DevOps Implementation Review
Looking to enhance your DevOps practices?
Our DevOps implementation review provides a holistic view of your current state, making it simpler to identify growth opportunities. We’ve designed 41 multiple-choice questions related to all the DevOps aspects, from environments and CI/CD to dockerization and SRE.
The results from the assessment can help you in different ways:
✔️Getting an overall picture of how well DevOps practices have been adopted in your organization
✔️Documenting your internal DevOps processes, standards, and guidelines
✔️Developing DevOps strategies to enhance your product
✔️Creating specific tasks to assign to your technical team
✔️Defining requirements when hiring outside DevOps contractors
The assessment takes about 30 minutes. An understanding of technical processes is required to ensure the most accurate results.
While the maximum 205 score serves as a benchmark, deviations don’t necessarily indicate problems. The true value of DevOps lies in the alignment of your efforts with business goals and technical needs.
Environments
Environments are the different stages where your software applications are set up and run. Typically, there are separate environments for developing the code, testing it, and running the final version for real users.
Environment definition
1. The main environments in DevOps are development (dev), production (prod/live), and testing. The dev environment is where developers write and change the code. Next, the code is deployed to the testing environment to check if everything works correctly. The final code is deployed to the prod environment, where the actual app is run for end customers.
2. All the environments must have exactly the same configurations. If they aren’t identical, it can lead to major problems like lost productivity and even service downtime.
3. Enabling this configuration consistency requires thorough documentation of each environment.
1. Project environments exist for
2. All environments have identical configurations
3. Documentation is complete for
Infrastructure
DevOps infrastructure includes all the hardware and software components required to build, test, and run your apps, such as servers, cloud databases, infrastructure services, and more.
Infrastructure as code
4. Good DevOps implementation practices aim to treat the entire infrastructure layer as flexible code that can be repeatedly deployed, updated, and torn down using automated processes. This approach is called infrastructure as code (IaC).
5. With IaC, all files defining your infrastructure setup should be versioned and stored in a version control system. Versioning these infrastructure configs lets you track who modified the code and why. It also enables the rebuilding identical environments from specific versioned configuration files.
4. Infrastructure as code is used for provisioning
5. Infrastructure configurations are version-controlled
Provisioning Automation
6. With manual provisioning, setting up a new environment or making changes to existing infrastructure is a time-consuming process.
7. However, when your infrastructure is fully defined as code and you leverage provisioning automation tools, you can radically speed up resource provisioning.
6. Infrastructure can be provisioned in a
7. Provisioning of resoures is automated for
Change Management
8. Any modifications made to your infrastructure should be tracked using version control systems. This allows you to see what has changed, when, and by whom, making it easier to manage and roll back if needed.
9. Before any changes are made, there must be an approval process involving stakeholders. This way, you can ensure changes won’t cause disruptions.
10. If a change does cause a problem or needs to be undone for other reasons, you should be able to easily revert to the previous state. The more automation you have, the faster you can roll back a change with minimal disruption.
8. Changes to infrastructure are version-controlled
9. Approval and review processes for making changes apply to
10. Any changes can be roll backed in
Documentation
11. By documenting your DevOps infrastructure, you can make sure everyone on the team is on the same page. Newcomers can get up to speed quickly by reading through the documents. And when something breaks, extensive documentation helps you understand what went wrong and how to fix it.
11. Documentation is present and actual for
Resource Utilization
12. If you don’t use resources efficiently, it makes capacity planning way harder. You can't accurately forecast future needs as traffic grows. You can also waste your budget on capacity you don't need. Optimizing resource utilization lets you only pay for what you actually use.
12. Resources usage is optimized for
Continuous integration
Continuous integration (CI) involves combining code changes from multiple developers into one shared codebase or repository. Whenever developers finish writing new code, they send changes to be automatically merged with the latest code from other developers.
CI Pipelines
13. When developers add new code changes to the central codebase, CI pipelines start running. They put the integrated code through a series of steps and checks, like unit and integration testing and deployment to staging environments.
14. As part of the CI pipeline process, developers' code changes get packaged into deployable artifacts. These could be executable files, container images, or Java packages— whatever bundled format is needed to run your app.
15. Different teams may be working on new features, bug fixes, and other changes simultaneously. A branch strategy offers structure, so you don’t have to assign all that work to a single branch.
13. Pipelines are defined for
14. Registry for the artifacts is configured for
15. Branch strategy is used across
Automated Testing
16.Automated testing plays a critical role in validating code changes before they progress any further. The CI pipeline automatically executes these tests as part of the defined workflow, so there’s no need to manually run different test suites.
17. Test coverage is the percentage of your codebase that is actually covered by your automated test suites.
16. Automated testing is done for
17. The lowest test coverage for appication is
Continuous delivery
Continuous delivery (CD) starts where CI leaves off. Once your CI pipelines have validated and compiled your latest code changes into a production-ready build, CD focuses on deploying these changes to live environments.
Deployment Automation
18. Instead of manually doing tasks like connecting to servers, running scripts, restarting services, etc., you simply trigger the automated deployment pipeline.
19. Release deployment time is the timeframe needed to deploy a new release or update to your apps. With an automated deployment, the time required is significantly shorter compared to manual deployments.
20. With proper CD automation, rolling back to the previous working version is a straightforward and relatively quick process.
18. Deployment process is automated for
19. Usually to deploy a new release it takes
20. In case of failure new release can be rolled back in
Monitoring and logging
In any software system, it's necessary to have visibility into what's actually happening — how apps perform, where issues occur, etc. That's where monitoring and logging come into play.
Log Management
21. In any complex system, you’ll have a massive amount of log data constantly generated from different apps, services, and infrastructure components. The goal of log management is to centralize and analyze streams of log output.
21. Logs are collected and centralized for
Performance Metrics
22. Performance metrics are used to track and measure your apps’ performance from a user's perspective. They give you insight into the real user experience. Some examples of performance metrics are response times, error rates, and page load times (for customer-facing apps).
23. Your monitoring system should constantly check these metrics. If it finds a problem based on your alert rules, it will automatically notify your team.
22. Key performance metrics are configured for
23. Alerts and notifications are configured for
Backups and recovery
You constantly make changes to your systems. But what if something breaks? With backups and recovery processes, you can keep your services running smoothly, even when issues pop up.
Data Backup Strategy
24. A backup strategy outlines your overall approach to protecting data through backups. It defines the key policies around backing up your assets, such as the level of automation involved, how frequently backups occur, backup retention periods, how you implement testing, and more.
A backup strategy should ideally be applied to all systems. If it’s not feasible due to resource constraints or other limitations, it should at least be implemented for the most critical apps.
25. A data backup is a safety precaution to ensure that if something happens to your original data, you have a backup version. When automated, your backups happen like clockwork. You gain peace of mind that your data is safely backed up, day after day.
26. The ideal backup frequency depends on how frequently your data changes and how much data you can afford to potentially lose if a restore is required.
27. Even if backups are successfully created, you won't know if they’re reliable until you attempt to restore from them. Regular testing ensures your backups are functional when you need them.
24. Backup strategy is in place for
25. Backup process is
26. Backups are performed
27. Backups are tested
Disaster Recovery Plan
28. A disaster recovery plan describes procedures for how your organization will respond to unplanned incidents that cause data to become unusable or inaccessible.
29. The recovery time can range from a few hours to several days or even weeks, depending on your system complexity and the effectiveness of your disaster recovery plan. Shorter recovery times are better, as they minimize disruption to your business.
30. Regular recovery plan testing can help identify gaps in your plan and refine the recovery procedures. It also helps ensure your team can execute the plan in an actual disaster scenario.
28. Disaster recovery plan is implemented for
29. You recover from a catastrophic failure in
30. Recovery testing is done
Security and authentication
In DevOps, security isn’t an afterthought. DevSecOps bakes security practices into the software development from the ground up.
DevSecOps Practices
31. Allowing open access to sensitive data online puts you at major risk of data breaches, so it's important to restrict unauthorized access across all resources.
32. Strong passwords typically mix uppercase, lowercase, numbers, and special characters. Password policies require regular password changes, reuse prevention, the use of an approved password management tool, and more. The best practice is to use strong passwords and policies consistently across every system to maximize security.
31. Sensitive data can be accessed via public internet from
32. Strong passwords and password policies are used for
Dockerization and K8s
Dockerization refers to packaging and isolating your app code and all its dependencies into standardized units called containers.
Kubernetes, or K8s for short, is a system that automates containerized applications' deployment, scaling, and management across a cluster of hosts.
Applications dockerization
33. Dockerization enables consistent, dependable operation in any environment, regardless of the underlying infrastructure.
33. Dockerization is done for
K8s readiness
34. K8s promotes separating application code from deployment configurations. This way, you can divide dev (code) and ops (config) responsibilities and be flexible in reusing the same container image with different configurations.
35. When you run apps on Kubernetes, it's important to have a way to signal when your app is truly ready to start receiving live traffic. This is what readiness checks or readiness probes mean.
36. Another central K8s capability is horizontal scaling, which automatically increases or decreases the number of running instances for an app. As the load increases, it can automatically spin up more instances. When demand declines, K8s scales back down.
34. Configuration is separated from the code for
35. Liveness, readiness probes can be easily set for
36. Horisontal scaling is applicable to
Cost optimization
When your cost is optimized, you get a high value from the resources you pay for. The goal is to avoid wasteful spending while still ensuring you have sufficient capacity to meet your app needs.
Resource Allocation
37. Reasonable resource allocation lets you avoid paying for excessive resource capacity. For example, you may have expensive licensed software just being unused.
38. With right-sizing, you can allocate the appropriate amount of resources for any given workload or environment — not too little, but not too much.
37. Resource allocation is checked for
38. Rightsizing is done for
Cost Tracking and Reporting
39. Yet, knowing when to right-size without cost tracking can be challenging. You need dashboards showing your spending on databases, tools, etc. With detailed cost reports, you can see which resources are underutilized and costing extra.
39. Costs are tracked and known for
Support and SRE
In any software system, you're bound to run into incidents from time to time. Site reliability engineering (SRE) focuses on your production systems' resilience and scalability. With SRE, you benefit from increased automation, robust monitoring and observability, and a culture of continuous improvement. Learn more about SRE services from IT Outposts.
Incident Response
40. Having an incident resposne process documented means there’s a written plan that details the roles and responsibilities of different team members, the communication channels to be used, the actions to be taken, and any other protocols.
41. A big part of SRE is setting clear targets for reliability. This involves defining service level indicators (SLIs) — measurable signals like error rates, latency, etc.
Based on SLIs, you establish service level objectives (SLOs) — the target thresholds and standards for acceptable reliability. For example, "service must sustain a less than 1% error rate over any 30 days."
When you combine SLOs with operations consequences, you have service level agreements (SLAs) that contractually bind reliability commitments between providers and customers.
Incident response practices aim to detect, respond to, and recover from any unplanned events or degradations that potentially violate defined SLOs and SLAs.
40. Incident response process is documented and set up for
41. SLO, SLA and SLI can be easily configured for
FAQ
What is DevOps implementation review?
DevOps implementation review is a deep look at how well a company is using DevOps methods. Experts check the tools, processes, team collaboration, and overall mindset. They point out what’s working well and what needs improvement on the DevOps journey.
What is the best DevOps implementation process?
There’s no one-size-fits-all approach. The best process depends on the company’s specific needs and goals. But a good approach is to start small with a pilot project. Build a culture of collaboration and automation. Slowly bring in the right tools and tech. And keep measuring and improving along the way.
What are the consequences of not using the DevOps approach?
Not using DevOps can create some problems. Software delivery cycles get slower, and there are more risks of errors and failures. Teams don’t communicate well, and there are many manual, repetitive tasks. In addition, you may lack visibility into processes, and it becomes hard to adapt to market changes quickly. In the end, efficiency and product quality suffer, and it’s harder to compete.