What is DevOps? How Does DevOps Work? (DevOps Ultimate Guide)

What is DevOps? 

DevOps is a term that was coined in 2005 by Eric Sink to describe the practice of integrating software development and operations teams to create a continuous integration/continuous deployment environment.  

In short, DevOps ensures that code gets deployed to production as fast as possible while maintaining high-quality standards. 

DevOps is not just a buzzword; it’s a way of thinking about how we build and operate technology systems. The ultimate goal of DevOps is to reduce the time between writing code and deploying it to production. This is done by automating processes and tools that were previously manual. 

Why do businesses need DevOps? 

Businesses are now aware of the necessity of DevOps, but they are unsure how to implement it.  

Some require DevOps “simply” to compete in a market that is becoming more saturated and competitive. At the same time, others want to improve internal company procedures and deliver the highest-quality items to their clientele as quickly as possible.  

It sounds pretty diversified, right? Let’s have a look at why businesses need DevOps! 

A. Managing Issues & Bugs 

As an IT professional, you might know that finding and fixing flaws in software is a key priority. This necessitates quick response and a system that all departments can adhere to.  

DevOps Azure is a continuous process and lets you do precisely the same as it enables you to release new features while improving the effectiveness of your program. Without DevOps, there is a backlash on productivity, which damages the customer experience. 

B. To increase customer satisfaction 

Adopting DevOps principles can provide several advantages, such as lowered failure rates for new features, accelerated service delivery, and improved recovery times. Continuous testing, implementation, and feedback loops encourage faster service delivery and satisfied consumers.  

Additionally, by optimizing the entire software development process, the operations division can improve business delivery while the DevOps team can focus on creating better products. 

How does DevOps work? 

Development and operations teams are no longer “decentralized” under a DevOps approach.  

When these two teams are combined, the engineers work across the whole application lifecycle—from development and test up to deployment and operations—and acquire various skills that are not specific to any one function.  

Quality assurance and security teams may also interact more closely with development and processes throughout the lifecycle of an application under various DevOps models.  

Advantages of DevOps 

DevOps is a set of practices that help teams work together more effectively. It aims to improve workflow by breaking down silos through early-stage verification of digital business intelligence and customer experience, developing, deploying, upgrading software, and enhancing department communication. 

A. Speed – Now, you can move fast to innovate and develop for your customers, more effectively respond to evolving markets, and increase your ability to provide profitable business outcomes to your clients. Thanks to DevOps, your development and management teams can achieve these objectives quickly, which was not possible earlier. For instance, microservices and continuous delivery (CD) enables teams to swiftly take control of systems and modify them, which is a strong possibility mainly due to DevOps.  

B. Boost the Client Project Delivery – Increase release frequency and pace to contribute to your product’s improvement more quickly. By introducing new products and fixing issues, you can quickly adjust to customer expectations and acquire a competitive edge over others. The entire software release cycle, from development to deployment, is automated using continuous integration (CI) and continuous delivery (CD). 

C. Reliable Delivery – Improving the type of application and the infrastructure has now been better than ever, so you can deliver consistently at a faster rate while maintaining a positive user experience. Using approaches for continuous integration (CI) and continuous delivery (CD), test each change to ensure it is safe and working. Additionally, you can use logging and monitoring techniques to track performance in real-time without any hassle. 

D. Scale – Keep an eye on managing the extent of your development processes. Now, by using automation and homogeneity, You can manage complex or changing systems effectively and with less risk, which is made possible only through DevOps. 

E. Close Collaboration – You can use the DevOps methodology to build more effective teams by emphasizing values like ownership and responsibility. Teams of developers and operators can collaborate closely, assign tasks, and combine workflows. Shortfalls are reduced as a result, and time can be saved. 

F. Security – Move swiftly while preserving control and compliance. However, how can you accomplish it without compromising security? By using automated regulatory requirements, fine-grained safeguards, and configuration management techniques, you can deploy a DevOps strategy without endangering the very fabric of security that was merely possible earlier. 

Establishing a solid DevOps pipeline 

The ideal DevOps pipeline includes the following stages in a continuous process, i.e., including but not limited to plan, code, build, test, release, deploy, operate, and monitor. 

Too many organizations are forced to pick between poor-quality code and rapid development. IT executives should leverage automation to build a solid DevOps pipeline as described below!!  

1. Make a road map
2. Collect user stories
3. Cut up the work into manageable bits
4. Automate whenever you can
5. Utilize AIOps (artificial intelligence operations) to minimize tedious, highly repetitive tasks wherever possible
6. Maintain strong compliance
7. Utilize standardized techniques and technologies to block the distribution of non-compliant programs
8. Include backup and make sure that any code modifications are secure
9. Integrate data by incorporating database design into any DevOps strategies

Agile vs. DevOps 

Despite their differences, both disciplines share a similar mentality and work toward the same goal!! 

Traditionally, development and operations teams would work separately on rather large waterfall-style development projects. When these started to draw people, it became evident that the issue was not going to be fixed, leading to the rise of DevOps. Agile was created when teams couldn’t provide what the client genuinely wanted, but DevOps was established out of difficulties between development and operations.   

So, the inception ideas for these methodologies are entirely different and should not be confused. But it serves as a link between these Agile developers and their IT operations counterparts I.e., those in charge of services like service management, performance management, monitoring, security, and incident management for applications in use.  

When using Agile, internal project managers used to schedule three-year software development projects using date-based delivery. They would declare, “We know where this software will go in three years.” However, the sector soon discovered that software development doesn’t operate in this manner, which led to the change we are seeing today in organizations.   

But initially, DevOps was primarily concerned with resolving issues within the organization, whereas Agile had a much more outbound aspect. However, both are now internally and externally mirrored. Although DevOps and Agile were first conceived as separate ideas, they have now been increasingly combined and used all over the world. 

Some of the DevOps best practices 

1. Continuous Integration: Continuous integration (CI) is a practice where code changes are integrated into a shared repository immediately after they’re checked out. CI is often paired with continuous deployment, where the code changes are deployed automatically to production. CI/CD is a popular DevOps strategy.
2. Automation: Automation uses tools and techniques to reduce human effort and increase efficiency. Automation helps us do things faster, cheaper, and better than before. Automation is a core principle of DevOps.
3. Infrastructure As Code: Infrastructure as code is a concept that describes using configuration management to automate infrastructure creation, deployment, and maintenance. Infrastructure as code means writing scripts that create and configure servers, databases, load balancers, and many other types of infrastructure.
4. Microservices: Microservices are small services that communicate over HTTP. Each microservice should have its database. An excellent example of microservices is Twitter.
5. Containerization: Containerization is the packaging of applications into containers. Containers are lightweight virtual machines that run on top of operating system kernels. Docker is a containerization tool.
6. Serverless Computing: Serverless computing is a cloud computing model where users pay only for what they use. Users don’t need to manage servers anymore. Instead, they focus on building applications.

DevOps Challenges 

How can DevOps be used to its fullest potential? DevOps has many difficulties that must be overcome to use it to its best. One of the biggest DevOps challenges to successful implementation concerns outdated IT architecture, which can’t support the new, agile way of working. Some of the main obstacles that are frequently encountered during DevOps adoption are listed below: 

a. Developers vs. Operations team mentality – The operations department often has to face a lot of trouble keeping up with high levels of support. On the other hand, developers want to experiment and make changes as soon as possible, which is one of the technological challenges most commonly faced by DevOps. 

b. Traditional infrastructure to Microservices – Depending on how long they have been maintained in the organization, older frameworks, and programs, and complex infrastructure may be a problem. The biggest challenge in putting DevOps into practice and implementing it on the full scale is moving from one outdated infrastructure to another. 

c. Focusing too much on tools – Tackling DevOps complications can be so fascinating that new solutions and tools appearing in the market can seem like they can solve any issue, no matter how complicated. Hence to use these new tools while simultaneously adhering to all security procedures and seamlessly integrating with the infrastructure, every company must thoroughly train its employees to avoid any unprecedented errors and risks. 

d. The discomfort of Change – Stakeholders and team members may feel intimidated by the move to DevOps. Moving across cultures can be very difficult and sometimes even distressing. Understanding that a DevOps transition should be gradual and fluid rather than abrupt is crucial. Everyone will be able to accept the DevOps culture as they get used to it and will soon discover the various ways they may contribute to the development cycle. 

How is DevOps transforming enterprises? 

A successful DevOps operation needs a few essential components. It should prioritize innovation and promote risk-taking, mutual trust, and regular feedback among all team members. Culture alone won’t be sufficient to change business activities; development and operation teams also require DevOps tools and software to complete the entire process seamlessly. 

As technological tools advance, it is essential to be able to instrument and analyze telemetry data across the cloud-native environment. This skill, commonly called observability, evaluates the health of apps and the infrastructure that supports them at every step of development using distributed traces, metrics, logs, customer experience data, and standard protocols. 

Despite the apparent advantages of DevOps, its accompanying technological and cultural shift may implement DevOps solutions in an incremental process. 

The most critical DevOps tools for tech workers 

DevOps tools are a set of software and processes that help teams to collaborate and build better software products. Many tools are available in the market today, but these seven tools are the most popular among companies. 

1. GitLab CI/CD: GitLab CI/CD is a continuous integration tool that helps developers build software faster. It provides features that help automate testing, deployment, and monitoring.
2. Jenkins: Jenkins is a free, open-source project management system (PMS) designed to simplify building and managing complex projects. It’s built using Java and runs on Linux, Windows, and Mac OS X.
3. GitHub: GitHub is a web-based hosting service where users can host their code repositories, manage issues, and communicate via pull requests.
4. Docker: Docker is an open-source technology that makes it easier to run applications anywhere. It’s a containerization platform that lets you package apps inside containers.
5. Kubernetes: Kubernetes is an open-source system for automating containerized applications’ deployment, scaling, and management.
6. AWS: Amazon Web Services (AWS) is a collection of cloud computing services offered by Amazon.com. These services include Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2), Simple Storage Service (S3), Elastic Block Store (EBS), Auto Scaling, Elastic Load Balancing (ELB), and others.
7. Terraform: Terraform is a configuration management tool that enables organizations to safely and predictably create, change, and maintain infrastructure.

Conclusion 

Transitioning to DevOps requires a change in culture and mindset. At its simplest, DevOps removes the barriers between two traditionally siloed teams, development, and operations. 

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