecture with DuckDB, and Bitol becoming a graduate project a-j.io/n260807 #DataBS
Reliable output needs a reliable upstream
Pipelines can only be as reliable as their inputs
a-j.io
Police have just arrested the tongue-twister world champion. If found guilty, they’ll be given a very tough sentence. #SundayPunday
In this week's newsletter I write about limiting what you have in your data contract. There's also links to articles on how a SSOT depends on governance, inverting data architectures, and shifting quality left. a-j.io/n260731 #DataBS
Limit what you have in your data contract
Only put in fields that drive automation
a-j.io
My friend Sid was a sudden ID theft victim. Now they’re just S. #SundayPunday
In this week's newsletter I write about how IaC is a prerequisite for automation, including automating with agents. There's also links to articles on improving agentic analytics, building an Agentic Development Platform, and Apache Ossie. a-j.io/n260724 #DataBS
IaC is a prerequisite for automation
That's true for tooling and AI agents
a-j.io
Interesting analysis on what makes an impact when trying to improve agentic analytics decisionspine.com/blog/agentic...
Agentic Analytics: How Much Does Grounding Actually Buy You?
Every vendor says their AI analyst works, and the benchmark numbers are high. So I built one in a controlled lab and added grounding one layer at a time (semantic layer, verified examples, knowledge…
decisionspine.com
Germany is advising people to stock up on cheese and sausages, in what officials are calling the Wurst Käse scenario. #SundayPunday
This week's newsletter is about change management for changes that impact the meaning of data. There's also links to articles on building a context layer, Write-Audit-Publish for analytics agents, and a new data streaming framework. a-j.io/n260717 #DataBS
Data contracts anti-pattern #4: Your CI passed. Your data still broke.
How to manage changes of *meaning* as well as structure
a-j.io
A ship carrying red paint collided with a ship carrying purple paint. Both crews thought to be marooned. #SundayPunday
In this week's newsletter I write about the 3rd anti-pattern in my series - Vanity SLOs. There's also links to articles on semantic vs context layers, building a semantic layer at Lyft, and data contracts in KCL. a-j.io/n260710 #DataBS
Data contracts anti-pattern #3: Vanity SLOs
SLOs that make a difference
a-j.io
The most disapproving of all the Pharaohs was King Tut. #SundayPunday
This week's newsletter is the second in my series of data contracts anti-patterns, following on from last week's post on contracts as documentation. There are also links to articles on data platform incident management and encoding your data expert. a-j.io/n260703 #DataBS
Data contracts anti-pattern #2: Checkbox compliance
Keep your data contracts lean and useful
a-j.io
A man tried to sell me a coffin today. I told him that’s the last thing I need. #SundayPunday
In this week's newsletter I write about the anti-pattern of contracts as documentation. There's also links to posts on building governance into the platform, making an impact as a platform PM, and analytical identifiers. a-j.io/n260626 #DataBS
Data contracts anti-pattern #1: Contracts as documentation
A data contract without impact is just documentation.
a-j.io
In this week's newsletter I write about scaling data governance by moving away from documents and towards automation. There's also links to articles on data product managers, context graph architecture, and autonomous web scraping. a-j.io/n260612 #DataBS
Stop writing data governance policies
Automate them instead
a-j.io
My mate lost his job as a pole vaulter. Never got over it. #SundayPunday
In this week's newsletter I talk about the importance of meeting your users where they are. There's also links to articles on a meshy approach to building data models, SQL patterns for catching fraud, and the case for data marketplaces. a-j.io/n260605 #DataBS
Meet your users where they are
Focus on their developer experience, not your own
a-j.io
Last weekend, I competed in the world race walking championship for the fourth time running. Needless to say, I was disqualified. #SundayPunday
In this week's newsletter I write about how we can't just blame data producers, we need to look at ourselves and the support we give them. There's also links to context, finally achieving self-serve analytics, and synthetic customers. a-j.io/n260522 #DataBS
You can't just blame data producers for poor data quality
Look at yourselves too
a-j.io
This is a good read on the future of platform engineering and the "missing middle" www.syntasso.io/post/platfor...
Platform Engineering: Orchestrating Applications, Platforms, and Infrastructure
We all know that when the good people at Gartner highlight a topic as a strategic technology trend for the coming year, everyone will pay more attention – especially within the enterprise ecosystem.…
syntasso.io
Since I cancelled my subscription to the Scrabble Club, they’ve started sending me threatening letters. #SundayPunday
In this week's newsletter I write about how to make your golden paths actually golden. There's also links to articles on self-serve data, north star metrics for AI data products, and standards in the data landscape. a-j.io/n260515 #DataBS
Make your golden paths actually golden
Or watch them quietly build their own
a-j.io
I’ve just won the ‘World’s most secretive person’ award. I can’t tell you how much it means to me. #SundayPunday
In this week's newsletter I write about the simple concept of data contracts, and its power. There's also links to articles on the 7-table fallacy and measurement engineering. And finally, a pun, but I can't say more. a-j.io/n260501 #DataBS
Data contracts are a simple concept
Simple concept, but powerful in practice
a-j.io
Someone ripped off the front and back sections of my dictionary. It just goes from bad to worse. #SundayPunday
"The best leaders don’t rely on smart people to notice mistakes in time. They build systems that assume confidence will arrive before correctness, and they design for that reality." Great post on challenging decisions. substack.com/home/post/p-...
Red-Teaming Your Strategy
Why Certainty Needs Constraints
substack.com
In this week's newsletter I write about how the quality of a data product is not just the data, it's the code behind it too. There's also links to articles on building an LLM platform, speed when decentralising, and building decision systems. a-j.io/n260424 #DataBS
The quality of a data product is its data and its code
Monitoring code quality is as important as data quality
a-j.io