DevOps is in high demand in technology today, from CI/CD (continuous software integration and deployment) to container management and server preparation. You might even say it’s a buzzword… on the ear. As a developer, you can be part of the DevOps team – not necessarily preparing servers for work and managing containers, but creating great software.
A lot of what developers, DevOps engineers and IT teams do in today’s software development lifecycle is tools, testing, automation and server orchestration.
Especially if the team is involved in a large Open Source project or we’re talking about one person. Here are five DevOps tips for developers who want to work more efficiently and faster.

YAML makes frontend work easier

Introduced in 2001, YAML has become one of the languages for many declarative automations – it is often used in DevOps and development of different interface configurations, automation and so on. YAML stands for Yet Another Markup Language. YAML markup is easy to read. It puts less emphasis on round and curly bracket characters and quotes {}, [], “.
Why is this important? By learning or even improving your YAML skills, you can more easily save configurations for applications, such as settings in an easy to write and read language.
YAML files are everywhere, from corporate development workflows to open source projects. Lots of YAML files on GitHub, too (they support a product we really like: GitHub Actions, but more on that later).

DevOps tools help speed things up

Let’s get something straight first: DevOps tools are a broad concept that covers cloud platforms, server orchestration tools, code management, version control, and more. These are all technologies that make writing, testing, deploying, releasing software easier and leave any worries about unexpected failures in the past. Here are three DevOps tools to speed up workflows and focus on building great software.
Git
You probably know that Git is a distributed version control system and source code management tool. For developers, it’s the foundation of the basics and a popular DevOps tool.
Why?

Cloud-based integrated development environments (IDEs)

I know, it’s kind of hard to say out loud (thanks, marketing). A simpler way would be cloud IDEs. But these platforms are worth exploring immediately.
And here’s why. Cloud IDEs are fully hosted development environments that allow you to write and run code, debug it, and quickly deploy new, pre-configured environments. Need validation? We launched our own cloud-based IDE, Codespaces, at the beginning of the year and started using it to build GitHub. It used to take us up to 45 minutes to deploy new developer environments – now it only takes 10 seconds.
With cloud IDEs, it’s very easy and fast to deploy new, pre-configured development environments, including one-offs. Plus, with them, you don’t have to think about computer power (hello to all those who dare to write code on tablets).

Server orchestration for greater flexibility and speed

If you’re building a cloud application or even just using different servers, virtual machines, containers or hosting services, you’re probably dealing with multiple environments. Being able to make sure that the application and infrastructure fit together reduces your dependence on the development team trying to run software on your infrastructure at the last minute.
This is where server orchestration comes in handy. Server or infrastructure orchestration is usually the task of IT and DevOps teams. These include setting up, managing, preparing, and coordinating systems, applications, and underlying infrastructure to run software.

Try writing repetitive tasks in Bash or PowerShell

Imagine: you have a bunch of repetitive tasks running locally, and they take too much time each week. There’s a better, more efficient way to handle them – write scripts with Bash or PowerShell.
Bash has deep roots in the Unix world. It’s the backbone for IT, DevOps teams, and many developers.
PowerShell is younger. Developed at Microsoft and launched in 2006, PowerShell replaced the command shell and early scripting languages for task automation and configuration management in Windows environments.
Today, both Bash and PowerShell are cross-platform (although most people used to working in Windows use PowerShell, and most people familiar with Linux or macOS use Bash).