Virhebudjetin

Virhebudjetin is a Finnish term that translates to "error budget" in English. It represents a concept used in software development and other technical fields to manage the acceptable level of risk associated with releasing new features or making changes. Instead of aiming for zero errors, which is often unrealistic and costly, an error budget acknowledges that some failures are inevitable.

The core idea is to allocate a specific amount of tolerance for errors or downtime over a given period. This budget can be consumed by incidents, bugs, or performance degradations. Once the error budget is depleted, further releases or significant changes might be halted until the system's stability is restored and the budget is replenished. This mechanism encourages a balance between innovation and reliability.

Implementing an error budget requires clear metrics for measuring errors and a defined process for tracking budget consumption. It also necessitates a shared understanding and agreement among teams regarding what constitutes an error and how the budget will be managed. The purpose is not to penalize teams but to provide a data-driven approach to decision-making, ensuring that the pursuit of new features does not compromise the overall stability and user experience of a product or service. It shifts the focus from simply preventing errors to managing the acceptable level of risk.