Azure CI: Automating Your Software Development Process

Automating your software development process with Azure CI can be a total game-changer. By streamlining your workflow, you can reduce errors, speed up delivery, and improve overall quality.

Azure CI integrates seamlessly with Azure DevOps, allowing you to automate your build, test, and deployment processes. This integration enables you to create a continuous pipeline that runs automatically whenever code changes are made.

With Azure CI, you can automate tasks such as code compilation, unit testing, and integration testing, freeing up your time to focus on more complex tasks. This automation also helps to catch errors early on, reducing the likelihood of downstream issues.

By automating your software development process, you can also improve collaboration and communication among team members, ensuring everyone is on the same page.

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Creating a CI pipeline in Azure DevOps is a straightforward process. You can create a new pipeline by selecting the "Create Pipeline" button on the Pipelines page.

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To trigger a Jenkins CI job when code is pushed to Azure Repos, you can use one of two approaches: wrapping Jenkins Job within Azure Pipelines or using the Azure DevOps CI/CD pipeline. The key benefit of the first approach is that you can have end-to-end traceability from work items to source code to build and release pipelines.

The first step in creating a CI pipeline is to select the source code management system, such as Git or TFVC, and provide the clone URL of the Azure DevOps Git repo. You will also need to provide credentials to access the repository, unless it is a public repo. To create a build definition, select the "New Item" link on the Jenkins home page and provide a name for the build definition, select Maven project, and click OK.

Here are the key components and stages in an Azure CI/CD pipeline:

Building an effective CI pipeline is a crucial step in ensuring the quality and reliability of your software releases. The pipeline is the backbone of your development process, automating the build, test, and deployment of your code.

To configure a service hook in Azure DevOps, navigate to the project settings page and select Service hooks under General. This will enable you to perform tasks on other services when events happen in your Azure DevOps Services projects.

There are several approaches to building a CI pipeline, including triggering the CI via a service hook in Azure DevOps or wrapping Jenkins job within Azure Pipelines. In the first approach, a service hook will be configured in Azure DevOps to trigger a Jenkins build upon a code commit.

Here are some key components to consider when building a CI pipeline:

• Source Control: This is where your application code is stored, such as Azure DevOps Repos or GitHub.

• Build Stage: This is where your code is compiled, tested, and build artifacts are produced.

• Release Stage: This is where your built artifacts are deployed to target environments, such as development, staging, and production.

• Deployment Gates: These are additional quality checks that occur before deployment to the next stage.

• Approve Workflow: This is where builds are approved manually before they are promoted to production.

• Artifacts: These are the build stage outputs that are passed to the release stage for deployment.

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• Release Triggers: These are events that trigger a release automatically when new artifacts are available.

• Environment Variables: These are settings that are managed within the pipeline for each environment.

• Logs and Monitoring: These are used to track the execution of the pipeline and provide insights into failures and performance metrics.

In the second approach, Jenkins CI job will be nested within an Azure CI pipeline, providing end-to-end traceability from work items to source code to build and release pipelines. To begin, an endpoint to the Jenkins Server for communication with Azure DevOps will be configured.

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The functional test stage is a crucial part of the CI pipeline, where various tests are run to validate that the deployed app is working as expected.

This stage involves checking out the master branch, which is the main branch of the repository that contains the code that is ready to be deployed.

The .NET version is set up, which is essential for the app to function correctly.

PowerShell is used to update the run settings to point to the application instance.

Function tests are run using the dotnet CLI, which is a command-line interface for .NET development.

Here are the steps involved in the functional test stage:

This stage is a critical gate that controls the release of the deployed software, ensuring that it is thoroughly tested before being released to the production environment.

To create a build in Azure DevOps, start by clicking on the New Item link from the Jenkins home page. Provide a name for the build definition and select Maven project. Scroll down to the Source code Management section and select Git, then provide the clone URL of the Azure DevOps Git repo.

You'll need to provide credentials to access the repository if it's private. To do this, go to your Azure Repos, select the Clone option, and generate new credentials. Note down the Username and Password, then add a new credential in Jenkins using the Add | Jenkins option.

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Select the credential created in the previous step from the drop-down, and the error message should disappear. Now, specify what action you want to take after the build is complete, such as archiving the build artifacts or triggering an Azure CD pipeline.

To archive the artifacts, enter target/*.war, *.sql in the Files to archive text box. Select the Save button to save the settings and return to the project page. The configuration is now completed, so select the Build Now option to initiate an Ad-hoc build.

Here's a summary of the build configuration steps:

Azure CI is built around a few key components and stages. The source control stage is where your application code lives, whether it's in Azure DevOps Repos or GitHub.

The build stage is where your source code is compiled, and tests are run, producing build artifacts. Release stages follow, where built artifacts are deployed to target environments like development, staging, and production. Deployment gates are an optional stage where additional quality checks occur before deployment.

Azure Pipelines simplify CI/CD pipelines, allowing you to start from a source stage containing existing code hosted on GitHub or on-premise containers.

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Continuous Integration (CI) focuses on detecting and addressing errors early in the development process, triggering automated builds and tests with every code change.

Its main objective is to integrate code changes into a shared repository often multiple times a day.

CI is a crucial step in ensuring the quality of code, but it doesn't go as far as ensuring the delivery of applications to production environments.

Here's a breakdown of the key differences between CI and CD:

Continuous Delivery (CD) extends CI by automating the delivery of applications to multiple environments, including testing, staging, and production.

The process is fully automated, with the only manual step being the deployment to production.

In contrast, Continuous Deployment (CD) takes it a step further by automatically deploying every change that passes through the CI/CD pipeline to production without manual interference.

This approach can significantly reduce manual work and speed up the delivery of features and bug-fixes.

In the world of Azure, you'll often hear the term CI/CD, but what does it mean? CI/CD stands for Continuous Integration and Continuous Delivery. Continuous integration is the practice of merging feature changes into a master or development branch several times per day, and compiling the code on a build server with each merge.

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Azure offers two primary managed CI/CD tools: Azure DevOps and Azure Pipelines. Azure DevOps lets you manage CI/CD processes by defining entities like artifacts, boards, and test plans. Azure Pipelines provides version control, a build server, and deployment systems that can put CI/CD into practice.

Azure Pipelines is a service that simplifies CI/CD pipelines designed for application development. It lets you start from a source stage containing existing code hosted on GitHub or on-premise containers.

Here are some key features of Azure Pipelines:

Azure DevOps offers several development services that help teams plan, build, collaborate, deploy, and support their applications. These services include Azure Pipelines, Azure Repos, Azure Boards, Azure Artifacts, and Azure Test Plans.

Azure CI Architecture is a crucial aspect of any CI/CD pipeline. It's a reference architecture provided by Microsoft that illustrates how to set up CI/CD processes in the Azure cloud.

Azure provides three reference architectures to get you started. These examples show how to leverage Azure Resources Management (ARM) templates and Azure's infrastructure as code (IaC) platform to automate deployment.

Here's a simplified overview of the CI/CD process for Azure VMs:

Microsoft provides three reference architectures that illustrate how to set up CI/CD processes in the Azure cloud.

These architectures are provided by Microsoft to help users understand how to implement CI/CD in Azure.

The architectures are available for users to reference and build upon, making it easier to create a CI/CD process in Azure.

One of the key benefits of using these architectures is that they are provided by Microsoft, ensuring that they are tailored to the Azure cloud platform.

By using these architectures, users can avoid common mistakes and ensure that their CI/CD process is set up correctly from the start.

The architectures are designed to be scalable and flexible, allowing users to adapt them to their specific needs and requirements.

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Azure VMs are a crucial part of many applications, and automating their deployment is a game-changer for any organization.

You can set up a CI/CD pipeline to push changes to Azure VMs using Azure DevOps, which provides a Git repository, a build system, and a complete release management.

Azure Resources Management (ARM) templates are used to provision infrastructure in each environment, and you define them to deploy the new build on it.

Here's a breakdown of the process:

The CI server triggers build and unit tests, and a CD trigger orchestrates the deployment of application artifacts to a testing environment.

Following automated tests, artifacts are deployed to a staging environment, and after additional tests, they're deployed to a production environment.

Azure Application Insights analyzes the health and performance of the new version, and the release manager updates the backlog item to indicate the relevant feature is released.

Containers play a crucial role in Azure CI Architecture. They allow for efficient deployment and scaling of applications.

Azure DevOps can help you set up continuous build and deployment for your containers if you're using Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS). This process involves a series of automated steps that ensure your application is always up-to-date and running smoothly.

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The process starts with a developer changing the application source code and committing code changes. The CI server then triggers a build, creates a new version of the container image, and performs unit tests. This ensures that the new version is stable and meets the required standards.

Here's an overview of the steps involved in deploying a containerized application using AKS:

With this process in place, you can ensure that your containerized application is always up-to-date and running smoothly. This allows for faster time-to-market and improved collaboration among team members.

In a hybrid development environment, development occurs on-premises alongside the Azure environment. Azure supports this setup, allowing for a seamless integration of on-premises and cloud-based development.

Azure DevOps lets you manage one CI/CD process that deploys artifacts to both environments in parallel. This means you can use the same pipeline to deploy code to both on-premises and Azure environments.

Azure Pipelines defines a CD process for both Azure and the on-premises environment, ensuring consistent deployment across both platforms. This is achieved through separate CD processes for each environment.

Terraform is used to enable deployment on both on-premises and cloud environments using infrastructure as code. This allows for the provisioning of VMs in the on-premise environment and Azure VMs or other resources in the Azure environment.

Azure Monitor stores analytics and enables continuous monitoring of both the on-premises and the Azure environment. This provides valuable insights into the performance of your applications across both platforms.

Azure Key Vault helps securely inject your secrets into both types of deployments, ensuring that sensitive information is protected.