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In our first Technology Deep Dive, we have asked our DevOps experts Daniel and Ben to share their insights into the advantages of working with GitOps and what the ultimate benefit of GitOps to VNC is.

The Problem?

Many organisations are letting their customers down because their change processes suffocate and slow developers down from releasing features that matter most to their customers. If it’s a common occurrence that your deployments are including 100s of features, taking all night to deploy or if you’re having major outages directly after a deployment then GitOps and this post could definitely be worth a read.

What is GitOps?

GitOps is a functioning framework that embodies DevOps best practices used for application such as a version control and CI/CD and applies them to application deployments. In simple terms, there is a relationship between the two: DevOps is a culture whereas GitOps is the Cult hero that DevOps engineers love to adopt and deploy time and time again.

Components of GitOps:

Infrastructure as Code + Merge Requests + Continuous Integration and Continuous Deployment

What are the benefits?

There is definite value that the GitOps methodology brings to an organisation and a team. Using Git as a source control system is one of them, as you can use it to do push or pull requests and automatically deploy any changes to your infrastructure as code. We also have the use of self documenting environments where we can keep a record of what we did previously, and with this in mind, we are also able to share what we have done with our team. Advantage: If someone picks up where you left off, the person will be able to check the environment, maybe within a “read me document” and understand what has happened. This is an advantage for teams that don’t necessarily work within the same office or even the same continent.

Another benefit: If there is an error or your code breaks, you have a handy audit trail in git. This is where version control comes into play. If you have a software dependency within your application, you bump it, build the new image and suddenly your app starts misbehaving. You are able to rollback and review the entire history and see precisely which build caused the error in the application. And you can also revert the code back to its previous state. This will help reduce recovery time.

There are also advantages relating to automation, security and compliance because everything is visible in the single source of truth which is your GitOps repo.

So what are VNC doing?

At VNC we are strong believers in the GitOps methodology. It allows us the flexibility to ship 10s of images per day, each with new features and then promote them fast through the environments once they’ve passed the necessary QA and sanity tests. The GitOps repos ensure that Git is the single source of truth. Couple this with Flux, constantly scanning and fixing any inconsistencies, this means that manual changes aren’t possible in any of our environments. This workflow reduces incidents in general but also reduces the time it takes to troubleshoot issues when they occur.

What’s the ultimate benefit of GitOps to VNC?
It’s the fact that we can deliver updates to our customers faster whilst having a rigid testing approach to ensure quality.

What can we do for you?

Want to see how the GitOps methodology will help you to roll out VNClagoon to large numbers of users?
Get in touch with us!

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    About VNClagoon

    Secure, Best in Class, Seamless Communication and Collaboration, Lowest TCO
    The VNClagoon enterprise software suite offers a full range of integrated communication and collaboration products for messaging, real-time conferencing, community building, channels, email, groupware, task and project management, file handling and more for large organizations. Built upon state-of-the-art open source technology by thousands of world-class developers around the world, VNClagoon is a leading alternative to closed source and SaaS-only applications like Microsoft Teams, Zoom, WhatsApp, Dropbox and many others. Now it is possible for VNClagoon customers to gain greater control over their digital sovereignty as they communicate and collaborate more securely using one completely integrated suite of applications.

    About VNC – Virtual Network Consult AG

    Seamless Communication and Collaboration: The New Normal for Today’s Enterprise
    VNC is a global software corporation that develops open source communication and collaboration applications for large organizations. With its interdisciplinary, high professional developer team, VNC has created an integrated suite of enterprise applications that offer a secure alternative to the established software giants. Now it is possible to collaborate with anyone, from anywhere, on any device, under the strictest privacy standards available while retaining the right to digital sovereignty. VNC – Virtual Network Consult AG, is based in Switzerland, Germany and India, serving a variety of system integrators, financial institutions, network organizations, telcos, non profit groups, healthcare providers, and government agencies and more. For more information visit https://vnclagoon.com

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