Weekly Top 10: The How-To’s of DevOps and Containers

Check out the original post on the Electric Cloud blog. 

Welcome to another round-up of the latest news in DevOps, Agile and Continuous Delivery. In this week’s blog, we are reminded that many organizations are still just starting their DevOps journey, and need help identifying and adopting best practices. Several of the recent news items have focused on breaking down how-to’s and best practices for DevOps, containers, and more. For those searching for more advanced reads, this week’s top news also dives into concepts like IT infrastructure agility and zero-friction PaaS.

Continue reading for more on the latest modern software delivery news and trends, and, as always, stay tuned to all the news coming from @ElectricCloud on DevOps and Continuous Delivery throughout the week.

1) DevOps: The Key to IT Infrastructure Agility

By Thomas Delaet and Ling Lau | Published on @mckinsey
http://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/digital-mckinsey/our-insights/digital-blog/devops-the-key-to-it-infrastructure-agility   

These days, digital grabs a lot of headlines that trumpet how it’s radically changing customer behaviors. This typically means that IT departments have to deliver new features faster even in the face of more demanding requirements for availability (24/7) and security. DevOps promises to do exactly that, by fostering a high degree of collaboration across the full IT value chain (from business, over development, operations, and IT infrastructure). But there’s a problem.

2) Microservices and DevOps Accelerate API-First Movement

By @jlouvel | Published on @JAXenterCOM
https://jaxenter.com/microservices-devops-api-first-132836.html  

API-first software offers companies a way to distribute their software between client and server parts using the HTTP protocol, get agreement on client requirements before implementing the server, parallelize the implementation of client and server parts, allows more efficient test automation of this software compared to UI testing or server-side testing, and improves overall continuous delivery of software in production.

3) Cloud-Based DevOps Tools Are Ripening Quickly

By @ChrisCondo2017| Published on @forrester
https://www.forrester.com/report/CloudBased+DevOps+Tools+Are+Ripening+Quickly/-/E-RES137388

Over the past year, the four major public cloud vendors (Amazon Web Services [AWS], IBM, Google, and Microsoft) have made big strides toward integrating development and operations (DevOps) tools with their platform-as-a-service (PaaS) offerings. It’s now possible to have a complete cloud-based DevOps tool chain. This report examines continuous delivery (CD) tool chains and provides guidance to application development and delivery (AD&D) pros looking to think outside the box when implementing and managing DevOps.

4) How to Implement DevOps: 5 Tips for Doing It Right

By @AlisonDeNisco | Published on @ZDNet
http://www.zdnet.com/article/how-to-implement-devops-5-tips-for-doing-it-right/ 

Enterprises are increasingly turning to DevOps as a way to deliver software and security updates more rapidly — both internally and to customers. But for many, actually implementing the new workflow remains challenging. “A lot of organizations have bought into the philosophy of DevOps — faster, more frequent releases, a collaborative culture, a cloud toolset, and the idea of automation,” said Elinor Klavens, a Forrester researcher serving infrastructure and operations professionals.

5) How to Apply DevOps Practices to Legacy IT

By @cliffsaran | Published on @ComputerWeekly
http://www.computerweekly.com/news/450416287/How-to-apply-DevOps-practices-to-legacy-IT

When Ticketmaster was established 41 years ago, its core software was written on a Vax minicomputer. Over time, its IT estate became more complex. The ticketing company acquired other businesses, taking on their IT, and moved with the times onto the web. The Vax still runs bits of Ticketmaster, albeit in the form of an emulated system rather than physical hardware, but it now has a raft of supporting software connected into it.

6) DevOps Delivers Savings and Speed, So Focus on Strategy

By @ErickaChick | Published on @TechBeaconCom
https://techbeacon.com/devops-delivers-savings-speed-so-focus-strategy

If there’s one thing that the DevOps community fetishizes, it’s speed. Release velocity is the glitziest measuring stick by which conference circuit speakers, case study writers, and DevOps evangelists can compare successes. In spite of all the chatter, though, the truth is that speed of delivery is only a secondary driver for many organizations. In fact, a recent survey released by YouGov shows that release velocity came in dead last among seven DevOps motivations.

7) What Admins Need to Know to Master Containerization Technology

By @DemitasseNZ | Published on @TechTarget
http://searchitoperations.techtarget.com/feature/What-admins-need-to-know-to-master-containerization-technology

Containers have inserted themselves into the IT conversation, and their usefulness is being discussed in ever-widening circles. While adoption has been limited so far, it seems clear that 2017 is going to see a lot more production deployment of applications in containers. Deploying anything into production, of course, is when the operations team gets involved — and they’re going to have questions.

8) Is Fear-Mongering Driving The Adoption of Microservices and Containers?

By @cameronmcnz| Published on @TSS_dotcom
http://www.theserverside.com/opinion/Questioning-the-advocacy-of-EIP-patterns-and-microservices-design

We’ve seen this all before. We’ve seen the industry get overwrought with high-profile thought leaders prognosticating about a beautiful future that will be brought to fruition if the patterns and the approaches they advocate are embraced across the board. And it always goes without saying that bringing their vision to reality means using the tools and leveraging the services of the vendor for whom these thought leaders work. As was said, we’ve seen this all before.

9)Examining The Internals of a Serverless Platform: Moving Towards a ‘Zero-Friction’ PaaS

By @sangramganguly, Diptanu Gon Choudhury, Andrew Michaelis & Ramakrishna Nemani | Published on @infoq
https://www.infoq.com/articles/serverless-internals

A common trend of application delivery over the last two decades has been a reduction in the time required to move from development to production. Moreover, on the operational side of the spectrum, the demand for higher availability, predictable latency and increased throughput of services has significantly increased. Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) architectures simplify how applications are deployed for developers and promise a ‘zero-touch’ operational experience thereby making application deployment faster and easier to scale.

10) Automation: Building The Future of Business

By Gavin Fell | Published on @ITProPortal
https://www.infoq.com/articles/quality-software-factors      

So far, it’s safe to say that the predominant trend in 21st-century business has been ‘digitalisation’. Every industry, organization, and individual has been touched by it one way or another. As we head towards 2020, we are moving to the next level of digitalisation. Now, what has already been digitalised will increasingly be automated – whether it’s the way we work, trade or connect with each other.

Want more DevOps, ARA, automation and other software delivery insights? The Electric Cloud blog brings you the knowledge!