A continuous integration and continuous deployment (CI/CD) pipeline is a series of steps that must be performed in order to deliver a new version of software. CI/CD pipelines are a practice focused on improving software delivery throughout the software development life cycle via automation.
By automating CI/CD throughout development, testing, production, and monitoring phases of the software development lifecycle, organizations are able to develop higher quality code, faster. Although it’s possible to manually execute each of the steps of a CI/CD pipeline, the true value of CI/CD pipelines is realized through automation.
By automating the process, the objective is to minimize human error and maintain a consistent process for how software is released. Tools that are included in the pipeline could include compiling code, unit tests, code analysis, security, and binaries creation.
CI/CD is the backbone of a DevOps methodology, bringing developers and IT operations teams together to deploy software.
Traditional CI/CD systems are designed for pipelines that use virtual machines, but cloud-native application development brings advantages to CI/CD pipelines.
