Overview of DevOps history
You are reading a book on DevOps, likely meaning you have a basic understanding of what DevOps is; if not, there's no need to worry – that will be covered as well. The history of DevOps is less known even within DevOps communities. First, we'll go back to understand key elements that came before DevOps that laid the groundwork and created the environment needed for DevOps to grow.
Lean manufacturing
Lean manufacturing is a production method aimed primarily at reducing cycle times within the production system as well as response times from suppliers and to customers.
The term Lean was coined in 1988 by John Krafcik and defined in 1996 by James Womack and Daniel Jones. Lean manufacturing is well-established as a set of best practices for manufacturing. Often branded as the Toyota Manufacturing Method, Lean manufacturing strives for process optimization across the manufacturing floor. Continuous improvement is the mantra for Lean manufacturing and practitioners continually evaluate ways to do the following:
- Keep inventory at a minimum.
- Minimize the queue of orders.
- Maximize efficiency in the manufacturing process.
Agile
In the early 2000s, traditional waterfall methods were evolving and being replaced by Agile, which required a large culture shift that focused on team empowerment. Agile is based around 4 core values and 12 principles. Some were adopted into DevOps as it evolved (https://kissflow.com/project/agile/values-and-principles-of-agile-manifesto/).
Extreme programming
XP aims to improve software quality and responsiveness to changing customer requirements. If you are thinking that sounds a lot like Agile, you wouldn't be wrong; it is a type of Agile software development. The biggest difference between XP and other Agile frameworks is the emphasis placed on the code and development (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extreme_programming).
The main contribution XP gave DevOps was Continuous Integration (CI). CI was a term introduced in 2001 by Grady Brooch and was published as the Brooch method soon after.
DevOps
The exact inception of DevOps will forever be debated; it is widely accepted that between 2007 and 2008 is when the movement started. It was a perfect storm of events that allowed and triggered the DevOps movement. The dysfunction in the software industry, namely between IT operations and software development communities, was the spark that ignited the movement, but it was the pioneers of Agile, Lean, and XP who were responsible for the initial fuel of the DevOps movement.
In a world absent of DevOps, developers and IT operations belonged to different corporate hierarchies and Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) for IT operations and development were asynchronous and detrimental to the other. These conditions created teams siloed from one another, causing a breakdown in communication, and ultimately leading to failed deployments, missed deadlines, and angry customers.
In 2008 Andrew Shafer, a software engineer, tried to put together a meetup session entitled Agile Infrastructure at an Agile conference in Canada. Patrick Debois, an Agile practitioner, was the only one there. The two had a long conversation, which today is known as the spark that ignited a fire that became a movement known as DevOps. Andrew and Patrick formed a discussion group for other people to post their ideas for how to solve this divide between development and operations later that year. In 2009, the first DevOpsDays was held, in Belgium, which turned DevOps into a buzzword forever cemented in history. The DevOps movement continued with local meetups around the globe. Around 2010, open source software focused on DevOps began growing in popularity; Jenkins CI server software and Chef infrastructure provisioning software were a couple of pioneers.
Pro Tip
Understanding the history behind the job title you are applying for will make you seem more serious about the role and conversation much more natural. Dig deeper and read some books such as The DevOps Handbook and The Phoenix Project. They will only increase your chances of success further.
The following diagram gives a timeline of key dates in the history of DevOps:
Figure 1.2 – History of DevOps timeline
Now that we have learned about the history of DevOps, let's look at DevOps culture in the next section.