Microsoft has recently announced the rebranding of VSTS (Visual Studio Team Service) to Azure DevOps. VSTS is an extension of Visual Studio, an integrated development environment from Microsoft. It enables developers, architects, and testers to design, develop, and test any software product in collaboration.

Azure DevOps is an extension of VSTS but it is much more in terms of features and functionalities. It is a strategic move from Microsoft with an aim to establish itself as the segment leader in the DevOps market.

What is Azure DevOps?

Azure DevOps is the evolution of VSTS (Visual Studio Team Service) using their own tools to build and develop a product in an efficient manner. Azure DevOps is a combination of VSTS, Team Foundation Server (TFS) with some improvements and a few extra. With Azure DevOps, you will get Azure pipelines, Azure artifacts, Azure Repos, Azure Test Plans, Azure Boards etc.

Here, one of the most notified features is Azure Pipelines where you get cloud-hosted pipelines for Linux, Windows, Mac OS etc. You can build, test, or deploy with any platform, programming language, or cloud. Further, it allows you to connect with GitHub for continuous deployment. Here, are a few great things about Azure pipelines. It will help you to understand why should you care about Azure DevOps in your next IT project.

Any Language, Any Platform : You can build, test and deploy software in Python, Java, PHP, Ruby, C, C++, Dotnet, Android, IOS etc and run parallelly on Linux, Windows, Mac OS.

: You can build, test and deploy software in Python, Java, PHP, Ruby, C, C++, Dotnet, Android, IOS etc and run parallelly on Linux, Windows, Mac OS. Containerization : It is easy to push or build images to container registries and deploy containers to individual hosts or Kubernetes.

: It is easy to push or build images to container registries and deploy containers to individual hosts or Kubernetes. Extension: With Azure Pipelines, you can explore or implement a wide number of community-build deployment tasks, along with hundreds of extensions from the Slack.

With Azure Pipelines, you can explore or implement a wide number of community-build deployment tasks, along with hundreds of extensions from the Slack. Any cloud deployment: It accelerates continuous delivery of the software to any cloud like Azure, AWS etc.

It accelerates continuous delivery of the software to any cloud like Azure, AWS etc. Good for Open-source projects: It ensures continuous integration and delivery for every open source project with unlimited build minutes and 10 parallel jobs.

It ensures continuous integration and delivery for every open source project with unlimited build minutes and 10 parallel jobs. Advanced Workflows: It offers wonderful support for YAML, release gates, test integration, reporting and more.

Once you are sure of the basic features of Azure DevOps, let us see how is it a big deal for Microsoft and the Community.

Azure DevOps – A Big Deal for Microsoft and the Ecosystem

VSTS is into existence from years designed with an objective to attract enterprise development teams to build most complex Windows apps. It had all the ingredients that are necessary to deliver an integrated experience of application lifecycle management (ALM).

DevOps was not into existence when product teams at Microsoft conceived the idea of VSTS. But software development has changed significantly in the last decade. The evolution of immutable infrastructure, infrastructure as the code, continuous integration, continuous monitoring, continuous deployment, continuous testing has changed the face of ALM. Now software product can be released much faster and it is not possible without DevOps.

Azure DevOps enable Microsoft to align with changing industry dynamics. Here are a few reasons why Azure DevOps is considered a big deal for Microsoft and the ecosystem.

1). Get the most out of GitHub acquisition

DevOps is all about the continuity and the Microsoft wants to maximize its investments by connecting the dots across Azure and GitHub. Microsoft is putting maximum efforts to deliver the best customer experiences and taking care of the source code stored in GitHub repositories. With Azure DevOps, Microsoft made it possible to deliver the best CI/CD (Continuous Integration/Continuous Delivery) experience for GitHub projects.

2). Move beyond Visual Studio and Windows

With Visual Studio, Microsoft enjoyed good market share similar to Windows and Microsoft Office Franchises. Microsoft become successful in taking Office beyond Windows to Macintosh and the web.

The Microsoft Visual Studio is still dominating for Windows application development. And the open source variants of Visual Studio are already a huge hit among open source developers.

With the introduction of Azure DevOps, new age developers may attract more whoa re not much associated with Visual Studio for modern app development.

3). Compete better with the AWS

In the last few years, Amazon has built a universe of tools. At the same time, Microsoft lacked an integrated DevOps story for Azure. The GitHub acquisition has put the Company in the forefront of DevOps.

By aligning existing VSTS assets, Microsoft finally released a versatile product Azure DevOps. It has the features to compete with some of the leading Companies in the DevOps segment.

4). Azure as the best cloud platform for open source projects

Microsoft put maximum efforts to make Azure as the best cloud platform for open source projects. With Azure DevOps, open source development is moved to the next level.

It allows developers getting cloud-hosted pipelines for Mac OS, Linux, and Windows with unlimited minutes ten parallel jobs for open source projects. It is certainly a big deal for implementing CI/CD projects.

The pipeline supports other cloud platforms too like AWS or GCP with better Azure integration features. With Azure DevOps, Microsoft has the best toolkit to develop or deploy open source projects.

5). Drive consumption of Azure Compute

The new currencies for platform vendors are computed and storage recently. Every public cloud vendor aligns its best services and offerings to drive consumption of computing and Microsoft is no different here. Microsoft has four compute services: Developers can use these computer services indirectly and the increased usage or consumption will directly affect the Company revenue.

Where to learn more about Azure DevOps?

Here are a few recommended resources to get started with Azure DevOps:

Keynotes or Workshops : You can tune in to the Azure DevOps workshop that generally lasts for hours. Save the date and time in advance for the live streaming on the event page. There are other resources and on-demand videos to help you get started.

: You can tune in to the Azure DevOps workshop that generally lasts for hours. Save the date and time in advance for the live streaming on the event page. There are other resources and on-demand videos to help you get started. Online Training : to get interactive online classes on Azure DevOps, you may join the DevOps certification training program and learn using the cloud platform in the work environment.

: to get interactive online classes on Azure DevOps, you may join the DevOps certification training program and learn using the cloud platform in the work environment. Online Conferences: If online conferences are not your preference then focus on live sessions too that usually lasts for two-three days and makes you familiar with the latest platforms and technologies launched recently in the technical marketplace.

Final Words:

DevOps has become a critical investment in team success while working around customers and developers. Microsoft used more than 15 years of experiences in designing Azure DevOps platforms and related tools to support the development teams.

In the last few months, more than one lac customers used Azure DevOps for the product shipment with maximum speed and quality. Azure DevOps has amazing offers and features to offer to development teams. It would be great to explore what amazing products can be created with Azure DevOps in the near future.



