What is DevOps?

DevOps is often associated with what is termed ‘Agile’ software development, where such practitioners promoted DevOps as a way to extend their own agile methodology into production, having found that iterative, rapid code development did not necessarily lead to iterative, rapid code deployment.

A combination of the terms “development” and “operations”, DevOps describes a collaborative, shared approach to projects undertaken by application development and IT operations teams.

It could simply mean better communication and collaboration between these teams or the adoption of much more complex and thorough, iterative software development procedures. It demands cultural change, trust and coordination between developers, systems administrators and aligning technological projects to business requirements.

With the aim of improving workflow throughout the software development lifecycle, DevOps incorporates all steps in a continuous loop: planning, coding, building, testing, releasing, deploying, operating, monitoring and with iterative feedback, further planning, which resets the loop. If undertaken correctly and without any hitches, it means that software meets user requirements perfectly on first use, deploying quickly and running properly, smoothly and securely.

With IT operations administrators AND developers involved in software design meetings and both supporting live software, they must deal with runtime issues together as a team. As a consequence, the more these specialists collaborate and share skills, the more they can foster a DevOps culture. To build quality, workable software, development teams must test their code in realistic conditions and understand the production environment. The net result is that with a faster process from idea to live software, companies can capitalise on market opportunities with a DevOps process that provides them with competitive advantage.