Do You Need DevOps? We Answer 5 Questions That Will Help You Decide

“You should implement DevOps” – if you are a Product Manager, you have probably heard that a lot. But what exactly is DevOps? A solution that will make all your problems go away, or a buzzword? Do you really need it?

DevOps’ goal is to deliver reliable products, build and maintain highly available infrastructure, and get ideas to the market quickly. Sounds so good, that there is a chance that right now you are blushed of excitement. But when it comes to spending money, you start to wonder. How is it possible? Is DevOps a magician, who makes the development process easier by swinging the wand? Is there even someone called “DevOps”? What are the costs and benefits? Don’t worry – we are here to help.

1. What is DevOps

DevOps became a quite popular buzzword, so it’s natural that many companies are curious about it. Some of them even claim that they want to “do DevOps” or “Hire DevOps”, which proves that they are not curious enough. DevOps is not a service or a role. It is a working culture, in which Developers and Operation teams cooperate closely. Historically those teams had different goals – the first one tried to deliver changes, and the second did its best to keep everything’s steady. It worked, sure, but was slow and painful for both sides. There were lots of obstacles, so the efficiency flew away.

DevOps collaboration allows for delivering product to the market faster. Both teams participate in the project from the very beginning and share the same goals. It is also a culture of sharing knowledge and transferring competencies. Are you familiar with Agile? For development and operations teams, DevOps is what Agile was for Business and Development.

Moreover, DevOps is associated with smart automation of many processes. Eliminating repetitive, manual tasks makes development and maintenance easier, and at the same time, product becomes more reliable.

2. When Do You Know That Your Company Needs DevOps

There are simple indicators for that. First – when you notice that your competitors leave you behind. You can’t keep up with updates, implementing new features and providing users stable experience no matter how high the traffic is.

If your infrastructure is failing, you see that there is a need for more performance, and your velocity in delivering products could be better – say hello to DevOps. Another thing that should drive you towards DevOps, is… the lack of team spirit between developers and operations. If they are playing as two separate teams, hold their knowledge to themselves and have entirely different priorities, you should change something.

Have you ever wondered how it is possible, that giants like Facebook or Netflix release updates so quickly?

But what’s the real value here? Well, you probably want to increase the speed of software development and to deliver new versions of your product to the market faster. Have you ever wondered how it is possible, that giants like Facebook or Netflix release new versions and fixes for their products so quickly? It may even happen many times a day! And with literally billions of users, the scale is unimaginable! They wouldn’t be able to do this if they didn’t work in DevOps culture.

3. What Changes Happen in the Environment When an Organization Moves Towards DevOps?

DevOps introduces tools and workflow that let your team automate tasks. It starts with training of a team – making them more aware about issues, best practices, tools and the process itself. In DevOps methodology, development becomes a continuous process. Everyone has to understand it, which often requires changes in the teams’ point of view. The key to DevOps is a collaboration.

4. CI/DC: How DevOps Speed Up Development Work and Reduces Costs

The answer is simple: automate everything that’s possible and test as often as you can. You’ll reduce unneeded manual labor and will increase the quality of your product.

In DevOps culture, we have processes that address this problem. It’s called CI/CD, which stands for Continuous Integration and Continuous Delivery. Continuous Integration gives you the opportunity to test code changes in your product frequently. The automated process allows for a faster detection of errors. Developers have information on the quality of the code produced within a few minutes, so manufacturing costs are reduced.

» We know what we are talking about! Check out our DevOps services page

The second stage, usually associated with CI, is Continuous Delivery, which consists of providing the tested code in form of a functioning application for the environment, which will be able to carry out additional tests on it. This solution also translates directly to the speed of product delivery.

5. What Are the Costs?

We can divide costs into at least two groups – associated with tools and with improving competencies. Even if you use open-source solutions, you have to count on the cost of maintaining these tools. Do not forget about it – it is often an underestimated case, but also a thing that you should not save on.

Improving competences doesn’t only mean external training, but also internal knowledge transfer. It is essential to calculate an extra time of technical specialists for knowledge sharing. You won’t regret it – it’s natural for DevOps culture to share, and extremely beneficial.

DevOps: A Modern Working Culture

DevOps is a modern, smart and reliable way to handle development and operations. Working in DevOps culture guarantees better collaboration, knowledge-sharing and higher efficiency in comparison to traditional methods.

This article is only a tip of the iceberg – we wanted to explain the basics and help you decide if you need to apply DevOps in your company. If you already know the benefits of DevOps, head over to our DevOps services page for a more detailed look, and contact us if you need any help.

This article is based on a webinar that we hosted with Sumeru Solutions – one of our partners. If you want to know even more about DevOps and how does it connect to security, check out the recording of the webinar.