Last Updated on January 10, 2022 by
A quote by Jez Humble, vice president at Chef and co-author of several books on devops,
“DevOps is not a Goal, But a never-ending process of continual improvement”.
Tech companies are constantly looking at the DevOps space with great expectations, which unite software developers and IT specialists to achieve a productive workflow and development process. Companies today are continually looking for suitable candidates with the optimum blend of DevOps skills and knowledge. It makes DevOps engineers demand soar more than ever before. LinkedIn has listed the DevOps Engineer role as the most in-demand job in the IT space. Apart from being in high demand, salaries associated with DevOps are quite high, one estimate from payscale based on a survey indicates an average annual salary of $96,692 for devops engineers in the US. The DevOps Engineer is highly valued in companies with various career paths and is usually an operations expert from different IT streams. If one is interested in creating a successful career in DevOps, DevOps Engineer Course is a good way to start.
Current article lists down important aspects about DevOps Engineers, things one will come across while working as a DevOps Engineer such as the roles and responsibilities, skills, tools required etc.
Table of Contents
Who is a DevOps Engineer?
DevOps is a combination of the words Dev and Ops; wherein ‘Dev’ is short form for development while ‘Ops’ is short form of Operations. DevOps can be defined as a software development technique that narrows down the gap between developers and IT professionals in layman’s language. Software development is quite rapid in modern times, customers are constantly looking for quick solutions with greater flexibility. DevOps technique allows tech companies to release applications with small features very quickly. DevOps is a robust feature-laden methodology that lets organizations adapt to new requirements with ease and reduce lead time between fixes.
A DevOps Engineer has an in-depth understanding of the Software Development Lifecycle and has good grip on different automation tools required for developing CI/CD (CI – Continuous Integration and CD – Continuous Deployment) pipelines. DevOps engineers primarily work with application developers and IT experts to ensure seamless code releases. One can work as a DevOps engineer if they happen to work as an application developer while interested in deployment and network operations or if they happen to work as a system administrator while interested in scripting and coding, transitioning themselves into development for improving the planning of testing and deployment.
Roles and Responsibilities of a DevOps Engineer
Candidates with bachelor’s degrees in Computer science, informatics, engineering, and mathematics are ideal for the DevOps engineer’s role. DevOps Engineer plays a role that is a combination of technical and managerial activities. It is important for one to have excellent coordination skills. The primary responsibility of an engineer is to narrow down the gap between teams and collaborate with different functions to meet the end goals. DevOps Engineers may need to work on various roles based on the need. Some key roles are listed below.
- DevOps Software Developer: primarily work on script development, unit testing, deployment, and reporting.
- DevOps Security Officer: In the age of cyber threats, security is of paramount importance for all products. DevOps security officers work with the developers, architects, and managers to develop robust and secure products. Security officers start working at an early stage of development rather than waiting and implementing security measures at the end.
- DevOps Automation Expert: Primary responsible for automation. Experts need to identify and use various tools to automate the development, integration, and testing of software deployment strategies. Selenium Automation is best tool in this regard.
- Release Manager: Works closely on coordination and management of a product release from start to end. He may need to work on post-release validation for the stability of the product.
- Quality Assurance: Works on the quality of the product.
Key Responsibilities of a DevOps Engineer are:
- Monitoring and troubleshooting methodologies for any issue or enhancement. Fixing the bugs before releasing the product.
- Creating new processes or updating existing processes to eliminate waste during the software development lifecycle.
- Planning and setting up processes for development, test, updating, and release. Motivating and creating fully automated processes for lengthy, time-consuming tasks
- Defining and planning team structure, identifying and allocating activities and roles for team members. Managing external, internal stakeholders effectively.
- Maintaining good coordination within the teams. Mentoring and coaching the team members
- Developing technical skills for quick review, validation, and technical support to the team.
- Understanding customers’ requirements, defining project KPIs, measuring and controlling KPIs regularly.
- Working on infrastructure to meet the customer requirements. Identifying different automation and validation tools for rapid software development.
- Identifying and deploying security measures to avoid any cyber threat and vulnerability in the products.
- Maintaining regular development progress reports for the stakeholders.
With the aforementioned points of responsibility, it is clear that a DevOps Engineer plays a crucial role in integrating the project functions and resources during the product life cycle right from the first step of planning, going along building and testing through deployment to support.
Skills Required
DevOps Engineer is a highly valued yet challenging role that requires one to acquire a certain skill set for consistent performance. A few of the skill sets are listed below.
- Experience in working with Linux-based infrastructure.
- Excellent skills in troubleshooting and problem-solving are highly desired.
- Soft skills such as oral and written communication skills are very critical for becoming a successful DevOps professional.
- Hands-on experience in database configuration and management, networking security, and cloud services.
- Experience in Agile Software Development and DevOps methodologies.
- Sound programming languages skills, namely in Python, Ruby, Perl, Java, and Javascript.
- Real-world experience in CI/CD tools and a strong understanding of networking protocols
- DevOps professionals often need to deal with multiple priority issues and may require high flexibility.
- Good command of various tools such as Git and GitHub, Jenkins, etc. along with open-source technologies
DevOps engineers need to work on plenty of tools for seamless delivery. Some of the key tools one should learn as a DevOps engineer are listed below:
- Git and GitHub, Selenium, Kubernetes, Jenkins, Puppet, Docker, Ansible, Chef, Nagios, MySQL, MongoDB.
Conclusion
DevOps is certainly a role that has everything professional looks for a decent career, good demand, high pay scale, challenging, and interesting. It is highly desirable to start a career as DevOps Engineer for job stability, value, and security. Professionals willing to dive into DevOps can do so by taking up a good online training course. Self-paced online courses with job assistance save a lot of time and allow candidates to propel in the right direction under the guidance of a field expert.
Read more: How Network Engineers Can Benefit From Cisco Certification Training
