A guide on introducing DevOps for your digital business

Goal

Knowledge Lab understands DevOps as an approach that integrates development, operations and testing units into cross-functional teams. Each team is responsible for the entire life cycle of the software product. In order to take full advantage of the DevOps principles, financial institutions must provide a stable operating environment via the various technology stacks used (e.g. Avaloq DSL, AFP-Java, containerization etc.). Knowledge Lab is convinced that software development and thus innovation in financial institutions can be accelerated with the implementation of appropriate measures.

Insight & Action 

The currently existing development processes and organizational structures have a significant influence on the development. DevOps therefore integrates the various teams and aligns them as a unit to provide their services. It is important to establish a service culture that is focused on the benefit for the success of the company. 

The developers need an accurate and up-to-date production environment. Development should be based on the "build and run" principle, i.e. the teams are responsible for the software product until it is installed on the production environment. The faster feedback on changes is reported, the better the quality and stability of the software. With the implementation of the DevOps principles, the testing of all components becomes an integral part of the development. Tests are therefore carried out continuously throughout the entire supply chain. 

After successfully passing the test cycle, the software build is automatically deployed. This allows new functions and updates to be quickly provided and proactive changes to the product to be made. 

 Monitoring the system with KPI's is of crucial importance in the implementation of DevOps. This can include, for example, development cycles, incorrect deployments, code vulnerabilities, server health and application performance. The key metrics must be defined and monitored for each KPI when implementing the DevOps principles.

Results

By bringing together collaborative teams throughout the organization and implementing the DevOps principles, Knowledge Lab has created its own stable operating environment. This allows to bring software code to market faster, reduce human error and bugs, improve version control and optimize costs, all while improving resource management.