New DevOps Trends – Development teams are actively embracing DevOps. In 2018 only, 17% of organizations could boast of successful DevOps implementation. In 2020, 62% of companies adopted CI/CD workflows. This approach ensures fast and continuous delivery of high-quality software. Let’s take a look at the top DevOps trends in 2022. You should consider them to gain a competitive advantage.
DevOps, Cloud, and Cloud-Native
Today, those companies are successful that can quickly develop and deliver software products. The cloud provides companies with agility in creating and deploying infrastructures. It provides almost unlimited computing power on demand. Cloud-native companies are more likely to bring products to the market, test new ideas, and respond to user feedback.
Not all businesses know how to rationally use the capabilities of the cloud. As the 2021 Puppet State of DevOps report showed, 56% of enterprises work with a public cloud. But only 20% of them use the technology to its full potential.
In 2022, organizations are continuing to implement innovation and look for the optimal cloud type. The 2021 Accelerate State of DevOps found that companies that deployed software in multiclouds and hybrid clouds were 1.6 times more likely to perform better than when using traditional cloud strategies.
A business needs a platform on which cloud applications and services will be created and launched. Such a platform will automate the process and integrate DevOps, CI/CD, microservices, and containers.
Cloud-Native brings together services for building, maintaining, and scaling software. Developers create products optimized for the cloud. They usually have a microservice and serverless architecture, and use PaaS, containers, and functions. These applications are managed by DevOps experts: they organize development so that the product quickly enters the market and responds to changes.
DevOps Trends: Serverless Computing
For a web application to work and respond to user requests, it must run on a server – a powerful computer. Previously, servers had to be purchased independently, and they took up a lot of space. When the cloud appeared, companies began to rent cloud servers and paid for capacity with a margin so that their software did not fail during peak hours.
It was not always profitable to pay with a margin: money was spent, and certain cloud resources remained “idle”. Cloud service providers found a way out and offered automatic scaling so that firms could only pay for the capacity used. But this solution has its drawback: in case of a DDoS attack, a business will lose a huge amount of money.
Serverless computing helped to solve this problem. A developer writes functions that reflect business logic and deploys them in the service of a serverless computing provider (like AWS Lambda). When a user request enters the program, a notification is sent to respond to it. The service tries to find the code that can answer the request. When it finds it, it loads the code into a container where it is executed. Then a response is generated and sent to the client.
DevOps is a catalyst that makes serverless computing and the serverless data center possible. This is a promising 2022 DevOps trend that addresses the issue of scarcity of resources and security.
Microservices
Previously, applications were developed on a monolithic architecture. This means that after the creation of all components, software was released as a single unit. Such solutions are easier to deploy, but over time, difficulties appear. When such software “acquires” new features, it is necessary to “repack” and redeploy the entire system. And if the software needs to be updated frequently or needs to be scaled in the future, this process becomes grueling.
To avoid these problems, enterprises are increasingly choosing a microservice architecture for their programs. Software is a set of services, each of which contains basic business functions. Services are less dependent than the components of a monolithic system and can be individually tested and deployed. Therefore, the application is updated faster and is easier to scale.
In 2022, DevOps teams will be able to deploy each service individually. A microservice architecture provides the flexibility and speed that SDLC lacks.
Even more automation: AIOps
The DevOps approach focuses on thinking through the steps to build and release a product quickly and efficiently. It allows IT professionals to organize continuous testing, delivery, and deployment. Automation in this case means adding technologies that will take on most of the tasks of specialists.
In 2022, DevOps services companies will increasingly use RPA, AI, ML algorithms, and IaC to automate IT infrastructure management and bring products to market even faster.
AIOps is an artificial intelligence platform for improving IT operations.
The technology is based on big data and machine learning algorithms. An AI system collects and analyzes data on the operation of IT infrastructure components. It accepts log files from various resources, detects problems in the system, and finds their source. It also helps to deal with incidents and predicts their occurrence.
Research and Markets calculated that by 2027 the global market for AIOps platforms will increase 7 times compared to 2020 and amount to $20.1 billion.
DevOps trends: DevSecOps
In a world where hackers attack systems more often, security testing should not be delayed until the last phase before a product is released. Development teams must implement protection methods in all phases of the SDLC.
DevSecOps, a growing trend in 2022, aims to address security gaps in the software development process.
According to the philosophy of DevSecOps, each project participant is responsible for the security of an application. Software protection is achieved by:
- reliable code, when a developer thinks over how to create software without vulnerabilities;
- conducting security testing at each stage of development;
- safety reviews of the main functions;
- involvement of cybersecurity specialists in all stages of development so that they find security flaws and the team corrects them before the software is released to the market.
Research results show that companies are serious about implementing this technology. Verified Market Research predicts an eightfold growth of the DevSecOps market by 2027. Technology spending will rise to $17.16 billion.
DevOps trends: Kubernetes
DevOps experts deploy dozens and hundreds of containers every day including applications with the dependencies necessary for their operation (code, runtime environment, system tools, libraries, and settings). One needs to manage them, monitor errors, and expand infrastructure. It is more convenient to do this through a common interface.
CNCF Cloud Native Landscape found that there are over 109 container management tools on the market, but 89% of organizations use some form of Kubernetes. The tool provides the operations team with the following benefits:
- it helps to use resources more efficiently;
- shortens the development cycle;
- helps to containerize monolithic programs;
- simplifies the transition to the cloud;
- optimizes cloud costs, and so on.
In 2022, the system will become one of the most important trends in DevOps as it optimizes test, build and deployment pipelines.
Adopting the low-code approach
Low-code is a development approach with minimal manual programming. A programmer independently writes complex code but uses ready-made functions and low-code elements to create software faster.
This approach simplifies and speeds up application development. Thanks to ready-made blocks, new functionality is developed faster, and ready-made scripts and coding help to set up integration with other systems. This is much faster than writing a program from scratch. The SDLC diminishes as there are no more architecture planning, development environment, prototyping, and design. These stages are already included in the low-code platform.
Gartner found that by 2024, over 65% of software will be built using the low-code approach. Even if low-code software is easier to build, it still needs to be maintained, improved and delivered. In 2022, low-code will streamline DevOps processes: it will speed up iterations, and optimize continuous delivery.
Application performance monitoring (APM)
Application performance monitoring (APM) is tracking important software performance metrics through a dedicated platform and telemetry data. DevOps experts use APM to ensure the availability of a mobile or web application. It helps to optimize performance, response time, and user experience.
If software’s working load increases, it loads slowly, does not load, or the system crashes. To prevent this, DevOps experts are searching for performance problems and their causes. These can be errors in the code, issues with the database, or interference in the hosting or network.
It is not easy to find weaknesses in the system: programs contain millions of lines of code, systems are integrated with third-party services, and have different architectures. It is almost impossible to sort through all the variables manually, that’s why specialists use APM.
In 2022 and beyond, APM will become a critical tool for IT operations. The platform reduces the average software recovery time and helps DevOps teams to better understand business processes and detect software disruptions.
DevOps trends: GitOps
GitOps is a Kubernetes cluster management and application delivery model. Git is the only portal to the system. Programs are deployed, monitored, and managed in one place.
The repository documents what is going on with the project in detail. The project is described in the code, and the description is fixed in the version control system. In case of an error, the developer reverts the system to the latest state by changing the infrastructure and code.
Sometimes changes in the code are determined by the changes in the infrastructure and vice versa. You have to update everything atomically. If an error was found in the atomic update, you will also have to revert partially. When the system is configured in different locations, restoring a previous version is nearly impossible. With GitOps, this problem is solved by reverting to a previous working commit.
GitOps makes auditing easy. You can track changes in chronological order: you can see who contributed, approved, or merged everything into the master branch. Git is the only reliable source of project information. The system automatically checks for discrepancies in Kubernetes and fixes them. New versions appear faster and more often. Their release does not become a painful procedure.
In 2022 and beyond, GitOps will increase the productivity of DevOps experts. The capabilities that Git provides are important because they make it easy to manage complex infrastructure.
Conclusion
The trends outlined above improve the continuous delivery and deployment of new products. They save time and money, speed up software release to the market, optimize the search, and fix problems in the infrastructure. When companies embrace DevOps in 2022, they will leave their technology competitors behind and drive business growth.
