This module introduces key DevOps concepts and teaches how to plan and structure an organization’s DevOps journey.

Lessons:

• Identify business drivers, goals, and metrics for DevOps adoption.

• Assess existing processes and culture to define transformation priorities.

• Design cross-functional team structures and define responsibilities.

• Select tools for project tracking, collaboration, and process integration (Azure Boards, GitHub Projects).

• Develop communication plans and performance indicators for DevOps success.

• DevOps adoption roadmap and governance.

• Value stream mapping.

• Change management and leadership buy-in.

• Metrics and reporting dashboards.

• Create a DevOps strategy plan in Azure Boards.

• Establish traceability between user stories, commits, and releases.

Learn to manage source control effectively and establish collaboration practices for distributed teams.
Lessons:

• Configure Git repositories in Azure Repos and GitHub.

• Define branching and merging strategies (GitFlow, trunk-based, GitHub Flow).

• Enforce branch policies and pull request approvals.

• Manage technical debt and code quality through reviews and feedback.

• Use Git hooks and automation scripts to streamline workflows.
  

• Version control fundamentals.

• Branching models and governance.

• Code review and collaboration policies.

• Traceability and integration with Azure Boards.
  

• Configure Git repository, branches, and policies in Azure DevOps.

• Set up a pull request workflow with reviewers and build validation.

Focus on automating build and testing processes for consistent integration.
Lessons:

• Design and configure build pipelines using YAML and classic editors.

• Manage build agents, pools, and parallelism.

• Integrate automated unit and functional testing.

• Implement build validation with GitHub Actions workflows.

• Use pipeline variables, secrets, and reusable templates.
  

• CI principles and best practices.

• Azure Pipelines architecture.

• Containerized builds using Docker.

• CI with GitHub Actions.
  

• Create a CI pipeline to build and test a .NET or Node.js application.

• Implement code quality gates and automated test runs.

• Design a release pipeline and deployment approval workflow.

• Implement continuous delivery (CD) using Azure Pipelines.

• Configure environments and variable groups for multi-stage releases.

• Integrate automated deployment gates and rollback policies.

• Manage infrastructure dependencies and release security.
  

• Blue-green and canary deployments.

• Environment configuration and approvals.

• Automated rollback and recovery.

• Quality gates and deployment sequencing.

• Build a release pipeline with pre- and post-deployment conditions.

• Implement environment approvals and rollback automation.

Learn how to secure and automate deployment processes end-to-end.
Lessons:

• Design secure deployment patterns for cloud applications.

• Manage secrets and configuration using Azure Key Vault.

• Integrate feature flags and dynamic configuration.

• Implement access controls, service connections, and credentials management.

• Validate deployments and ensure compliance using automated scans.
  

• Secrets management best practices.

• Role-based access control (RBAC) in pipelines.

• Security testing integration (SAST, DAST).

• Feature management and experimentation.
  

• Configure Azure Key Vault integration in Azure Pipelines.

• Deploy an application using feature toggles.

Automate infrastructure provisioning and configuration at scale.
Lessons:

• Deploy resources using ARM templates and Bicep files.

• Manage configuration drift and environment consistency.

• Implement Desired State Configuration (DSC) and Azure Automation.

• Apply Infrastructure as Code pipelines for reproducibility.
  

• Declarative provisioning with templates.

• Configuration versioning.

• Continuous deployment of infrastructure.

• Compliance validation and drift detection.
  

• Deploy an Azure environment using Bicep and pipelines.

• Automate configuration updates with DSC.

Ensure efficient package and artifact management within DevOps environments.
Lessons:

• Configure Azure Artifacts and secure feed access.

• Implement dependency versioning strategies.

• Scan for vulnerabilities and outdated packages.

• Integrate artifact feeds with CI/CD pipelines.

• Package management governance.

• Artifact retention and promotion policies.

• Dependency compliance and security.
  

• Create and consume internal NuGet/NPM packages.

• Configure security scanning for dependencies.

Establish visibility and feedback loops for continuous improvement.
Lessons:

• Implement application monitoring using Azure Monitor and Application Insights.

• Configure dashboards, alerts, and log analytics.

• Capture end-user feedback and integrate it into development cycles.

• Correlate telemetry across distributed systems for incident response.

• Design feedback channels for retrospectives and KPI tracking.
  

• Telemetry and observability.

• Automated alerting and incident management.

• Feedback loops and DevOps metrics.

• Continuous improvement culture.
  

• Build a monitoring dashboard for deployed applications.

• Configure alerts and visualize telemetry in Azure Monitor.