Different companies face different challenges as they adopt DevOps practices and endeavor to improve them. Some companies have trouble acquiring the tools they need to be successful; others struggle with the necessary cultural adjustments. CA Technologies provides the widest array of highly automated solutions necessary to build and optimize integrated workflows across application development, delivery and operations. It also helps customers address the cultural and procedural challenges they face with a variety of services including coaching, benchmarking and current- state workshops.
“One challenge is the lack of integration across the software development lifecycle toolchain,” said Aruna Ravichandran, vice president, DevOps pProducts and sSolution mMarketing at CA Technologies. “Successful DevOps requires a level of integration throughout the software development lifecycle—starting with the planning tools, through development and testing and all the way to operational tools.”
CA’s offerings span the entire application lifecycle including planning, development, testing, release and operations. With CA, organizations get the full range of capabilities needed to deliver secure, quality applications quickly that provide unparalleled customer experiences. Its products provide open integrations with hundreds of third party and open source software and systems. That way, customers can choose what works best for them whether it’s an end-to-end solution or integration into their existing technology ecosystem.
“As a leading provider of DevOps tools and services, CA Technologies helps you build, monitor and manage better apps faster and at lower costs,” said Ravichandran.
For example, United Airlines saved $500,000 in testing costs while increasing test coverage by 85%. GM Financial accelerated its loan funding 500% and reduced regression testing by 93%.
Test Continuously
Continuous testing requires DevOps teams to integrate testing processes throughout the software development lifecycle. A recent study by Computing Research showed that 63% of DevOps practitioners consider QA testing the biggest bottleneck. One reason for this is that testing hasn’t garnered the attention that other tools within the DevOps ecosystem have which means many teams are still conducting tests manually, late in the development process, slowing software delivery and negatively impacting quality.
With automation and virtualization, software testing can be done continuously as code is planned, developed and operating. The results are more comprehensive test cases and double the confidence in delivery speed and quality, Ravichandran said.
The Intersection of DevOps and Cloud Matters
The intersection of DevOps and Cloud hasn’t received as much attention as it deserves. While they are both important technological and cultural shifts, little has been done to explore the link between the two.
“DevOps and Cloud have a powerful connection that organizations should consider more closely as they strive to deliver software faster and with better quality,” said Ravichandran.
CA recently commissioned Freeform Dynamics to explore this topic. Interestingly, organizations with a high level of commitment to DevOps and Cloud saw an 81% increase in overall software delivery performance. The same organizations were able to deliver software 90% faster with a 69% increase in user experience.
DevSecOps Is Now Mandatory
Developers are under constant pressure to deliver software faster. This is especially true as businesses attempt to adopt mobile-first strategies and other accelerated development approaches. By 2019, Gartner predicts that 70% of enterprise DevOps initiatives will realize the importance of implementing security into their DevOps practices. Similarly, a recent study conducted by CA’s Veracode found that 62% of IT pros felt app security was very important to their development team. The same study also revealed that 43% of IT pros said fixing flaws during development is easier than patching.
“DevSecOps is gaining greater visibility because companies are realizing that protecting their apps after code is written is a reactive approach that is simply too little, too late,” said Ravichandran.
Put simply, security is a critical aspect of quality throughout the software development lifecycle. The only way to ensure app security is to automatically scan code for vulnerabilities starting from development, through production and continuing through deployment. It’s the only way to protect users from bad experiences and businesses from making data breach headlines.
Is Your DevOps Endeavor Successful?
Ravichandran said she’s often asked how to measure the success of a DevOps implementation or practice. Quite often, DevOps teams are established and running before the thought even occurs to them.
A better approach is to establish success metrics before beginning or extending a DevOps practice. Since each company is unique, the metrics differ from organization to organization.
“DevOps has a wide range of benefits,” said Ravichandran. “I’ve seen organizations often have their own primary motivation—whether its costs, velocity, competition or something else. It’s best to focus on metrics that are aligned to your organization’s primary objectives.”
CA helps organizations identify and track the success metrics that are unique to the business. Its tools help ensure successful DevOps implementations.
Learn more at www.ca.com.
