DevOps

Robust development processes.

Drupal DevOps overview

Aim

Design and implement backend systems and processes to aid the efficient and deliverable delivery of web applications.

Approach

Develop a set of processes and tools to help developers to efficiently create and manage projects, utilising continuous integration of code and automated quality checks.

Outcome

A team of developers who are productive and confident in the development process so that they are able to focus on delivering functionality to the application rather than debugging the deployment process.

Drupal DevOps

Morpht comes with a DevOps co-founder, so it is naturally a priority in the company and for our developers. We have spent time working on our processes and tools to ensure that developers are productive from the get go and have confidence in the deployment process. This has led to higher developer productivity and more quality in the code we deliver.

Our tech stack is based around the following tools:

  • A containerised approach to defining our environments: We use Docker, frequently with development tools such as Lando or Ahoy. 
  • Hosting platforms: Utilising best of breed hosting platforms such as Pantheon, Acquia and GovCMS. We develop a (similar) recipe for each to ensure productivity no matter the environment.
  • Continuous integration: We utilise tools such as Github Actions to run tests and deployments.
  • Testing: Our continuous integration pipeline allows for automated tests to be run against our code or sites, using frameworks such as Cypress and BackstopJS
  • Monitoring and alerting: We care about the reliability of the sites we maintain. Our monitoring toolset alerts us about possible problems, ideally before they happen.

At Morpht we have the saying that "if a developer cannot get up and running in 30 minutes then it is a bug." We strive to improve our working methods and will adapt as the landscape changes to stay abreast of current best practices.

Frequently asked questions

It covers the infrastructure, deployment, monitoring and operational practices that keep a Drupal site running reliably in production, environment management, automated deployments, backup/recovery, uptime monitoring, and incident response, as distinct from the application-layer development work of building features.

Government sites can face unpredictable traffic spikes (a health alert, a policy announcement, a natural disaster update) where poor DevOps practice is the difference between a site staying up and going down at the exact moment citizens need it most. Ask any prospective partner for concrete evidence of production incident response, not just a features list.

GovCMS SaaS handles a substantial portion of infrastructure DevOps for you, since it's a shared managed platform; GovCMS PaaS and non-GovCMS Drupal hosting put more of that DevOps responsibility on your agency (or your delivery partner), which is an important factor in the SaaS-vs-PaaS decision.

Insights

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Visual regression testing: BackstopJS for the win

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