Preface
Both DevOps and the Scaled Agile Framework® (SAFe®) are about extending agility beyond the team.
DevOps looks to extend agility beyond the “traditional” boundary of development to include the deployment and release of the development to a production environment. This includes what to do if the new changes developed introduce failures in the production environment, activities typically done by operations teams.
SAFe® strives to extend an Agile mindset to products that require multiple teams to develop and maintain. In this paradigm, alignment and the ability to properly execute delivery and release are among the important factors for success. Both these factors are encouraged by DevOps. It is for this reason that to implement SAFe, you need to make sure that DevOps is implemented as well.
This book looks at the DevOps approach used in the SAFe. While there are practices specific to SAFe, many of the concepts, practices, and theories we introduce for DevOps are truly universal and are not limited to SAFe exclusively.
We hope you enjoy your learning journey!
Who this book is for
This book is intended for IT professionals such as DevOps and DevSecOps practitioners, SREs, and managers who are interested in implementing DevOps practices using the SAFe approach. Basic knowledge of DevOps and Agile Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC) and their methodologies will be helpful for using this book.
What this book covers
Chapter 1, Introducing SAFe® and DevOps, is a brief look at the history of how DevOps and SAFe came to be. We view the conditions that brought about Agile development, the evolution of Agile development to the DevOps movement, and the role SAFe can play in moving to DevOps.
Chapter 2, Culture of Shared Responsibility, covers the types of cultures that are present in organizations today, which are beneficial for DevOps. We also look at how to change your organization’s culture to one that is needed for DevOps.
Chapter 3, Automation for Efficiency and Quality, explores the automation and technology used by organizations to establish a Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment (CI/CD) pipeline. We look at tools used for monitoring and measuring the pre-production and production environments. We then finish by discussing the teams responsible for setting it up.
Chapter 4, Leveraging Lean Flow to Keep the Work Moving, describes the principles and methods to accomplish a Lean Flow as part of SAFe. We examine the roles that the size of the work, the length of the backlog, how busy our workers are, and the differences between items of work play in the time it takes to complete the work.
Chapter 5, Measuring the Process and Solution, studies the potential measurements needed to ensure value, security, and reliability of the product under development. We look at the measurements that help identify whether teams have flow in their development. We explore monitoring and observability to find the metrics that ensure the solution is secure and reliable. Finally, we look to collecting metrics that assess the product’s end-user value.
Chapter 6, Recovering from Production Failures, outlines some methods to ensure reliability of the product in a customer-facing environment. We look at examples of famous production failures. We explore the discipline of Site Reliability Engineering (SRE), developed at Google to establish practices and ensure reliable environments. We finish our exploration by looking at Chaos Engineering, which strives to prepare for production failures by establishing experiments of failure in a production environment.
Chapter 7, Mapping Your Value Streams, takes a look at how to identify and establish value streams with a value stream identification workshop. We will explore how to prepare for the workshop and the mindset needed for moving to value streams. We then look at the steps needed to identify and map the Operational Value Stream. We finish by identifying and mapping the Development Value Stream.
Chapter 8, Measuring Value Stream Performance, delves into the metrics that are used to improve value streams. We explore the metrics that are organized by the DevOps Research and Assessment organization, known as the DORA metrics. We also explore Flow Metrics, a part of the Flow Framework created by Tasktop.
Chapter 9, Moving to the Future with Continuous Learning, examines how to become an organization that is continually learning. We explore the disciplines required for continuous learning as well as the practices from Lean thinking that encourage continuous learning such as the Improvement Kata.
Chapter 10, Continuous Exploration and Finding New Features, elaborates on the first phase of the Continuous Delivery Pipeline, Continuous Exploration. We explore the use of epics as hypotheses of potential customer value. We elaborate on the hypotheses by ensuring the architecture can allow for these new ideas and maintain the security and reliability of the product. We then look at decomposing the epics into features, ready for an Agile Release Train to develop.
Chapter 11, Continuous Integration of Solution Development, discusses the second phase of the Continuous Delivery Pipeline, Continuous Integration, including the start of the automation process. We look at the importance of testing, including the adoption of test-driven development and behavior-driven development. We explore the incorporation of automation in a CI/CD pipeline.
Chapter 12, Continuous Deployment to Production, provides an examination of the continued use of automation and practices in Continuous Deployment, the third stage of the Continuous Delivery Pipeline. We continue the exploration of automation through the CI/CD pipeline as it deploys to the production environment packages created in Continuous Integration. We also explore how testing continues in the production environment.
Chapter 13, Releasing on Demand to Realize Value, covers the last phase of the Continuous Delivery Pipeline, where customers receive new features through Release on Demand. We explore how teams continuously monitor the system to ensure the product is reliable and secure. We then look to see whether what is released really meets the customer’s needs.
Chapter 14, Avoiding Pitfalls and Diving into the Future, expounds on the new trends in DevOps in terms of process and technology and some tips and tricks to get you started on your journey. We start with helping you begin your journey to DevOps or SAFe.
To get the most out of this book
For this book, knowledge of the basics of the SDLC is beneficial. Knowledge of SAFe or DevOps is not required.
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Bold: Indicates a new term, an important word, or words that you see onscreen. For instance, words in menus or dialog boxes appear in bold. Here is an example: “Select System info from the Administration panel.”
Tips or important notes
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