In 2008, Patrick DuBois and Andrew Clay Schafer made this connection between Development and operation practices which were separate concepts at the time and later Patrick coined the term “DevOps”. DevOps brings speed to the Agile practices and Agile brings adaptability to change. Together they drive customer satisfaction, growth, and a great user experience.

Agile as a concept works at its best when we are dealing with small-size teams which can work in close proximity to each other. Scaling Agile to large-scale organizations has its own challenges which require certain additional development practices to be adapted for scaling the Agile culture to scale it. 

DevOps as a culture on the other hand is built for scale and has been field-tested for a while in and around that.

As per the 14th State of the Agile report, a majority of the companies survey has already started to make a shift to the DevOps in an Agile software development team. A significant portion of the respondent also found the transformation to be very important and relevant.

What is Agile?

Changing requirements are a nemesis to any software project. The project team picks up the requirements, analyzes and designs the solution, implementation is halfway through and BOOM!… the requirements changed. Start all over again. 

Agile tries to address the problem of adaptability to changing requirements by not doing big plans and designs upfront but rather in small increments and short cycles of analysis, design, implementation, and testing to deliver value without overshooting the cost for adapting to changing scope. The teams are kept small in size and the iterations are kept small which makes calibration and changing fast and effortless. 

Agile Manifesto

The Agile Manifesto consists of 12 Agile principles put together by the stalwarts of software development. It tries to resolve some of the biting problems of the time. At its heart, the Agile manifesto is based on the following values:

1. Prefer individuals and interactions between them over tools and processes 
2. Working software should be preferred over documentation
3. Collaboration with customer for better feedback should be preferred over contracts 
4. Respond to change rather than follow a fixed plan

The 12 principles of Agile which were jotted down in the snowbird summit became the guidelines for the Agile software development paradigm. 

Agile Methods

Agile software development is an umbrella term that we use to designate a set of practices that gives us better adaptability to changing scope of the project. But within Agile, there are different schools of practices [ methods ] which has slightly different and often competing views of things

Kent Beck developed Xtreme Programming [ XP ] had a view somewhat in line with >  Requirements gathering isn’t a phase that produces a static document, but an activity producing detail, just before it is needed, throughout development.

Mike Cohn developed scrum which is more about the way we execute than anything else, scrum do not involve any big design or plan but rather happens in incremental short, and well-defined steps 

Mary and Tom Poppendieck are attributed to the development of Lean revolves around the idea of reducing wasteful products or by-products from the development process. This should eventually lead up to a more efficient development process. 

What is DevOps?

Historically the development, operations, quality, and security teams have worked in silos and this needs to change for faster adaptability to change and faster feedback. This has been the driving force behind DevOps which is a set of practices that ties the independent sets of executions into a continuous flow of steps which allows for better change management for the project and also faster feedback. The loop symbolized the continuous nature of the development process. 

In an interview published by JAVA magazine in 2015, Patrick DeBois mentioned that before DevOps came into existence it was difficult to have an overview or a complete picture of what is actually happening within the development and the deployment process. Debugging, monitoring and profiling used to be a lot harder to execute. Due to the lack of insight into the overall process of building the system and deployment, it was hard for the engineering and the operations team to resolve the issues early on. This made Patrick believe that there has to be a way to combine the two separate disciples together and make things better for everyone. This is when Patrick DeBois coined the word ‘DevOps’.

Continuous improvement is the foundation stone for building good products and there is nothing like prompt and early feedback, this is exactly what DevOps brings to the table.

DevOps Culture

DevOps is not just a set of practices or tools but rather has a cultural tone to it. It is the way people in the organizations think or collaborate and the way organizations like to approach their solutions engineering process. 

Collaboration is at the heart of DevOps, different teams, practices, and processes come together. As a result, a merger of process, priorities, expertise, and corners is typical in this scenario. They work together for the planning, execution, and feedback from the issues. It introduces a different dimension to the problem-solving ability of the team and the organization as a whole. 

DevOps teams tend to shorten the release cadence and the feedback cycle. This helps in adapting to change and catering to issues much faster. In the pre-DevOps era, Risk Management was a complex process because project teams uncovered challenges and issues in the process very late. This changed with the DevOps culture which works on the fundamentals of an incremental process. 

Benefits of the DevOps Culture

Continuous learning and innovation are two of the most critical outcomes of the DevOps culture. The feedback cycle also leads to a growth mindset at an organizational scale. 

Better governance, security, compliance, and innovation are the cornerstones of a thriving DevOps culture. Accountability, quality, and performance are some of the outcomes which have obvious benefits to the overall success of the project. DevOps process results in faster development, better feedback to build mature products, and elevated customer satisfaction. 

Finally, it also has a positive business impact due to: 

• Faster time to market because last-minute surprises are minimized and less rework
• Adaptability to market and competition 
• Reduced recovery time

DevOps Practices 

It is not just enough to build the DevOps culture in the organization. However, is also the practices that need to be in place and baked into the development lifecycle of the product. 

1. Continuous Integration and Continuous Delivery [CI/CD] 

The idea of continuous integration and continuous delivery is arguably the most prominent pillars of the DevOps practices. The idea of continuous integration revolves around the concept of automating the workflow of development to delivery from code check-in to production or staging. This brings down the cost of the change and also quick feedback to minimize the last-minute reworks. This also brings down the risk and makes updates pretty seamless. 

2. Version Control 

The idea of version control helps to maintain revisions and versions of the work artifacts. This makes managing rollbacks, merges, and conflicts like a breeze. The version control is possibly the most prominent collaboration tool that is currently in the state of practice. As a result, dividing the work while connected by distinct projects becomes easy. 

3. Agile Software Development 

DevOps and Agile go hand in hand to deal with today’s fast paces software development. Small upfront design, short iterative steps, and constant feedback allows for easy integration of updates and changes in requirements. Makes learning and adapting to change easy. In fact, DevOps culture and practices are the major support systems for the Agile development team.

4. Monitoring

Software in today’s world is a living and breathing system. It is alive. Monitoring tools and techniques allows for logging, analysis, profiling, and visualizing the entire software, databases and data flow for the entire end-to-end workflow. DevOps allows us to generate meaningful and actionable insights along with alerts in a real-time fashion. 

5. Security 

Security is an integral part of the DevOps culture and practice. It is almost impossible to add security as an ad hoc increment to the existing system. Hence, we need to start from day one. So, security has a major impact on the analysis, design, implementation, and testing of any modern system. It needs special handling and checking at many places. DevOps is the perfect candidate to make policy enforcements automated and error-free. 

6. Infrastructure Management 

The severs, routers, domain name servers, load balancers need to be managed, provisioned, and monitored to keep the infrastructure in place. For the software to do its job and also reduce the risk in deploying new features and improvements. We use configuration management tools to monitor and track infrastructure state and avoid drifts before it turns into a disaster. 

Conclusion

Agile and DevOps belong together as partners. It bring about the cultural change which has taken the software industry by storm. Once organizations understand the core values, principles, and practices then they can leverage the full potential of an effective Agile DevOps integration in combination.

EngineerBabu is an expert team of DevOps in following Agile Software Development model. If you are having and business idea or planning to take your business online. You can contact us and share your ideas with us. Our expert team of developers are here to assist you and take your business idea live.

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DevOps generates the results in simplifying the organizational task to make it more dynamic, flexible, and effective. This simplification of the process is required to check on every aspect of the organization. Its ever-growing organization utilizes too many resources and restores the overall flexibility of the development team.

To sustain the Software Development industry, one needs to learn new skills at a regular interval to get updated and beat the competition. Apart from that, it might be possible that DevOps Engineers need to do the coding from scratch, that’s why they need to know about it. Therefore, a variety of DevOps Scripting Languages required to be picked by the DevOps.

Here, let us take a look at popular DevOps Scripting Tools/Languages to help you get started.

Languages for Scripting in DevOps

1. Python Scripting in DevOps: In IT Infrastructure, Python has become an all-purpose language. It is required to build Cloud Infrastructure Projects like OpenStack. It also supports Web Applications through Framework like Django. Python is a great language platform that can offer a wide range of uses.
   Therefore, Python is considered as the first DevOps scripting language you should learn. The 3 main reasons behind the popularity of Python as a starter for scripting in DevOps are;
   1. Easy to Learn: Frankly speaking, no language is so easy that you will become an expert in Python overnight. However, relatively Python is easier to start learning with as compared to other languages. The syntax used in Python is more “human-readable” than the lower-level languages. Hence, you can build something valuable without learning the intricacies of Object-Oriented Programming.
   2. Enables Automation: The main aim of DevOps Scripting is to automate the work. The maximum elimination of manual work is always good. So, in this respect, Python can help implement CI/CD (Continuous Integration / Continuous Delivery) or configuration management efforts with various DevOps tools like Jenkins, Chef, and Ansible.
   3. Areas where Python can be used: Python can be used to develop the Business Application like ERP. It comes with inbuilt libraries to handle the Internet Protocol like HTML, JSON, and XML. Python can also be used to develop user interfaces.
2. Bash Scripting: Bash is one of the most frequently used Unix Shell Scripting and provides good support. Bash Scripting and Shell Scripting languages support thousands of Linux systems around the world. As well as, it is available for Windows and Mac Operating Systems too.
   Bash Scripting is a POSIX-compliant shell but is available with several extensions. Though Bash Scripting is an implementation of the POSIX.2 shell specification, as well as there, are areas where the usual default behavior differs.
   The command shell programming and shell scripting language of Bash is used to automate the process of ‘N’ number of Linux Servers around the world.
3. Ruby: Ruby is another DevOps Scripting language that offers a lot of versatility. Likewise, Python is another DevOps Scripting tool to start learning. It is commonly used for Web Development, but it is also an excellent tool for IT Infrastructure.
   It provides a flexible approach towards programming as the DevOps can make numerous alterations in the parts of scripting to fulfill the requirements. Many IT Infrastructure projects use Ruby, as ManagelQ is a Ruby on Rails App.
   The amount of flexibility Ruby provides, which makes this a great skill to add for DevOps Automation Scripts. As it gives DevOps more freedom when it comes to writing codes. Apart from that, Ruby has many other features as well, like any other conventional programming languages.
   Originally the Ruby implementation was done in the form of Matz’s Ruby Interpreter (MRI). However, there are many other ways of implementation as well i.e., JRuby, MagLev, IronRuby, MacRuby, mruby, HotRuby, Topaz, and Opal.
4. JavaScript: JavaScript is used as DevOps Scripting to create network-centric applications. It is a lightweight and Interpreted DevOps Scripting Language. Due to which, earlier, it was named LightScript, but its name was changed by Netscape as JavaScript.
   JavaScript is hugely preferred by the DevOps due to its numerous advantages like less server interaction, increased interactivity, immediate feedback to the visitors, richer interfaces. In recent days, this DevOps Programming Language is also being used in Mobile App Development, Game Development, and Desktop App Development.
   Overall, the ecosystem of JavaScript Framework and Project continues to grow at a very rapid pace. It ranges from Client-side JavaScript to Server-side Frameworks, a great range of Internet runs over JavaScript.
   Though, JavaScript is not as flexible as Python, despite that JavaScript is benefited from a vast user base. With this, we can infer that there is a large community to benefit from it and having plenty of JavaScript projects as well to work on it.
5. C/C++: C/C++ both are High-Level Programming Languages. As you will be amazed to learn that C++ is the third most used and popular language after C Language and Java. If an agile DevOps is looking to create high-performance, optimized code then, C/C++ would be a great choice for you.
   However, it may lead to a number of challenges in implementing C/C++ DevOps environments. It may also give a representation that the compiled codebases are often too large and not very portable.
   Without a doubt, during all these years, many DevOps Programming Languages have come and gone. Still, C Language has remained one of the most popular programming languages of more than half a century.
   Though C/C++ both have few pros and cons, yet it remains the most learned language among the DevOps.
   Pros – C/C++ offers fast and high performance and works as a foundation for modern computing.
   Cons – It’s size is comparatively larger than languages like Go or Ruby in magnitude. Therefore, it requires more compilation time in C/C++. The Application Binaries produced by C are not portable.
6. Go: The Go DevOps Scripting tool was introduced in 2009 and has made quite a good impact in the market since its inception. DevOps Programming Language ‘Go’ was built on the foundation of C Language. The designers of Go, DevOps Programming Language, were more focused on making a statically typed language that is easy for humans to read but can also work well at scale.

The language is a wonderful choice of programming language for DevOps as it offers excellent performance. Unlike C Language, it is a very portable language and handles concurrency as well.

The only drawback Go is facing is that it is new in the market and lack of track record. Because not many DevOps are familiar with this language. However, it doesn’t mean the language is not good for DevOps. It is a very good language and useful language for DevOps.

Overall it is a good technology for DevOps to learn as it easily supports a number of important web technologies, such as Kubernetes, Docker, and others as well.

How is DevOps making IT Infrastructure more Scalable?

In technical terms, talking about scalability means defining the exact capability of the system. As well as, it can easily increase to accommodate the ever-changing needs of the world. With the evolving trend and customer dependency on your service makes it mandatory to ensure scalability. It may make you redesign or rethink your processes and system in a different manner.

With the market evolution, the demands of customers are also evolving rapidly. Hence, to attract new customers, the prime focus of IT companies is to prepare comprehensive strategies that can focus on scalability.

Hence, for companies, it would be a great call to invest in DevOps related time and dollars. So, to analyze how the DevOps are making IT Infrastructure more Scalable, here are a few points that can assist in creating a scalable, secure, and high-performance deployment.

1. Proper Monitoring: While performing any task or working on any project, it is imperative to keep an eye over every small or big change. So, the sooner you catch a problem, the easier it will get fixed and can minimize the damages. By continuously monitoring the DevOps can work effectively and can also get instant updates over any type of issues like bugs, errors, or situations that could cause the product to crash. With this monitoring, one can easily cut down and save their costly technical debts.
2. Collaboration and Organization: DevOps usually depends on the ability of the Agile DevOps teams and the IT Operations team to collaborate properly in an ongoing manner. Collaborative work ensures the proper solutions are to be done and to be delivered faster and more efficiently. The proper collaboration and organized way of working in IT infrastructure will present the operational personal and their capability as an art.
3. Proper Deployment: After having proper monitoring and collaboration, it requires the proper deployment of codes. The continuous deployment allows the release of code into production automatically after completion of the Testing Phase successfully. It is one of the ways to improve the quality of the software in real-time. This always allows users to access the latest version of the product.
4. Automate Everything: The smart and Agile DevOps can easily recognize that manual processes work negatively for fast value delivery, safety, and high productivity. However, automation is not only about saving time and money. Automation enables the creation of quick processes for repeatable environments. Hence, this becomes easy to understand, improve, secure, and audit. Automation also eases the process of learning and response to market demand and customer feedback.
   Application and Agile Life cycle management tools make a standardized environment for communication and collaboration between the DevOps Team and related groups.
   Automated Testing tools include unit testing, acceptance testing, load testing, and performance testing.
5. Lean Flow: Agile DevOps and trained used to strive to achieve a continuous state of flow. Visualized and limited Work in Progress helps the team to identify the bottleneck situation and manage the amount of work in progress on the available development and operations capability.
   Another way to improve the workflow is to minimize the batch sizes of the work. Small batches in the system can move fast into the system with less variability. It also supports faster learning and frequent deployments. This eventually led to investment in maintaining IT Infrastructure and automation, which automatically reduces the transactional cost of each batch.
6. Automatic Data Backup: Automatic updation of critical data ensures the security and the integrity of your services. Automated data backup implementation and restoration process or your IT infrastructure to protect your code and save your time and expense, which will require to recreate the things again and exactly the same.
7. Ease of Use: Scripting in DevOps is overall about the data automation and repetitiveness. However, there are few tools that are capable of automating the building and configuration of VMs. So, make sure the tools go hand-in-hand with your available resources. As a matter of fact, at the end of the day, it is only about how you make your product installation and configuration process easier.
8. Enables Low-Risk Release: In order to support the continuous delivery pipeline and the concept of release on demand. The system needs to be designed for the low-risk component or the service-based releasability, deployability, and instant recovery from operational failure. However, there are a few more techniques that support fast recovery.
   1. ‘Stop-the-line’ mentality: The ‘stop-the-line’ mentality allows everyone to focus on it until the problem gets resolved. When there is an issue with the continuous delivery pipeline or the deployed solution, this method needs to be applied. This turns findings into improvements that are integrated into the process or product to prevent the problem from getting repeated in the future.
   2. Plan for and Rehearse Failures: When we talk about large IT infrastructure, failure is guaranteed despite small industries where failure can be considered as an option. However, going with a proactive approach while experiencing the failure will definitely increase the team’s response practice and lead them to be attentive as well.
   3. Build Capable Environment to fix forward or rollback: There is no doubt that any DevOps doesn’t commit any mistake or error. Due to this mistake, the server may fail. Hence, the team needs the capability to fix the issues quickly, and wherever it is necessary, it can roll back to a prior known good state.

Goals for Scripting in DevOps

From a project planning to the project delivery, the major goal of DevOps always remains to improve collaboration during the period by developing and automating the continuous delivery pipelines. To achieve the targets, the DevOps need to follow the following goals:

1. Improve the quality and increase the frequency of deployments.
2. Improve innovation and risk-taking by making it safe to experiment.
3. Releases faster time to the market.
4. Improves the quality of the solution provided and minimizes the lead required to fix the issue.
5. Reduce the serious issue arousal and frequency of failures in the released product.
6. Improve the Mean Time of Recovery (MTTR).

The DevOps is becoming more and more popular and in-demand with each passing day. So, it is important for each DevOps to add the appropriate programming skills, which can be a great advantage to your career. You are not supposed to learn every language, but having to grab over a skill set is important. Though having an appropriate language skill grab can lead you to a good company and become a good developer. A good developer can prove to be a great asset to the company and can also grab the opportunity to work over a variety of projects. Apart from that, it can enhance your skills and contribute appropriately to the growth of the company.

If you are equipped with such skills then we can work together or if you are looking for experienced and highly-skilled DevOps Scripting Engineers to develop or transform your business then EngineerBabu is a great destination for you. You can hire DevOps Engineers at a very affordable price and experience the quality services. Feel free to contact us at any time.

Also Read:

• Check out the latest 10 DevOps Monitoring Tools (2020)
• What is the Role of DevOps engineer in your Business?
• 10 Tips to Remember while Hiring DevOps Engineer

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