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Service-Centric Mapping for Agile Software Deployments

Tom Molfetto

If you've spent any time at all on industry websites, you've probably seen a couple of statistics that support of service-centric mapping: 80% of unplanned business service downtime is due to change (and therefore a failure in IT change control), and that more than 50% of unplanned downtime is the result of human error. It's a simple fact, and there's no way of getting around it. And in today's landscape, there can be more impactful issues than downtime on the business, such as security vulnerabilities, especially where personal information or sensitive data is at stake.

This fact becomes especially important to consider in organizations and amongst teams that operate in an agile development environment, where fast and regular iterations of the core product – which is that which serves to distinguish the company in the marketplace and is imperative along the pathway to market leadership – are being released to introduce new features or otherwise improve performance.

In this type of environment, where the development team is generally rolling out new builds on a monthly basis, and perhaps even more regularly to address minor issues, problems often arise in the gap that exists between the development and operations teams. Fast and short iterations of the core service require rapid and sometimes automated deployment procedures from IT teams, who are being pressed to ensure that the production environment is stable, functional and performing optimally. And as development continues to push new builds towards production, IT is oftentimes introducing new components into the infrastructure to support various aspects of the core product.

DevOps is a software development method that stresses communication, collaboration and integration between software developers and information technology (IT) professionals that aims to help an organization rapidly produce software products and services. It is a method that effectively combines and accounts for: product development, technology operations, and quality assurance. In short, DevOps is a method that seeks to bridge the gap between development and operations teams in a way that allows for greater efficiency for the operation, and a better experience for the end-user of the core service.

In order to promote DevOps harmony, it is important that the operations team responsible for managing the production environment begins to manage from the perspective of the business service(s) being powered by the IT infrastructure as opposed to managing the components of the IT infrastructure without a sense of context for the service(s) that it underlies.

With the advent of virtualization, organizations that rely on agile development to stay ahead of the competition run the risk of a fragmented and disorganized infrastructure with VMs spread out all over the place. It can be difficult to keep track of the physical locations of each VM, many of which are powering mission-critical pieces of the core product. In this sort of environment, having an up-to-date, service-centric map that makes sense out of the increasingly complex IT infrastructure powering many of today's most powerful applications is critical.

In a landscape where a single business service may have dozens of distinct virtualized IT components, it is critical that the traditional approach taken by IT organizations of managing disparate technology silos shifts towards managing the business services that are running in the data center. Otherwise IT is not supporting the business in an optimal manner.

Tom Molfetto is Marketing Director for Neebula.

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Service-Centric Mapping for Agile Software Deployments

Tom Molfetto

If you've spent any time at all on industry websites, you've probably seen a couple of statistics that support of service-centric mapping: 80% of unplanned business service downtime is due to change (and therefore a failure in IT change control), and that more than 50% of unplanned downtime is the result of human error. It's a simple fact, and there's no way of getting around it. And in today's landscape, there can be more impactful issues than downtime on the business, such as security vulnerabilities, especially where personal information or sensitive data is at stake.

This fact becomes especially important to consider in organizations and amongst teams that operate in an agile development environment, where fast and regular iterations of the core product – which is that which serves to distinguish the company in the marketplace and is imperative along the pathway to market leadership – are being released to introduce new features or otherwise improve performance.

In this type of environment, where the development team is generally rolling out new builds on a monthly basis, and perhaps even more regularly to address minor issues, problems often arise in the gap that exists between the development and operations teams. Fast and short iterations of the core service require rapid and sometimes automated deployment procedures from IT teams, who are being pressed to ensure that the production environment is stable, functional and performing optimally. And as development continues to push new builds towards production, IT is oftentimes introducing new components into the infrastructure to support various aspects of the core product.

DevOps is a software development method that stresses communication, collaboration and integration between software developers and information technology (IT) professionals that aims to help an organization rapidly produce software products and services. It is a method that effectively combines and accounts for: product development, technology operations, and quality assurance. In short, DevOps is a method that seeks to bridge the gap between development and operations teams in a way that allows for greater efficiency for the operation, and a better experience for the end-user of the core service.

In order to promote DevOps harmony, it is important that the operations team responsible for managing the production environment begins to manage from the perspective of the business service(s) being powered by the IT infrastructure as opposed to managing the components of the IT infrastructure without a sense of context for the service(s) that it underlies.

With the advent of virtualization, organizations that rely on agile development to stay ahead of the competition run the risk of a fragmented and disorganized infrastructure with VMs spread out all over the place. It can be difficult to keep track of the physical locations of each VM, many of which are powering mission-critical pieces of the core product. In this sort of environment, having an up-to-date, service-centric map that makes sense out of the increasingly complex IT infrastructure powering many of today's most powerful applications is critical.

In a landscape where a single business service may have dozens of distinct virtualized IT components, it is critical that the traditional approach taken by IT organizations of managing disparate technology silos shifts towards managing the business services that are running in the data center. Otherwise IT is not supporting the business in an optimal manner.

Tom Molfetto is Marketing Director for Neebula.

Hot Topics

The Latest

According to Auvik's 2025 IT Trends Report, 60% of IT professionals feel at least moderately burned out on the job, with 43% stating that their workload is contributing to work stress. At the same time, many IT professionals are naming AI and machine learning as key areas they'd most like to upskill ...

Businesses that face downtime or outages risk financial and reputational damage, as well as reducing partner, shareholder, and customer trust. One of the major challenges that enterprises face is implementing a robust business continuity plan. What's the solution? The answer may lie in disaster recovery tactics such as truly immutable storage and regular disaster recovery testing ...

IT spending is expected to jump nearly 10% in 2025, and organizations are now facing pressure to manage costs without slowing down critical functions like observability. To meet the challenge, leaders are turning to smarter, more cost effective business strategies. Enter stage right: OpenTelemetry, the missing piece of the puzzle that is no longer just an option but rather a strategic advantage ...

Amidst the threat of cyberhacks and data breaches, companies install several security measures to keep their business safely afloat. These measures aim to protect businesses, employees, and crucial data. Yet, employees perceive them as burdensome. Frustrated with complex logins, slow access, and constant security checks, workers decide to completely bypass all security set-ups ...

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Cloudbrink's Personal SASE services provide last-mile acceleration and reduction in latency

In MEAN TIME TO INSIGHT Episode 13, Shamus McGillicuddy, VP of Research, Network Infrastructure and Operations, at EMA discusses hybrid multi-cloud networking strategy ... 

In high-traffic environments, the sheer volume and unpredictable nature of network incidents can quickly overwhelm even the most skilled teams, hindering their ability to react swiftly and effectively, potentially impacting service availability and overall business performance. This is where closed-loop remediation comes into the picture: an IT management concept designed to address the escalating complexity of modern networks ...

In 2025, enterprise workflows are undergoing a seismic shift. Propelled by breakthroughs in generative AI (GenAI), large language models (LLMs), and natural language processing (NLP), a new paradigm is emerging — agentic AI. This technology is not just automating tasks; it's reimagining how organizations make decisions, engage customers, and operate at scale ...

In the early days of the cloud revolution, business leaders perceived cloud services as a means of sidelining IT organizations. IT was too slow, too expensive, or incapable of supporting new technologies. With a team of developers, line of business managers could deploy new applications and services in the cloud. IT has been fighting to retake control ever since. Today, IT is back in the driver's seat, according to new research by Enterprise Management Associates (EMA) ...

In today's fast-paced and increasingly complex network environments, Network Operations Centers (NOCs) are the backbone of ensuring continuous uptime, smooth service delivery, and rapid issue resolution. However, the challenges faced by NOC teams are only growing. In a recent study, 78% state network complexity has grown significantly over the last few years while 84% regularly learn about network issues from users. It is imperative we adopt a new approach to managing today's network experiences ...

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From growing reliance on FinOps teams to the increasing attention on artificial intelligence (AI), and software licensing, the Flexera 2025 State of the Cloud Report digs into how organizations are improving cloud spend efficiency, while tackling the complexities of emerging technologies ...