In a DevOps (short for development and operations) approach, both the development team and the operations team work collaboratively during the build and deployment phases of the software development life cycle, sharing responsibilities, and providing continuous feedback. The software builds are tested frequently throughout the build phase on production-like environments, which allows early detection of defects.
Sometimes, you will find a software application development and its operations are handled by a single team, where engineers work across the entire application life cycle, from development and deployment to operations. Such a team needs to develop a range of skills that are not limited to a single function. Application testing and security teams may also work more closely with the operations and development teams, from the inception to the production launch of an application.
Speed enables organizations to stay ahead in the competition and address customer requirements quickly. Good DevOps practices encourage software development engineers and operations professionals to work better together. This results in closer collaboration and communication, leading to a shorter time to market (TTM), reliable release, improved code quality, and better maintenance.
Developers benefit from feedback provided by the operations teams and create strategies for testing and deployment. System administrators don't have to implement defective or untested software on production environments because they participate in the build phase. As all stakeholders in the software development and delivery life cycle collaborate, they can also evaluate the tools that they intend to use at each step of the process, to verify compatibility between the devices and also to determine whether any tools can be shared across the teams.
DevOps is a combination of culture and practices. It requires organizations to change their culture by breaking down the barriers between all teams in the product development and delivery life cycle. DevOps is not just about development and operations; rather, it involves the entire organization, including management, business/application owners, developers, QA engineers, release managers, the operations team, and system administrators. DevOps is gaining popularity as the preferred operating culture, especially for organizations that deal with cloud or distributed computing.