202510011056 Software only produces value in production

Coming from Lean, Agile, and DevOps movements among other influences, this is the idea that only software that is running for real for users is producing any value.¹ Traditionally, this has been discussed in the context of businesses and the software they produce as a product to sell to customers. I believe that this is applicable outside of this context as well if we're flexible with our definition of "production". For example, I would say that a CLI tool that I wrote for myself and would never have other people use is "in production" if I can use it for its intended purpose. If it's still developmental and not working at all, then it wouldn't be "in production". Under this definition, we still see that the concept makes sense.

Ultimately, We should optimize for the flow of complete slices of work. We should 202310241510 Stop starting, start finishing.