📍 Introduction:

In this blog post, we will explore the concept of continuous deployment (CD) and learn how to implement it using Azure Pipelines. We will cover creating a release pipeline, configuring deployment environments, and setting up approvals. By the end of this post, you will have a solid understanding of CD and be able to implement it in your projects using Azure Pipelines.

🔍 Understanding Continuous Deployment (CD)

Continuous Deployment (CD) is a software development practice that involves automatically deploying code changes to production or other environments after they have passed through the build and test stages. This helps to ensure that new features and bug fixes are delivered to users quickly and efficiently. CD typically involves the following steps:

• Code changes are committed to a shared repository.

• A build system automatically compiles the code and runs tests (Continuous Integration).

• If the build and tests pass, the changes are automatically deployed to the target environment.

• If the deployment fails, the team is notified, and the issue is fixed.

🔍 Creating a Release Pipeline

To create a release pipeline in Azure Pipelines, follow these steps:

Step 1: Sign in to your Azure DevOps account and navigate to your project.

Step 2: Click on "Pipelines" in the left-hand menu, then click on "Releases."

Step 3: Click on the "New pipeline" button.

Step 4: Choose a template for your release pipeline. This will provide a starting point for your pipeline configuration. For example, you can choose a template for deploying a web app to Azure App Service, a Kubernetes cluster, or an on-premises server.

Step 5: Customize the release pipeline configuration as needed. This may involve adding or modifying deployment tasks, specifying deployment variables, or configuring deployment agents.

Step 6: Click "Save" to create your release pipeline.

🔍 Configuring Deployment Environments and Approvals

Deployment environments represent the different stages of your deployment process, such as development, staging, and production. To configure deployment environments, follow these steps:

Step 1: In your release pipeline configuration, click on the "Add" button under "Environments."

Step 2: Choose a template for your environment, such as "Azure App Service," "Kubernetes," or "IIS."

Step 3: Customize the environment configuration as needed. This may involve specifying the target resource, configuring deployment tasks, or setting environment variables.

Step 4: Repeat steps 1-3 for each environment in your deployment process.

Approvals are a way to ensure that deployments are reviewed and approved by the appropriate team members before they are deployed to an environment.

🔍 To configure approvals, follow these steps:

Step 1: In your release pipeline configuration, click on the "Pre-deployment conditions" or "Post-deployment conditions" icon for the environment you want to configure approvals for.

Step 2: Enable the "Approvals" option.

Step 3: Click on the "Add" button under "Approvers" and select the team members who should approve deployments to this environment.

Step 4: Configure any additional approval settings, such as the approval timeout or the number of required approvers.

Step 5: Click "Save" to save your approval settings.

📍 Conclusion:

In this blog post, we have explored the concept of continuous deployment, learned how to create a release pipeline in Azure Pipelines, and configured deployment environments and approvals. By implementing CD in your projects using Azure Pipelines, you can ensure that new features and bug fixes are delivered to users quickly and efficiently, while maintaining control over the deployment process.

🔍 Checkout GitHub Repository for projects:

🔗 github.com/sumanprasad007