DevOps is a culmination of culture, tools, and practices that helps increase the organization's ability to deliver services and applications at a faster velocity. DevOps is the offspring of agile software development which involves continuous planning, testing integration, and continuous evolution of software and project evolution. Compared to the traditional waterfall-style processes, these are all lightweight and inherently adaptable. The most profound and important about agile methods is that they empower collaboration with quick and effective decision making.

The goal of DevOps is essentially an improvement of collaboration between all the stakeholders involved through automation of the delivery process in order to:

• Achieve faster time to market.
• Lower failure rates. (of new releases).
• Shorten the lead time of fixes.
• Improve deployment frequency.
• Improve mean time to recovery.

DevOps Scenario includes developers, testers, operations, and support professionals who plan to create software that is ready for deployment. The coding is done each day by the coding team which is then tested through a set automated process after which it is ready for deployment. This deployment is passed onto a small set of ‘beta' users which is continuously monitored to ensure there are no unforeseen problems and it is stable. This new code once passes the testing phase, is then proliferated to the remaining users. Other than the planning and development the process is done with no human intervention.

Tools that are used in DevOps

The key tools and practices to know are:

1. Source Code Repository- This is where the developer's check-in and code. The repository manages various versions of the code to mitigate duplication or overwriting of each other's work.
2. Build Server- An automation tool that compiles the code in the source code repository into executable code.
3. Configuration Management- The configuration of a server or an environment to suit the project requirements. Popular Tools- Puppet, Chef.
4. Virtual Infrastructure- Virtual infrastructure includes cloud vendors like AWS, Microsoft Azure that sell infrastructure or Platform as a service (PaaS) which has APIs to create new machines using configuration management tools such as Puppet and Chef. Virtual Infrastructure, therefore, empowers you to automatically test a brand-new code by sending it to your cloud infrastructure, build the environment, and run all the tests with no human intervention.
5. Test Automation- DevOps testing focuses on automated testing within your build pipeline therefore by the time there is a deployable build, it is ready to be deployed. Popular Tools- Selenium and Water
6. Pipeline Orchestration- This is like a manufacturing assembling that happens from when the code is completed until deployment in the production or a late-stage production stage.
7. Unifying Enterprise Software Development & Delivery- Process of unifying agile application lifecycle and DevOps providing entire software delivery in one platform. Popular Tools- VersionOne VS

DevOps is indeed a revolution in the software industry without which quick, seamless integrations and deployments would not be possible. We are launching a specialty DevOps Certification with Azure and AWS soon! Follow us and let us help you upskill, upgrade, and progress in your career!