Platforms are supposed “to make life easier” for the teams using them. I would argue that it shouldn’t make it too easy. A “one-click” platform (one that hides everything from the user) might in fact create a dependency between the users of the platform and the platform team for daily usage of the platform.
Just the right amount of magic
I’m sure we all used at some point some feature of a software product that seemed magical to us (Pivot Tables in Excel anyone?). It generally works well for basic use-cases, but the moment you want to try something more advanced you are in deep waters. You need some help to figure things out.
Magic makes tools to work well for simple use-cases and difficult to use for complex ones. And I still have to see a platform that handles only simple use-cases.
Teams using platforms usually have slightly different needs, which means that flexibility is an important characteristic of platforms. This also means magic will have to be used sparingly. So if a platform is started with a goal to provide “one-click” authentication or “one-click” deployments or “one-click” builds or “one-click” whatever, you can almost be sure it will never realistically reach this goal.
Concerns that are usually extracted and abstracted in platforms are complex. The purpose of the platform is to take away some of that complexity, but I don’t think it is possible to take it away altogether. When the platform takes too much complexity away, this increases friction between the users of the platform and the platform team. Because the users need help to figure out how to handle their “special” use-case. Platforms should be self-explanatory and used with as little live support from the platform teams as possible.
I’m not saying a platform should not be easy to use. By all means, make developers spend no more time than they have to while using the platform. But I am saying that the amount of time developers might need to spend using the platform is a bit longer than just a few clicks here and there. In the same way as “bug-free” code is unfeasible, “one-click” platforms are simply dreams that will never come true.