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Original · left

Canary (bird)

A small yellow songbird historically carried into underground coal mines to detect lethal carbon monoxide leaks.

First in use: the 1500s
Duplicate · right

Canary release

Deploying software updates to a tiny, isolated percentage of live infrastructure to detect regressions before a full rollout.

First in use: the 2000s

Canary / Canary (bird) / Canary release

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Colour keyGrey · original meaningGreen · duplicate meaningAmber · contested (40–60%)How colours work

The coal-mine canary gave DevOps its name.

Which meaning of Canary is the original, and which one is the duplicate riding on its name? Canary (bird) came first (the 1500s). Canary release arrived in the 2000s. The data below shows which one owns the word now.

Wikipedia pageviews since 2015

Canary (bird)Canary release
English Wikipedia pageviews since July 2015 load here.

Duplicate's share of attention

Green line = duplicate's % · above 60 it owns the word · below 40 the original does

Share-of-attention line loads here.

The case for each meaning

Sourced definitions, usage stats and quotes

Original · the 1500s

Canary (bird)

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Duplicate · the 2000s

Canary release

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More duplicated terms

Cloud & infrastructure