Team Development with Azure DevOps

Azure DevOps vs GitHub

Azure DevOps is the collaboration hub offered by Microsoft for everyone in the development team, including project managers, testers, architects, developers and end-users. Likewise, GitHub is used mainly for open source projects.

• Introduction to Azure DevOps
• Using GitHub
• LAB: Creating and configuring your project

Using Git

Sources are probably the most important part in any software project and we need a way to keep track of all sources and all changes. Azure Repos gives you the choice between TFVS and Git for storing your source history, branching, merging and everything else required. Here we discuss Git source control.

• Version Control concepts
• Distributed Source Control with Git
• Git Clients: Command Line, Visual Studio or Visual Studio Code
• Creating a local repository
• Configuring your git repository
• Checking the status of your repo
• Staging files
• Committing files, and then amending it
• Comparing changes in files
• Reverting commits
• Using Git Hooks
• Using Aliases to Customize your Experience
• Finding the bad change using git bisect
• LAB: Working with a local repository

Team collaboration with remote repositories

Multiple developers working on the same code base requires a central place for all your team's code and changes. In Git these are known as remote repositories. Here we discuss team collaboration with Git.

• Team collaboration with remote repositories
• Cloning a remote repository
• Synchronizing with a remote repository
• Resolving Git Pull conflicts
• LAB: Working with remote repositories

Working in isolation with branches

How can we avoid code changes from one developer interfering with code from others? Branching has always been used to allow developers to complete their changes before integrating them with others.

• Adding branches to your workflow
• Branching Strategies - Using GitFlow
• Merge vs. Rebase - keeping a linear history
• Different Merge Strategies, i.e. Squash Merge
• Managing your branches
• LAB: Working with branches in git

Team Collaboration with Pull Requests

Working as a team on the same codebase comes with its own challenges. Factors like false cognates, code conventions, SOLID principles, etc., could result in good or bad code quality. Pull requests allow you to ensure that your code maintains its high quality.

• Protecting your branches with pull requests
• Ensuring high quality code with Pull Requests
• Versioning with Git Tags
• Using Forks
• LAB: Team collaboration with Pull Requests

Azure DevOps Team Projects

Azure DevOps is the collaboration hub for everyone in the development team, including project managers, testers, architects, developers and end-users. Here we will create a team project and configure it.

• Development Processes
• Team Projects and Process Templates
• Using GitHub Projects
• LAB: Creating and configuring your team project
• LAB: Customizing your process

Project Management with Azure Boards

The project backlog contains all the features that users have requested. This does not mean we will immediately add this feature; for this, we have backlog planning where we try to identify the features we want to build next.

• Iterative Development
• Creating the project backlog
• Work Items and Queries
• Velocity and Forecasting
• LAB: Create your project backlog

Planning a sprint

Once we have decided which features we will build next, we will identify the various tasks that need to be completed to build that feature. We will look at balancing product, schedule, and cost.

• Sprint Planning
• Identifying user stores for the next sprint
• Capacity planning
• Defining tasks to complete a user story
• Adjust work to fit team capacity
• Sharing a sprint with stakeholders
• LAB: Planning the next sprint

Running the sprint

Ready? Set? Go! During the sprint the whole team builds the next features. Communication here is essential, so we will look at the daily standup meeting and how VSTS can help. We will also look at reporting in DevOps.

• Running a sprint
• The daily standup meeting
• Burndown chart
• Team dashboard
• Task integration with source control
• LAB: Starting the sprint

Continuous Integration with Azure Pipelines and GitHub Actions

To build quality software and to avoid integration problems at the end of the project, continuous integration builds are considered a best practice. Azure DevOps simplifies continuous integration through its pipeline system. Here, you will author build pipelines to ensure the quality of your project.

• Doing Continuous integration
• Introduction to YAML
• Authoring a build using the designer and YAML pipelines
• What are stages, jobs, tasks?
• What are build agents?
• Setting up a build agent in your enterprise network
• Using GitHub Actions and Runners
• LAB: Setting up and running a build definition

Continuous Deployment with Azure Pipelines

With continuous deployment, you can automatically deploy your project. By utilizing stages, you can verify the quality of your deployment through manual and/or automatic steps before deploying to production.

• Release management and continuous deployment
• Release definitions
• Integrating with other systems (such as Azure and GitHub) using Service Connections
• Approving releases with release gates
• LAB: Continous Deployment with a release definition

Deployment Patterns

Continuous Delivery is more than release management. Here we will discuss different deployment patterns and when to use them.

• Deployment is more than deploying to QA and PROD environments
• Explore Microservices Architecture
• Minimize Deployment Downtime using Blue/Green Deployment
• Using Canary Releases
• Optimize performance using A/B Testing
• Using Progressive Exposure (aka Ring-Based Deployment)
• Exposing New Features using Feature Toggles
• Choosing between deployment patterns
• LAB: Implementing a Canary Release with Traffic Manager

Configuration and Keeping Secrets Safe

• Application Configuration Options
• Using Azure Key Vault
• Centralize your settings using Azure App Configuration
• Feature Toggles with Azure App Configuration
• Managing Secrets in GitHub
• LAB: Using Azure Key Vault with CI/CD

Implement Secure Continuous Deployment

How do you ensure your applications are secure and stay secure with continuous integration and delivery? How can you find and fix security issues early in the process? It begins with practices commonly referred to as DevSecOps.

• Explore Continous Security Validation
• Key Validation Points
• Scanning your Code Base for Security
• Avoid Packages with Vulnerabilities

Infrastructure as Code

The cloud enables you to easily provision computing infrastructure, such as servers, networks, storage, and other resources. With 'infrastructure as code,' you use machine-readable definition files, such as ARM or Bicep, to deploy your infrastructure.

• What is Infrastructure as Code?
• Authoring Bicep Templates
• Deploying Bicep using Azure CLI
• Using Desired State Configuration
• Using Continuous Deployment to create your infrastructure
• LAB: Deploying your application's infrastructure

Azure Artifacts

Modern development utilizes packages like NuGet, NPM, or others. With Azure Artifacts, you can create your own private or public package feeds.

• Understanding Azure Artifacts
• Creating a Package Feed
• Pushing a Package
• Understanding Upstream Sources
• Versioning Packages
• Using Artifacts in Azure Pipelines