Development of applications has been going on for a long time. Although, initially all the features and bug fixes in an app happened over time. Also, there were a variety of problems with the traditional as it was taking a lot of time to deliver. In the current age where companies are shelling out features every week, it could be a little hard to work with the traditional methodology. Therefore, to tell you about the modern-day boon i.e DevOps, we have written this article.
What is DevOps?
DevOps can be considered a combination of two words i.e. Developers and Operations. Rather than being a tool or anything, it is more of a mindset that tries to increase the efficiency of an organisation by properly using the provided resources. Therefore, in short, it can be said that DevOps is best practices that ensure the deliverance of work in time.
History of DevOps?
From a long time, an idea like devOps was in need. The idea began to spread in the year 2009. Although, it was the year 2008 when Patrick Debois and Andrew Clay Shafer began talking about the approach. The philosophy behind DevOps is simple: it just requires collaboration between the developer’s teams and the operations team. If you are still confused then it meant that the people who make code and deploy code should work in coherence so that everything is executed within the time limit.
The idea began its journey from Ghent, Belgium. The conference was itself kept by Patrick Debois who was a Belgium Consultant, Project Manager, and Agile practitioner. Later it was conceived by Alanna Brown at Puppet in the year 2012. At that time, it was being called as the state of devops report. Later on when the use of DevOps accelerated within the industry Nicole Forsgren, Gene Kim, Jez Humble, and some credible people published the report on DevOps.
Multiple names have published about the DevOps report by then spreading more awareness about the topic. In 2015, DORA(DevOps Research and Assessment) was found by Nicole Forgsen, Jez Humble, and Gene Kim. Later in the year 2017, the same team published, “Accelerate: Building and Scaling High Performing Technology Organizations”.
What is a DevOps Engineer?
There isn’t a professional course that will certify you as a DevOps Engineer. It is something that a person becomes with time and experience since it more a more of a philosophy. Although, at the core, one can say that it is an IT professional who is well-versed with the methodologies of implementing DevOps in his/her current project.
Multiple responsibilities can be bestowed over a DevOps Engineer. It can be summed up as someone who checks the code releases and maintains coherence between the team. A DevOps Engineer will require the soft skills to overcome the traditional methodologies and barriers are often seen in code deployment, testing, and co-ordinations with the operations team.
There are a variety of tasks that the Devops Engineer should be capable of coping up with. For instance, some of those include things like preparing test cases, analyzing the outcomes, troubleshooting recurring problems, and communicating the issues to the development team. The roles and responsibilities of a DevOps engineer are recurring and requires constant supervision from his/her side.
What was the requirement of using DevOps for App Development?
Earlier when the projects were being done in an organisation at that time, the traditional time would take a lot to complete the project. The reason behind it was simple, there wasn’t any methodology that would make sure the coordination between the developer’s team and the operations team. Although, the real reason would be the size of code and the lack of continuous integration & continuous deployment.
Previously, the developer would be working on a module which would comprise of a huge pile of code. Also, the code integration & code deployment would be done on a weekly, twice a month, or even monthly. This approach would create issues as there are a plethora of issues that the operations had to face. The problems were collateral since when a code is a deployment, each of the modules requires its architecture and compatibility for each platform. This increased the delay of new features that can be used by the customers.
Well, for now, all the top application have a competitor by their side and the fight is simple whosoever releases the new features first takes the cake. Also, during the time of deployment and integration, there would be several issues and bugs that needed to be resolved by the developer’s team. Although, by the time the operation team would figure it out, the developer’s team would be working on something else. This created two issues: first is the fact that the team has to stop there work and fix the previous issues, second would the delay for the current feature that was in development. It often led to a constant tussle between the two teams and a load of the blame game. Also, the factor took away the competitive edge of any organisations since there would be a huge pile of previous that had to be fixed. The DevOps philosophy was created so that all this could be tackled with ease.
How DevOps Works?
As discussed previously, it is more of a mindset, methodology, or philosophy that is implemented to improve the efficiency of any organisations. This increases the communication within the developer and the operations team. With DevOps unlike Agile, changes are made more at the grassroot level. The changes that done will be in the department of Organisational Structure, best practices, and Order. Below are some of the DevOps philosophies that can ensure that there is order in your organisation:
- Standardizing all the infrastructural provisionings along with software forgiveness.
- Automation of all the work that requires tedious repetitive work.
- Inclusion of a technology stack that will speed up the overall efficiency of the organisation.
- Rather than segregating the Developers and Operations teams collaborating them into one.
- Tightly integrating the quality assurance and security during the development life cycle.
- Usage of tools that helps the deployment of code easy and efficient.
Note: In case if you wish to read our article on the Use of CI/CD in App Development then click on the link provided.
Advantages of Using DevOps
Speed: The devops methodology lets you speed up the development process. This in return helps the business to deliver better. It also allows the team to be more resilient and adaptable to market changes enforcing good business results.
Faster Delivery: It increases the efficiency of releasing new features and bug fixes faster. This gives a competitive and makes your product more prominent in comparison to the competition.
Reliability: Great practices like continuous integration and continuous deployment makes sure that you release features consistently. They make sure that each of the changes made is consistent and safe. Also, it involves the monitoring and logging practices that checks for overall efficiency and provides you with real-time statistics.
Scalability: With the methodologies, it becomes easy to manage the scalability of your project. It can help you with infrastructure and development processes. It helps you manage all the complex systems and changing system with reduced risks.
Better Collaboration: This is the crux of the whole methodology. It helps you create better teams which are more accountable and values ownership. Using DevOps, the teams are capable of more collaborating closely, sharing multiple responsibilities, and after that combining the workflows. It also reduces inefficiencies and helps in saving time.
Security: It is one of the most crucial factors that can be said it’s one of the greatest advantages. It can be moved quickly while you are retaining proper control and compliance. There are a couple of things using which you can ensure that the security is sustained. These things would be automated compliance policies, fine-grained controls, and configuration management techniques.
Disadvantages of DevOps
Organisational: It is a little difficult to establish the DevOps methodology of an organisation. The reason is simply that the developers working have their way of dealing with things. Also, all the roles and responsibilities are divided differently. It takes time because any developer you pick who has worked for years is more comfortable working in a certain way. For instance, if you talk about a full stack developer then he has his/her way of doing things. Distributing his/her responsibilities will simply create a little conundrum for them.
Speed and Security: Both these words don’t get along so much better together. Although, we must keep them in mind. For instance, the developer needs to create a plan for each step for security. This may make the process of deploying features a little slow but it is worth it. Although, in the long run, it is completely worth it.
Technology in Use: This is a little difficult for some organisations to fulfil. DevOps ask for automation for all the tedious and repetitive manual tasks.
Processes: Well, the methodology requires a certain amount of speed in implementation. It requires the request and response of a particular process within a certain timeframe. This will stress the developers to cope up with the pace all this is carried out. Although, once it is up to speed it is going to benefit you.
So this was our article on DevOps and how it can benefit you considering the ease it brings to the table after a while. As an organisation, all your employees must follow a structure and work accordingly. Also, communication is key and Devops makes sure that all your process runs fluid and there is active communication between everyone. In case, if you are looking for app developers then maybe we can help. To send us an enquiry mail us at [email protected]. If you are interested in reading about CSS4 and Top Lightweight Mobile CSS Framework then click on the link provided. We hope this article may have been of some help to you. Also, thank you for reading this article until the end.
