Adopting DevOps is a must for companies looking to stay ahead of the innovation curve. However, with the increased speed and efficiency provided by DevOps, comes great responsibility.
Here are 6 DevOps mistakes to look out for in your IT department:
1. Choosing Speed Over Quality
Many executives new to DevOps become too focused on the speed of the application release and allow things to be rushed out the door with little to no testing. IT executives need to work closely with developers, operators, and database administrators to find the happy balance between speed, quality and safety. If not, the application can be prone to be error, and the database can be left vulnerable to a data breach.
2. Testing At The End Of The Production Lifecycle
Testing does not have to wait until the end of the production lifecycle! This will only lead to unpleasant surprises (glitches) and unnecessary drama for everyone involved. With modern, open-sourced tools and domain-specific languages, developer driven performance testing is now possible.
Developers are taking responsibility using low-volume performance tests to examine functionality and performance via API endpoints. These become building blocks for automated integration, deployment and post-production tests. In addition, a multitude of tests can be run simultaneously, which is a major time saver.
3. Limiting the Tools Developers Use
In organizations with large IT departments, DevOps team members may struggle under the single company-wide set of tools. Properly understood and implemented, DevOps allows for companies to set up smaller, self-sufficient teams that run on their own, with constant inter- and intra-communication between all teams and project groups. This way, each unit can set up DevOps and continuous delivery tools that work for them and meet their needs.
4. Assuming Tools Aren’t Compatible
The use of open-source tools have become common among developers, with most developers having a or several favorite tools that they use consistently. Many database DevOps tools are now compatible with one another, especially with a unified orchestration framework in place, that allow for different tools to be a part of a single, unified DevOps tool chain without restricting choice.
5. Not Sharing Responsibility
With DevOps, the roles and responsibilities of the development and operations teams are at best fluid and at worst ill-defined. The willingness to collaborate and get your hands dirty in tasks not previously included in your job description therefore is paramount to success.
Consider for example the responsibility of creating unified and high performing teams. This all-important task – integral to the break down the silos created by the waterfall system – falls on everyone’s shoulders, from the CIO to the DBA.
6. Forgetting About the Database
One fundamental fixture of the IT eco-system – often overlooked when adopting DevOps – is the database. The reason the database so often lags behind is because of a mistrust for automated database development. With a well-structured, intelligently implemented, and totally transparent automation infrastructure that mistrust is unfounded.
When IT organizations marry automated code to manual database processes, the entire development lifecycle gets delayed. There are no ifs ands or buts about it. DevOps needs to be applied across departments and across the entire software eco-system to work. As such, smart database automation is not only possible, but essential to the success of your broader DevOps program.
Putting It All Together to Avoid DevOps Mistakes
The most important way to best implement continuous integration strategies is by avoiding the DevOps mistakes. Of course, you’re never really finished avoiding mistakes. That said, start with those mistakes outlined above. If you can successfully avoid these, you’re already ahead of the game.
Changing organizational processes via DevOps will allows for safe automation that leads to rapid, error-free releases. But in order for the DevOps methodology to achieve peak performance, the database must not be left behind.
DevOps needs continuous improvement, so what are the 7 signs that you are mishandling it? Check out our post to find out.
