Pet Servers
Pet Servers is an infrastructure management approach where servers are treated as unique, manually configured entities that require individual care and maintenance, similar to pets. This contrasts with the 'cattle' model where servers are disposable, identical, and easily replaceable. It involves custom setups, manual interventions, and deep personal knowledge of each server's configuration and state.
Developers should understand Pet Servers when working in legacy systems, specialized environments (e.g., high-performance computing, embedded systems), or small-scale deployments where automation is impractical. It's relevant for maintaining critical, non-standardized infrastructure where uptime and unique configurations outweigh the benefits of automation and scalability, such as in on-premise data centers or niche applications.