data.day
automation / maintenance / no-code

Zapier Is Not Magic. It Is Plumbing.

No-code tools promise miracles. They deliver pipes. Pipes leak. Pipes clog. Treat automation like industrial plumbing, not magic tricks.

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The Silent Leak

We built an automation for a logistics client. Trigger: Driver submits delivery note. Action: Send invoice to Xero.

It worked perfectly for three months. Everyone was happy. “It’s magic,” they said. Then, a driver entered a delivery note with a special character in the customer name: O'Reilly & Sons. The automation platform treated the & as code. It choked. It did not send the invoice. It did not send an email alert. It just stopped.

We found out six weeks later. We had missed 40 invoices. The magic had turned into a mess.

The Bottleneck: The Black Box

The problem with “No-Code” is that it hides the complexity. It gives you a clean interface for a dirty job. You drag a line from A to B. You think the job is done. You do not see the handshake. You do not see the API rate limits. You do not see the data formatting.

When we treat software like magic, we stop doing maintenance. We assume it will run forever. This is dangerous. A physical pipe drips when it leaks. You see the puddle. A digital pipe fails silently. The data disappears into the void.

The Pipe: Visible Pressure Gauges

We adhere to the “Plumber’s Code.”

1. Expect the Clog. Bad data will enter the system. Plan for it. We added a filter. If the name has strange characters, we do not try to invoice. We send it to a “Manual Review” Slack channel.

2. Install Alarms. We do not trust the “Success” screen. We built a reconciliation script. Every night, it counts:

  • Notes Submitted: 50.
  • Invoices Sent: 49.
  • Difference: 1.
  • Alert: Check the missing one.

3. Label the Pipes. We document the flow. “This Zap connects the Site App to the Finance App.” If we change the Site App, we know we might break the pipe.

Automation is Maintenance

Do not set it and forget it. You would not install a water pipe and never check it for ten years. Check your automations. Clean the filters. Respect the plumbing.

FAQs

Is Zapier bad?

No. Zapier is a PVC pipe. It is good for light loads. Do not use it for high-pressure industrial waste.

What happens when an automation breaks?

Usually, nothing happens. That is the danger. It fails silently. You need an alarm system.

Do we need a developer for this?

You need an engineer's mindset. You need to ask: 'What happens if the internet goes down?'