The term ‘DevOps’ is known to almost everyone in the IT field. However, even as DevOps’ adoption continues to accelerate within organizations across the globe, there’s still confusion about what exactly the term means. Is it a culture, a philosophy, an approach or a combination of these things? In this article, we’ll explain what DevOps really means followed by some of the myths about DevOps and scope of DevOps in 2021.
What is DevOps?
According to Gartner- “DevOps represents a change in IT culture, focusing on rapid IT service delivery through the adoption of agile, lean practices in the context of a system-oriented approach. DevOps emphasizes people (and culture), and seeks to improve collaboration between operations and development teams. DevOps implementations utilize technology— especially automation tools that can leverage an increasingly programmable and dynamic infrastructure from a life cycle perspective.”
Let us simply this definition for you. DevOps, a compound of Development (Dev) and Operations (Ops), is the union of people, processes and technology to continually provide value to customers. It enables formerly siloed roles such as development, IT operations, quality engineering and security to coordinate and collaborate for better output. It entirely challenges to shorten the system development life cycle and runs a continuous high software quality.
Some of the commonly referenced best practices that make up DevOps are:
- Continuous Integration/Delivery/Deployment
- Agile Software Development
- Microservices Application Architecture
- Infrastructure-as-Code
- Effective Logging and Monitoring
Now that we’ve explained DevOps, let us bust some of the popular myths about DevOps for you!
Myth #1 DevOps is just for Dev and Ops
In the purest definition of DevOps, yes. But the scope of DevOps has evolved over the years. Nowadays, DevOps principles are being applied to sales/marketing positions, consulting engagements and leadership roles etc. The crux of DevOps is about collaboration and communication towards a common goal and thus, it can be applied unilaterally across an organization.
Myth #2 You can’t have DevOps without cloud
Cloud technology provides the ability to dynamically provision infrastructure resources for developers and testers to rapidly obtain test environments without waiting for a manual request to be fulfilled. So, the Cloud is good to have but it is not a “must” to practice ‘DevOps’. As long as an organization has efficient processes for obtaining resources to deploy and test application changes, it can adopt the DevOps approach.
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Myth #3 Adopting tools makes you ‘DevOps’ ready
Not quite! DevOps is more about people that tools. It is a cultural movement focused on collaboration and innovation. It requires a cultural shift beyond simply implementing new tools or technology. For DevOps to be successful, each department (technical as well as non-technical) needs to understand the cultural shift behind DevOps.
Myth #4 DevOps doesn’t work for large, complex systems
False! On the contrary, complex systems often require the discipline and collaboration that DevOps provides. DevOps facilitates better coordination of the complex delivery cycles and system-level release planning, which improves efficiency and leads to better output.
Myth #5 Continuous delivery means release all the time
The term “continuous” is ambiguous. Facebook’s motto is “Ship Often.” However, it’s not specific to a time frame. Continuous delivery doesn’t mean you should release as often as you can but gives you the ability to release as often as you want. How often is solely your company’s decision.
Dev(Sec)Ops in 2021
The practical applications of DevOps are increasing daily in the different areas of the IT industry and there’s no doubt that it can rule the IT industry in 2021.
However, as the IT industry constantly evolves and experiences changes, DevOps should improve methods to ensure rapid results. One of the key problems with DevOps is that there is a lack of focus on security. This needs to change in 2021 as cybersecurity will continue to evolve even as most of the world enters a post-COVID-19 era. Cybercriminals are ready to take advantage of whatever may happen next. This will keep security teams trying to catch up and stay ahead.
So, the next step towards increasing efficiency throughout an application lifecycle is to include security throughout this process, thereby adopting a DevSecOps approach.
DevSecOps combines development, security and operations and puts heavy emphasis on security checks throughout the development process. The inclusion of security throughout the process has become a great asset in a world where cyber threats are becoming more frequent and more sophisticated. Simply put, DevSecOps seeks to merge security into DevOps. This can be helpful for a business seeking both rapid and secure growth.
Wrapping up
Hope this article has helped you bust some of the myths around DevOps and has improved your understanding of DevOps. Implementing DevOps can help your organization to improve productivity and create better products. Organizations will have to continue pivoting in 2021, for DevOps to stay afloat and flourish. It will be more important than ever for teams to collaborate and work together. And this not only involves professionals in development and operations, but also those in security.
