The Value of DevOps

From mobile apps to custom software solutions, at Flint Hills Group we strive to provide the best products for our customers. With our team of US-based employees spread from coast to coast, we have found that DevOps and using a good DevOps platform like GitLab for our projects has been extremely beneficial. Our team maintains high transparency and communication through the same platform, but the final project outcome is delivered more efficiently and cost-effectively.

Why DevOps?

Traditional models of software development and operations were isolated functions within a company. The developers wrote the code for the projects then handed them off to the operational team responsible for its their deployment and integration. Unfortunately, this process lacked communication between the development and operations teams, creating many roadblocks to product rollouts.

To address these issues, DevOps was created by merging development, quality assurance, and operations into a single, continuous set of processes. This set of processes requires the entire team to collaborate on every aspect of a project from planning to development, testing, to deploying.

With DevOps, many hurdles associated with traditional models of development are eliminated. Traditionally, the development process was self-contained within their own silos. Combining process methods improves the agility and automation within the IT and development teams. At Flint Hills Group we use the DevOps software solution, GitLab. GitLab increases our efficiency in-house and also provides better services to our customers.

Benefits of GitLab

GitLab is a robust web-based tool and development platform. It provides us with the ability to collaborate and manage software development across an entire project’s life cycle. We are able to collaborate and monitor processes from development to testing and launch. GitLab’s functionality to provide simultaneous access and control of a project provide additional benefits both internally and externally. Some of the benefits of DevOps and GitLab are illustrated below.

Source Code Control

Before DevOps, the development and operational process were made up of a complex toolchain or series of processes. With DevOps, we now have a streamlined process to ensure code is tested, scanned, and verified before released. This process allows each product to maintain high quality and security standards. With DevOps, we catch bugs early in the lifecycle, before the code is released.

Continuous Integration

A lot of testing goes into our products before they are launched. The ability to have continuous integration (CI) has been extremely valuable. In GitLab, CI works by pushing small code chunks into the application’s codebase to create an opportunity to test, validate and adjust the code changes before merging them into the final piece. With so many adjustments and tweaks needed during development, having an area to test the changes where everyone can view the test environment has decreased errors and increased production efficiency and speed. The GitLab benefit for this merging of software code is that all the developers in a project can see and share their code together. This means that everyone working on a project is working on nearly the same code. This reduces the likelihood of any code conflicts in the future.

Shorter Project Time

A shorter development cycle enables us to go from an idea to implementing that code change rapidly. With a single program used by all of our employees, we can immediately respond to our clients’ changing needs and go to market faster and more efficiently.

Issue Tracking

In a traditional setting, many developers use different systems. A Forrester study found that many organizations are using two to five toolchains for software delivery, and 56% of those organizations reported that each toolchain has six or more tools. The complex unlinked toolchains often leave teams at risk for identifying any problems in their code. Using tools like GitLab provides a way to remove multiple toolchains and offers the team only one area to search and find any code issues. This simplifies the process and can reduce the number of bugs or problems in the code being deployed.

Continuous Monitoring

We like to keep the pulse on every release for all of our projects. With a solution to keep track of every piece of the puzzle, we have the ability to provide continuous monitoring, enabling faster and better response times. Continuous monitoring allows our team to track software performance and improve it at any point of the process.

Cost Savings

Consolidating all software development into one tool has cost-savings benefits for all of our clients. These savings are realized both financially and with time. Using a free tool like GitLab has enabled us to drastically reduce time spent across each phase of the DevOps lifecycle. Less time spent on a project makes it quicker to get a project to market and for our clients to begin using the product.

Increased Communication

Communication and collaboration are significantly increased with the use of a DevOps program. Not only does the software process connect the workflow and responsibilities of the team, but it also improves communication across the entire company. From developers and operations to marketing and sales, every part of the organization is closely aligned with every project.

The DevOps Difference with FHG

With DevOps, all of our team members are able to collaborate every step of the way on every client’s project. This allows us to build better software and achieve the best possible results. For our customers, the use of DevOps provides them with many benefits throughout their entire project. From the speed and accuracy DevOps provides our team to the cost and time savings it provides our customers, it’s a mutually beneficial program for all parties involved. To learn more about our services or DevOps contact our team today.