100 Days Of DevOps – A Complete Guide For Beginners

In the fast-paced digital world, enterprises survive on agility and innovation. Here is where DevOps comes in; it is a new approach that bridges development and operations. It makes software delivery seamless and enables rapid application deployment. Nevertheless, how do you navigate as an aspiring DevOps practitioner through this exciting, yet intricate field?

This roadmap is carefully thought out to help participants excel in the DevOps environment. And now buckle up for a ride that will shake the world of efficient collaboration, automated infrastructure, and superior performance of applications.

What is DevOps and Why is it Crucial?

Integration between development, operations, security, and quality assurance teams is promoted by the DevOps ideology and set of procedures. Throughout the software development life cycle, it emphasizes breaking down silos, automating procedures, and fostering ongoing feedback loops.

Here’s why DevOps is essential:

• Faster Time to Market: Deliver features and updates at breakneck speed, keeping your business ahead of the curve.
• Improved Quality and Reliability: Automate testing and monitoring to ensure flawless application performance.
• Enhanced Collaboration: Bridge the gap between development and operations teams, fostering a culture of shared responsibility.
• Reduced Costs: Streamline processes and eliminate inefficiencies, leading to significant cost savings.

Detailed Phase Breakdown:

Phase 1: Foundations (Days 1-20)

Prerequisites : Familiarity with programming languages such as Python, Java, or others.

Objective: Understand the tenets of DevOps – The principles of DevOps are important to get a grip on.

Day 1-3: DevOps Fundamentals

• Get absorbed into the basic ideas concerning such things as the benefits of DevOps, cultural shifts or alignment changes it has brought about, and how it enables streamlining in software delivery.
• Resources:
  • Introduction to DevOps
  • How DevOps Works?

Day 4-8: Operating System

• Learn to handle OS Concepts and Linux command line interface (CLI), manipulate files, perform system administrator tasks: these are some easy steps for dealing with different Linux based servers which are commonly used by D-Ops professionals
• In addition to that, you should get an insight into networking’s core principles: IP addresses, subnetting, and TCP/IP protocols. This is foundational knowledge which is necessary for understanding how applications communicate within and across networks.
• Resources:
  • Operating System
    • OS Basics
    • Process & Threads 
    • CPU Scheduling 
    • Process Synchronization
    • Deadlock 
    • Memory Management
    • Disk Management
    • Disk Scheduling
  • Virtualization
    • Application Virtualization
    • Network Virtualization
    • Desktop Virtualization
    • Storage Virtualization
    • Server Virtualization
    • Data virtualization

Day 9-13: Linux (Command Line, Scripting, Networking, Security)

• Command Line
• Bash and Shell Scripting
• Package Management
• Networking Tools
• Security Concepts
• How to Set File Permissions in Linux

• Networking Protocols
  • HTTP
  • HTTPS
  • TCP/IP
  • FTP / SFTP
  • DNS
  • SMTP
  • SSL / TLS
  • SSHPort Forwarding
• Computer Networks

Day 14-17: Git Version Control & Advanced Git

• The fundamentals of Git, an effective version control system, must be learned. You need to be familiar with several fundamental commands for versioning, branching, merging, and resolving conflicts in order to manage your code efficiently.
• Resources:
  • An Ultimate Guide to Git and Github
  • Git Tutorial

• Branching strategies (Gitflow, feature branching), rebasing or complex workflows are just but a few advanced functionalities of Git that you should explore. It will equip you with skills in managing larger codebases as well as effective team collaboration.
• Resources:
  • Branching strategies In Git

Day 18-20: Introduction to Configuration Management

• A popular word in tech world is Infrastructure as Code (IaC) which refers to the automation of infrastructure provisioning and management. One can study tools like Ansible or Chef.
• Resources:
  • Ansible
  • Introduction to Ansible and its Architecture components

Phase 2: Version Control & Configuration Management (Days 21-40)

Objective: Deepen your understanding of version control and infrastructure automation.

Day 21-24: Infrastructure Automation with Ansible

• Deepen your knowledge on Ansible with more exploration of it IaC skills
• For complex Ansible playbooks writing covering such tasks as provisioning, configuration management, application deployment etc.
• Ansible roles and modules which are reusable and modular.

Day 25-30: Containerization with Docker

• To start with on Dockers – which package application with their dependencies for consistent and isolated deployment – get familiar with its basic principles. You will be guided on building running and managing containerized applications.
• Resources:
  • Docker Tutorial
  • Containerization with Docker
  • Virtualisation with Docker Containers

Day 31-37: Infrastructure Orchestration with Kubernetes

• Learn about container orchestration and how it helps with large-scale containerised application management.
• Discover more about the well-liked open-source container orchestration tool, Kubernetes.
• Recognise fundamental concepts in Kubernetes, such as services, namespaces, deployments, and pods.
• Resources:
  • Introduction to Kubernetes
  • Kubernetes Tutorial
  • Kubernetes – Introduction to Container Orchestration

Day 38-40: Introduction to Cloud Computing

• Cover the principles of cloud computing as well, including deployment options and service types (IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS). There will also be discussion of the advantages and factors to take into account when using cloud platforms for DevOps projects.
• Resources:
  • Cloud Computing
  • Architecture of Cloud Computing
  • Difference between Cloud Computing and Traditional Computing
  • Virtualization in Cloud Computing

Take Aways From This Phase

• Create a personal development environment to strengthen your knowledge of the course. Apply what you have learned so far about these technologies and tools via some experimentations. This may mean, for example, creating a simple Git repository, deploying an application into a container, or doing infrastructure as code (IaC).
• Resources:
  • Online tutorials, code repositories, and sandboxes offered by cloud providers.

Phase 3: Continuous Integration & Delivery (Days 41-60)

Objective: Master the practices and tools for automating software delivery.

Day 41-46 : Introduction to CI/CD and CI/CD Tools

• Immerse yourself in the world of CI/CD, or continuous integration/continuous deployment. Why not experiment with several CI/CD processes that will provide an overview of them.
• Resources:
  • CI/CD

• Become familiar with well-known CI/CD tools such as CircleCI, Jenkins, or GitLab CI/CD. Recognise their functions and how to apply them to automate different software development lifecycle stages.
• Resources:
  • Jenkins
    • How to Make a CI-CD Pipeline in Jenkins?
  • GitLab CI/CD
  • CircleCI

Day 47-50: Testing in DevOps

• Investigate testing frameworks such as JUnit for Java programming language, pytest for Python programming language and alike frameworks that are available for other languages you may choose.
• Use these frameworks in your CI/CD pipeline to achieve automated testing and reporting.
• Discover more about test coverage metrics to enhance your software’s reliability as well as quality.

Day 51-54: Infrastructure as Code (IaC) with Terraform

• Learn more about Infrastructure-as-a-Code by Terraform is a well-liked cloud provisioning tool for on-premises infrastructure management systems and multi-cloud platforms.
• Understand Terraform configurations, modules, and state management.
• Practice writing IaC scripts to automate the creation and configuration of infrastructure resources.

Day 54-57: CI/CD Pipeline Design and Implementation

• Design a CI/CD pipeline tailored to your project’s specific needs and chosen tools.
• Configure your chosen CI/CD platform to automate the following stages:
  • Code commit: Trigger builds upon code commits to the version control system.
  • Build and test: Automate building, testing, and code quality checks.
  • Deployment: Deploy the application to staging or production environments based on successful test results.
  • Monitoring: Monitor the deployed application for errors or performance issues.

Day 56-60: Practice and Hands-on Learning:

• Set up a CI/CD pipeline for a real-world project or a personal experiment.
• Integrate the tools and concepts learned so far to automate the software delivery process.
• Monitor the pipeline’s performance and identify areas for improvement.

Phase 4: Infrastructure & Automation (Days 61-80)

Objective: Enhance your ability to manage and automate infrastructure.

Day 61-65: Cloud Platforms in Depth

• Select any one cloud platform (AWS, Azure, GCP) to explore their infrastructure management services and deployment system automation further.
  • AWS: Explore services like EC2, S3, VPC, and CloudFormation.
    • AWS Tutorial
    • Create EC2 Instance in AWS (Amazon): Complete Tutorial
    • Introduction to AWS Simple Storage Service (AWS S3)
    • Amazon VPC – Introduction to Amazon Virtual Private Cloud
  • Azure: Learn about Azure VMs, App Service, Storage Accounts, and Resource Manager.
    • Virtual Machines in Microsoft Azure
    • Microsoft Azure Tutorial
    • Microsoft Azure – Storage Accounts
  • GCP: Discover Compute Engine, Cloud Storage, Cloud Functions, and Deployment Manager.
    • GCP Tutorial
    • Introduction to Google Compute Engine
    • How Cloud Storage Actually Works !!
    • Cloud Functions in GCP

Day 66-70: Practice and Hands-on Learning

• Apply what you have learnt in a personal project or participate in open source projects where you can contribute your skills to others who might need them just like you did when assembling this guide for yourself.
• You may automate infrastructure tasks through Terraform or Ansible IAC tools
• Use Kubernetes to deploy containerized applications on a cloud platform.

Day 71-75: Configuration Management Best Practices

• Learn about Infrastructure as Code (IaC) best practices to ensure secure, maintainable, and scalable infrastructure deployments.
• Explore topics like:
  • Modularization: Break down infrastructure configurations into reusable modules for better organization and maintainability.
    • Modularity and its Properties
  • State Management: Understand how IaC tools handle infrastructure state and potential conflicts.
  • Security: Implement security best practices within your IaC code to minimize vulnerabilities.

Day 76-80: Infrastructure Monitoring and Alerting

• You can track the health and performance of your infrastructure using monitoring tools.
  • Kubernetes Monitoring
• System metrics collection, data rendering, alerts on abnormal activities are done by Prometheus and Grafana respectively.
  • Kubernetes Prometheus‘
  • Grafana
• You should set up automated notifications that will help identify potential issues early enough so that action can be taken before they escalate into emergencies.

Phase 5: Security & Monitoring (Days 81-100)

Objective: Integrate security practices and enhance monitoring capabilities.

Day 81-85: Security in DevOps (DevSecOps)

• Understand why it is essential to maintain security during the undertaking of DevOps.
• Learn about threat modeling, secure coding, and vulnerability scanning as some of the DevOps practices commonly referred to as DevSecOps.
• Discuss automated security checks within CI/CD pipeline through automation techniques in terms of tools.
• Resources:
  • What is DevSecOps?
  • DevSecOps – Role and Benefits

Day 86-90: Application Security

• Ensure you know common application vulnerabilities and countermeasures against them.
• The other areas include secure coding practices, input validation and security testing methodologies.
• Other sorts of resources for application security are static code analyzers and dynamic application security testers (DAST).

Day 91-95: Advanced Monitoring

• To learn more about distributed tracing and log aggregation for better application performance monitoring.
• There are tools like Zipkin that trace requests among microservices as well as ELK Stack that is designed for centralized log management and analysis.
• You may use these tools to get more insights into the behavior of your applications and pin down issues.

Day 96-97: DevOps Case Studies and Community Engagement

• By reading case studies, which provide examples from real life, companies can gain practical knowledge on how successful DevOps has been in different sectors.
• DevOps teams of various organizations have shared their experience in coping with them as well as adapting to Agile methodologies.
• The worldwide community comprised of system administrators, software developers, testers, and network engineers have many venues to interact online such as forums, meet-ups or conferences to share their experience and skills or learn from others.

Day 98-100: Continuous Learning

• It’s important to dedicate some time towards keeping up with the trends, latest tools, and best practices.
• Visit web sites offering new technologies or get enrolled into some online courses/ workshops. Don’t miss industry events related to DevOps where you will be able to expand your knowledge area further on the subject matter.

Conclusion

The only constant thing in the world is change. Be ready that this plan of 100 days of DevOps is just a reference point rather than some strict plan. Keep learning constantly; explore new technologies but also actively participate in DevOps community. After studying these steps and staying abreast with recent developments you would be close enough to becoming a DevOps engineer.