Thinking Out Loud

Data. Architecture. AI. What actually works.

Writing on what it takes to build data platforms that hold up — drawn from 35+ years of enterprise architecture and the last two building them with AI as a genuine collaborator.

Featured

The Bridle: Riding the AI Stallion Without Losing the Reins

"The highest-leverage use of AI assistance is not code generation — it's consistency. A solo practitioner building a governed data platform faces constant pressure to let standards slip. An AI that has internalized your standards and will apply them every single time, without fatigue or shortcuts, is worth more than one that can write clever code but ignores conventions."

Darwin Fisk  ·  June 2026  ·  25 min read

Last August I started using AI on a data platform engagement. My first tool was ChatGPT — not for coding, but for requirements analysis. I was a solo practitioner on a real engagement, building something that had to work, and I had dense, sometimes contradictory business documentation to work through.

By early 2026, I was running a complex multi-layer ETL platform — SQL Server, Snowflake, five database layers, a governed deployment process — with Claude as a genuine collaborator on the engineering side. Not a code generator. A partner in architectural reasoning, documentation, pattern enforcement, and sustained, session-to-session continuity.

This is the story of how that happened, what I learned about the limits of AI and my own limits, and why I never once let the AI drive.

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Data Engineering

Cost-Effective Data Management: A Native SQL Approach

If you're on AWS, Azure, or Google Cloud, you probably already have everything you need to build a governed data platform. A practitioner's case for native SQL over the modern data stack — and when the tools are actually worth it.

Darwin Fisk  ·  June 2026  ·  10 min read
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Coming Soon

Requirements-Led Architecture: Why the Discovery Phase Is the Whole Job

Coming Soon

Data Vault in Practice: What the Literature Doesn't Tell You

Coming Soon

Enablement Over Dependency: How to Hand Off a Data Platform and Actually Let Go

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