Flow Improvement Learning Path

These are the core skills we recommend everyone learn to execute CD.

Behavior-Driven Development

Every step in CD requires clear, testable acceptance criteria as a prerequisite. BDD is not test automation. BDD is the discussion that informs acceptance test driven development.

• Videos
  • What is BDD Dave Farley co-author of Continuous Delivery - 16:28 min
  • Acceptance Testing By Dave Farley - 14:49 min
• Recommended Reading
  • BDD In Action by John Ferguson Smart
  • Behavior-Driven Development with Cucumber: Better Collaboration for Better Software by Richard Lawrence, Paul Rayner

Continuous Integration

Continuous integration is a requirement for CD. It requires very frequent integration of non-breaking code.

• Videos
  • Top 10 Rules For Continuous Integration Dave Farley - 17 min.
  • Continuous-Integration-Practices on Linkedin Learning. Instructed by Ernest Mueller and James Wickett - 4 min.
  • Continuous-Integration on Linkedin Learning. Instructor by Laura Stone - 4 min.
• Recommended Reading
  • Continuous Integration: Improving Software Quality and Reducing Risk by Paul M. Duvall, Steve Matyas, Andrew Glover.

Conway’s law

“Any organization that designs a system will produce a design whose structure is a copy of the organization’s communication structure.” - Melvin Conway

Loosely coupled teams create loosely coupled systems. The opposite is also true.

• Videos
  • Don’t Forget Conway’s Law Sarah Novotny - 8:50 mins.
• Recommended Reading
  • Building Microservices - Ch 10 by Sam Newman.

Domain-Driven Design

This is another key design tool both for organizational and system design. This is a critical skill for developing microservices.

• Videos
  • What is DDD Eric Evans - 57:06 min.
  • Software Architecture: Domain-Driven Design LinkedIn Training Course.
• Recommended Reading
  • What Is Domain-Driven Design? by Vladik Khononov.

Pipeline Steps

Architecting a system of delivery is about designing efficient quality gates for the system’s context.

• Videos
  • Understanding A DevOps Pipeline David Farley - 13:24 mins.
• Recommended Reading
  • Continuous Delivery: Reliable Software Releases through Build, Test, and Deployment Automation Jez Humble and David Farley

Test-Driven Development

TDD highly correlates with application architecture that is easy to maintain and easy to upgrade.

• Videos
  • Does TDD Lead to Better Software Design? Dave Farley co-author of Continuous Delivery - 18:32 min.
  • Three Mindsets of TDD Dave Farley co-author of Continuous Delivery - 18:57 min.
  • TDD and DDD with .NET Core and VSCode - 1 hour
• Recommended Reading
  • Test Driven Development: By Example by Kent Beck.

Three Ways

The core principles that define DevOps:

1. Consider the system of delivery as a whole
2. Amplify feedback loops
3. Continuously learn and improve the delivery system

• Videos
  • The 3 Ways of The Phoenix Project co-author Gene Kim - 3:30 mins.
• Recommended Reading
  • The Three Ways: The Principles Underpinning DevOps by Gene Kim
  • The DevOps Handbook - Gene Kim et al

Value Stream Mapping

The primary process analysis tool used to help identify and attack constraints to delivery.

• Videos
  • How we used Value Stream Mapping to accelerate DevOps adoption Marcus Robinson - 45:26 min.
• Recommended Reading
  • Value Stream Mapping: How to Visualize Work and Align Leadership for Organizational Transformation - Karen Martin and Mike Osterling

Wastes

Our goal is to remove waste daily. We must first learn to recognize it.

• Videos
  • The 7 Types of Waste in Software Development Alex Green - 10:34 mins.
• Recommended Reading
  • Making Work Visible by Dominica DeGrandis.
  • The Art of Lean Software Development by Curt Hibbs; Mike Sullivan; Steve Jewett.