Book
Sustainable Software: A Developer’s Guide to Green Computing
My latest eBook, Sustainable Software: A Developer’s Guide to Green Computing, will be launching 1st April as a free download from The New Stack. You can sign up now to get notified as soon as it is available.
This short, practical guide examines how developers can reduce the environmental impact of their software through operational strategies and thoughtful design choices. The book explores key concepts, including energy proportionality, carbon emissions tracking, and the various approaches to measuring and reducing IT’s carbon footprint.
I discuss pragmatic techniques like serverless-first architecture, rightsizing cloud resources and strategic CPU selection. I introduce concepts such as Holly Cummins' 'LightSwitchOps' for managing development environments, and explain demand shifting and shaping as methods to align computing with cleaner energy availability.
The eBook uses frameworks like the Green Software Foundation’s Maturity Matrix (led by Anne Currie), to help teams assess their current practices and identify opportunities for improvement. It also emphasises that sustainability efforts often align with cost optimisation and performance improvements.
For developers and organisations looking to reduce their software’s environmental impact while maintaining performance, this resource offers a balanced, practical approach to green computing practices.
Sign upMy belief is that sustainability should join cost, performance, security, regulatory concerns, and reliability as one of the top-level considerations when optimizing your cloud workloads.
