Azure DevOps App Overview and Key Features Explained

Azure DevOps App is a comprehensive platform that helps teams plan, track, and deliver software projects more efficiently. It integrates a range of services, including project planning, source control, continuous integration, and continuous deployment.

One of the key features of Azure DevOps App is its project planning tool, which allows teams to create and manage work items, such as user stories, bugs, and tasks. This feature is accessible from the Azure DevOps App dashboard.

Azure DevOps App also includes a source control feature, which enables teams to manage their code and collaborate on projects. This feature supports Git, Team Foundation Version Control (TFVC), and other version control systems.

The Azure DevOps App dashboard provides a centralized view of all project activities, including work items, builds, and deployments.

To get started with the Azure DevOps app, you'll need to add the Microsoft Entra ID app to dbt Cloud. This will enable headless actions like deployment runs and CI.

First, connect a service user via OAuth to power these actions. This is a crucial step that must be completed by an account admin.

Once the Microsoft Entra ID app is set up and the service user is connected, you can then personally authenticate in dbt Cloud from Azure DevOps.

Azure DevOps is a set of tools and services that help DevOps teams provision and manage production environments. It's a game-changer for teams looking to automate, orchestrate, and manage application and service delivery.

Azure DevOps optimizes source control, build, test, and release processes to enable continuous delivery. This means you can focus on creating high-quality software without getting bogged down in tedious tasks.

Microsoft also offers Azure DevOps Server, the on-premises version of Azure DevOps, which you can deploy in your local data center. This gives you the flexibility to choose between cloud-based and on-premises environments.

Azure DevOps promotes the use of DevOps practices across cloud and on-premises environments, making it a versatile solution for teams of all sizes.

Azure DevOps is a set of tools that helps teams manage production environments. It automates, orchestrates, and manages application and service delivery.

You can use Azure DevOps to optimize source control, build, test, and release processes for continuous delivery.

Microsoft also offers Azure DevOps Server, which is an on-premises version of Azure DevOps that you can deploy in your local data center.

Power Platform solutions can be easily exported from one environment and imported to another.

The Features board is a powerful tool for DevOps teams and managers to review a project's progress and ensure the continuous flow of deliverables.

You can customize your Features board to support team-specific processes, making it easier to monitor and manage projects. The board offers a fast, visual monitoring approach through its Features backlog.

The Features board allows multiple teams to review features for shared projects via an interactive board. This makes it easier to collaborate and ensure that everyone is on the same page.

You can add rollup columns to the Feature backlog to help monitor a project's overall progress. This gives you a clear view of how your project is progressing.

Azure DevOps offers SQL access to operational data, allowing you to easily query and analyze your project's data. This can be especially helpful when trying to identify trends or issues.

Some of the key features of Azure DevOps include:

Azure Boards offers interactive, customizable tools to help developers manage software development projects. It includes many capabilities, including an easy-to-configure dashboard and calendar views.

A CI/CD pipeline is a crucial part of Azure DevOps, allowing you to automate the building and testing of your code. It's a continuous process that ensures high-quality, consistent code while making it easily accessible to team members.

Azure Pipelines is a powerful tool that supports most languages and project types, making it a great choice for various projects. It offers combined continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD) pipelines for building and testing code and shipping it to a target.

To create a CI/CD pipeline, you'll first need to navigate to your project in Azure DevOps and click on Pipelines. From there, you can create a new pipeline by selecting Azure Repos Git and choosing your repository.

Here are the basic steps to create a pipeline:

Once you've created your pipeline, you can add tasks to it by selecting Service connection, specifying the solution name to export, and specifying the path and zip file name as solution output file. This will take a compressed solution file and decompose it into multiple XML files.

Azure Pipelines also offers dynamic builds, progressive delivery, and much more, making it the world's most modern CI/CD platform.

By following these steps and using Azure Pipelines, you can create a powerful CI/CD pipeline that automates the building and testing of your code, ensuring high-quality, consistent code and making it easily accessible to team members.

Azure Artifacts is another powerful tool that allows development teams to share and manage code efficiently using software packages controlled from a unified platform. Developers can use Azure Artifacts to publish packages to feeds and share them within a team, across the organization, or publicly.

Project Setup is a crucial step in getting your Azure DevOps app up and running. Azure Boards offers tools to help each team plan and track its progress.

Defining teams is essential to ensure each project team can independently operate while enabling collaboration. Azure Boards defines default teams for each project and supports feature-specific teams.

By setting up project teams, you can streamline your workflow and make the most out of Azure DevOps.

Test Plans are a crucial part of the software development process, and Azure Test Plans is a powerful tool that can help improve code quality and collaboration.

Azure Test Plans offers user-friendly, browser-driven test management capabilities that teams can use to plan and implement manual and automated tests, including user acceptance and exploratory testing.

This platform provides the necessary tools to collect feedback from stakeholders, making it easier to identify and fix issues early on.

With Azure Test Plans, teams can improve code quality and collaboration, which can lead to faster time-to-market and reduced costs.

In a CI/CD pipeline, Azure Test Plans can be used to trigger the application build process and run unit tests, ensuring that the code meets the required standards before deployment.

Here's a brief overview of the data flows involved in a CI/CD pipeline that uses Azure Test Plans:

By incorporating Azure Test Plans into the CI/CD pipeline, teams can ensure that their code is thoroughly tested and validated before deployment, reducing the risk of errors and improving overall quality.

Setting up project teams is a crucial step in getting your project up and running. Azure Boards offers tools to help each team plan and track its progress.

Defining teams ensures each project team can independently operate while enabling collaboration. Azure Boards supports feature-specific teams.

Azure Boards defines default teams for each project, which helps to streamline the setup process. This way, you can focus on getting your project started without worrying about team configurations.

Setting up sprints is a crucial step in project planning. Project teams use sprints to define the project's sprint cadence, usually one to four weeks.

A sprint is an assignment a given team must deliver by a specified deadline. Each sprint represents a specific task or goal that the team needs to complete.

Sprints can support hierarchies, including release pipelines. This means that sprints can be nested within each other to create a hierarchical structure.

Organizations should define realistic sprint cadences that all team members can commit to. A minimum of six iterations is recommended, which is equivalent to a six-month plan.

To install Power Platform Build Tools, you first need to browse to the extension on the Visual Studio Marketplace.

Click the "Get it free" button to proceed with the installation process.

Select your Azure DevOps organization to associate the extension with your account.

Click the "Install" button to complete the installation of Power Platform Build Tools.

This will add Power Platform service connection and Azure Pipeline tasks to your Azure DevOps environment.

The installation process is straightforward and should take only a few minutes to complete.

Connecting your Azure DevOps account to a new app is a straightforward process. To get started, you'll need to have an Azure admin with the right permissions, specifically an Azure Service Administrator or Azure Co-administrator role in both the Microsoft Entra ID and Azure DevOps environments.

To connect Azure DevOps to your new app, you'll need to follow these steps: select Organization settings in the bottom left of your Azure DevOps account, navigate to Microsoft Entra ID, click Connect directory, select the directory you want to connect, and then click Connect.

The permissions required for this process are clearly outlined in the Azure documentation, so make sure to check those out if you're unsure. With the right permissions in place, you can proceed to connect your Azure DevOps account to your new app.

Here are the specific permissions you'll need:

By following these simple steps and having the right permissions, you'll be able to connect your Azure DevOps account to your new app in no time.

To add Entra ID to dbt Cloud, you'll need to connect your Microsoft Entra ID app and Azure DevOps first. This will require an Azure admin to have one of two specific permissions in both environments: Azure Service Administrator or Azure Co-administrator.

Once connected, you'll want to create a "service user" in Azure DevOps. This is a pseudo user with permissions scoped for service-to-service interactions, which will power headless actions in dbt Cloud.

To set up the service user, an Azure DevOps admin will need to follow these steps: From the Azure DevOps account, select Organization settings in the bottom left, then navigate to Microsoft Entra ID, click Connect directory, select the directory to connect, and click Connect.

A service user is necessary because Azure DevOps forces all authentication to be linked to a user's permissions. This is why linking authentication to a real Azure DevOps user is not recommended.

To add your Microsoft Entra ID app to dbt Cloud, navigate to your account settings in dbt Cloud, select Integrations, scroll to the Azure DevOps section, and complete the form. Your Microsoft Entra ID app should now be added to your dbt Cloud Account.

The Features board in Azure DevOps is a game-changer for DevOps teams and managers. It allows them to review a project's progress and ensure the continuous flow of deliverables.

You can customize your Features board to support team-specific processes, making it a versatile tool for various organizations. The board can be configured to include natural states during the design, development, and deployment of features to production.

The filter feature is a useful tool that allows viewers to focus on a tagged item based on features, specific sprints, etc. This helps teams stay on track and avoid distractions.

Adding rollup columns to the Feature backlog helps monitor a project's overall progress, giving you a clear picture of where you stand. This feature is especially useful for teams working on shared projects.

Configuring project delivery plans allows multiple teams to review features for shared projects via an interactive board. This makes collaboration easier and more efficient.