Best Pratices in DevOps in the Cloud in 2019

• By: JPM Edu Solutions
• DevOps, DevOps with Cloud

Over the years, the IT space has grown intensively competitive. Topics and best practices keep changing with the current trend. Be that as it may, the best practices are those which make an organisation leaner, more focussed and use a cohesive teamwork for developing and marketing products. The need for having the best practices to stay in business resulted in the DevOps culture being adopted worldwide by many organisations and the number is growing exponentially.

DevOps, a term formed from the combination of ‘development’ and ‘operations’, has introduced a new work culture in organisations that have adopted it. No more were Development and Operations teams working in isolation with each other, but together and with frequent interaction.

All app development, from planning to launch, was a joint team effort. This had the direct impact of reducing cycle times and it resulted in apps that were error free with no crashing at launch. Even if problems arose, the entire team put their shoulders to the wheel and solved the problem in the least possible time.

DevOps, like other such developments, needed to have the best possible practices to ensure that it gave the maximum benefits to the organisation and the work teams involved. The trend in the IT Industry is for moving operations to the cloud. DevOps is well suited for cloud based operations since it can leverage the tools provided by the Service Provider. So what are the main best practices in DevOps in the Cloud for 2019?

Do not rest on your laurels, keep the momentum going

Once the DevOps process has been introduced in the organisation, do not remain stagnant, move forward by continuing to improve and refine it so that it is has the best practices possible. Leverage all the tools that the Service Provider has to optimize your efficiency and operations. Once this is done, the cycle time for product launch will be reduced and failures, if any, will be resolved much faster than otherwise.

Keep the spotlight on performance

The production of high quality products is the ultimate aim of DevOps. A high quality product can only be developed if the DevOps ecosystem performs well. The value of having introduced DevOps will depend on it maximizing efficiency, predictability, security and maintainability as and when each new product is launched. To achieve this, performance has to be prioritized and should be the common goal of each and every team member be it from Development, Security and Operations. Without achieving the stated parameters, the entire DevOps strategy will not pay off.

Conduct version control and automation

"Once the focus is on performance, how do you make it happen?” is what confronts IT Managers. Industry wide surveys have shown that the best practices are to have version control for infrastructure management and to install automated code deployments. Though it sounds simple and basic, it is an idea that gives the intended results Managers hope for.

Tight feedback loops are the key

The way to achieve this is to align quality checks between Development and Operations teams. At times, the quality aspects of each team, since they will be viewing it from slightly different work angles, may be at variance. To ensure that each team’s quality goals are aligned with the other requires tighter feedback loops. Feedback loops give an insight into end user experience and the data input from this can be used to optimize performance.

Redefine skill sets

To operate a smooth DevOps work culture, what are the ideal skill sets that staff need? A primary skill has to be in the field of coding and scripting, then people skills, followed by process re-engineering skills and last but not least, experience with specific tools. By giving more importance to people skills rather than experience, helps break down the barriers between Development and Operations much more easily and that is what DevOps culture is all about – teams needing to break out of silos and combine their synergies. This will set the DevOps ball rolling in the intended direction.

Security is of prime importance

In a public cloud, security is of utmost importance. Both, the DevOps tools as well as the entire organisation, has to be under a impenetrable security blanket. No customer will deal with an organisation with lax security standards. If need be, take the help of professionals who can monitor security 24x7. There are many tools which are well designed for DevOps cloud automation and they perform rigorous audits to ensure there is no data breach.

Are you intrigued by the idea of DevOps? With proper DevOps training and certification, It provides a path to a lucrative and satisfying career.