I just finished reading the DevOps Handbook by Gene Kim, Jez Humble, Patrick Debois, and John Willis, and thought it was an excellent read with content-rich information that is directly applicable to shops attempting to deliver technology faster (which is nearly everyone).

the-devops-handbook

Overall Thoughts

This book discussed excellent concepts and techniques for improving technical delivery times and backed them up with case studies of real companies making the transition to a DevOps approach. The case studies were some of the best parts in my opinion because they showed the struggles and challenges that organizations can face and how embracing the DevOps techniques overcame the problems. It is obvious that the authoring team spent years doing the research to put this book together considering how many references are made to conferences, company scenarios, and interviews with various technical managers. With so much background research and studying done, the book is organized very well with ideas that are true to the industry.

Breakdown

The DevOps Handbook are split into 6 main parts; 1) The Three Ways, 2) Where to Start, 3) The First Way, 4) The Second Way, 5) The Third Way, and 6) The Technical Practice of Integrating Information Security, Change Management, and Control. If you’ve read the Phoenix Project, the concept of the Three Ways will be somewhat familiar. I think it is ideal to read the Phoenix Project first and then read this book afterwards. This book dives into the technical concepts that are discussed in the Phoenix Project.

One idea that stuck with me was the fact that DevOps is more than just automation. There is far more of a cultural shift that must occur for an organization to thrive with a DevOps methodology. For example, one of the best sections in my opinion discussed how to effectively transfer lessons learned across an entire organization to better everyone. This is no easy task, but the book suggests interesting ideas on how to effectively complete this. Also there is a good amount of discussion on bettering communication across teams within an organization which is crucial for succeeding in DevOps. Considering I am more of a technical person, reading about these ideas was definitely interesting and inspired me to discuss some changes with my manager. However, this book definitely gets into the technical concepts such as automation, telemetry in staging environments, and 0 downtime upgrades which are essential in DevOps.

Who Should Read This?

System administrators, developers, auditors, security engineers, IT managers, and anyone else involved in technical work should read this book. There are essential concept that are applicable across the entire IT and Security departments. Even if this book does not directly apply to a security engineer, it is important to understand the best practices from all members within the department to promote better habits and communicate more effectively. The book discusses teamwork heavily and how all teams should be in sync with processes. Specifically, security should not be an after thought, rather, it should be integrated into the automated process during development.

Conclusion

This is a great read and I encourage everyone to take some time and look through it. The concepts are solid and supported with real case studies that the authors spent years compiling. To learn the best practices when it comes to embracing the DevOps culture, read The DevOps Handbook.