One of the most hoped-for benefits of cloud technology is increased agility and the ability to deliver IT more quickly.
The on-demand capability of the cloud provides one element of that agility. Without lengthy provisioning processes, you can access technology when you need it.
Another key element of IT agility is a DevOps process that allows you to deploy applications consistently, successfully, and frequently. Amazon Web Services (AWS) provides a wide range of tools that enable engineering teams to build effective continuous integration (CI) and continuous delivery (CD) pipelines.
AWS Tools to Streamline Delivery Pipelines
AWS provides several tools that directly support CI and CD. AWS CodePipeline automates your release process. The build, test, and deploy phases can happen every time there is a code change. AWS CodeBuild automatically creates build packages. AWS CodeDeploy automatically deploys packages to instances. AWS CodeStar provides a platform to manage and collaborate on your projects. If you’re delivering a web application, AWS Elastic Beanstalk can completely handle the deployment for you.
AWS Tools to Streamline Infrastructure Management
Many deployment challenges come from the need to manage the environments where workloads run.
Serverless computing eliminates the need for infrastructure management the most direct way, by eliminating the infrastructure. With AWS Lambda, instead of deploying to your own servers, you deploy functions that run via an AWS service instead of on an instance you need to manage.
Other tools make it easier to keep your configurations correct. With AWS CloudFormation, you use templates to define sets of related resources. By using templates, you can repeatably define application environments. Use AWS OpsWorks, based on the Chef automation platform, to define server configurations via code and ensure changes are rolled out consistently. AWS Config lets you monitor changes to configurations and verify that your systems conform to your governance rules.
AWS Tools to Streamline Monitoring
The Ops team’s job doesn’t end once a new release is deployed; they need to continue monitoring systems and responding to trouble alerts. AWS tools help streamline that, too. Amazon CloudWatch collects metrics and generates alerts. AWS X-Ray helps your team investigate the root cause of any problems.
With all these tools, AWS makes it easy to implement agile, responsive deployment processes that deliver one of cloud’s big promised benefits. Contact VAST IT Services to learn more about streamlining application development using AWS tools.
