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IT team of any organization can control version and track the changes to the infrastructure in the same way as with software code, this is one of the key benefits of implementation of IaC in organizations. Feature also helps in better collaboration within and other teams in the organization.

Since IaC supports programming language and tools, it improves the organization’s strategy to deploy reliable and repeatable infrastructure at scale. This also reduces the risk of errors due to human intervenes and ensure that infrastructure is deployed and configured consistently across the environments.

Overall, IaC is an efficient and adaptable method for managing and deploying infrastructure, while also enhancing the reliability and security.

This whitepaper will help the audience to understand lifecycle of IAC, different tools, patterns, and best practices to start planning the infrastructure deployment processes and help in faster digitization as well.

1. Infrastructure Resource Lifecycle

The infrastructure resource lifecycle is the process that an organization goes through when it creates, deploys, and decommissions an infrastructure resource. It is an important concept to understand, as it helps to ensure that they are using their infrastructure resources in the most effective and efficient way.

Figure 1: Infrastructure Lifecycle

Source: Infosys

The lifecycle of an infrastructure resource typically begins with the planning stage, where the organization determines the needs and requirements for the resource, as well as any constraints or limitations that need to be considered. This may involve conducting a cost-benefit analysis, identifying potential risks and impacts, and developing a roadmap for the project. IaC used to plan and design infrastructure resources via code and using tools to evaluate and optimize the design. This can help organizations to more accurately determine their infrastructure needs and requirements, and to identify any potential risks or issues.

Next, the organization will move into the provisioning stage, where it creates and sets up the infrastructure resources. This may involve allocating resources, such as compute or storage, and configuring them according to the organization's standards and policies. IaC automates and provision infrastructure resources, by using code to create (Bicep, ARM template, CLI and DevOps Tools) and configure the resources according to the organization's standards and policies. As a results organizations get improved the consistency and reliability of deployments.

Once the resource is set up, it will be deployed and made available for use. This may involve installing and configuring software, integrating with other systems, and performing any necessary testing and validation. IaC can be used to automate the deployment of infrastructure resources, by using code to define and deploy the resources rapidly, repeatably via consistent manner. This help organizations to deploy resources more quickly and with fewer errors.

Once the resource is deployed, it enters the operation stage, where it is used to support the organization's operations and business processes. This may involve monitoring the resource, performing maintenance and updates/upgrades, and responding to any issues or incidents. By automating the tasks like monitoring, maintenance and update/upgrade using the code and tools, it helps in organization in improving the efficiency and reliability of infrastructure operations.

Eventually, the infrastructure resource will reach the end of its useful life and need to be decommissioned. During the retirement stage, the resource is taken out of service and any necessary data or assets are transferred to a new resource or system. IaC can be used to decommission infrastructure resources by using code to automate the process of transferring data and assets to new resources or systems and retiring the old resources. This can help organizations to retire resources more efficiently and reliably at the end of their lifecycle.

Understanding the infrastructure resource lifecycle is crucial for businesses and organizations, as it helps to plan, deploy, and manage infrastructure resources in a way that is efficient, effective, and aligned with business needs and standards.

2. IaC Generic Flow, Guidelines, Best Practices

Below is the High-Level flow for IaC:

Figure 2: IaC Flow

Source: Infosys

Flow Explanation:

Ways to IaC approach:

As organizations increasingly adopt cloud computing and Infrastructure as Code (IaC), governance and compliance become crucial components for ensuring that the infrastructure deployed meets regulatory requirements and company policies. IaC governance and compliance enable organizations to maintain the integrity of their cloud infrastructure by establishing policies, procedures, and best practices for deploying and managing cloud resources.

Infrastructure as code (IaC) is a powerful tool for managing and deploying infrastructure, but it's important to follow certain guidelines to ensure that you are using it effectively and efficiently. These guidelines can help you to plan and design your infrastructure, collaborate with other team members, test, and validate your code, document your code, and keep your code up to date. By following these guidelines, you can ensure that your IaC practices are aligned with your business needs and goals, and that your infrastructure is deployed and managed in a reliable and efficient manner. Below are some guidelines to consider when utilizing IaC:

Keep your code up to date: As your infrastructure and business needs change, it's important to keep your infrastructure code up to date. This will help to ensure that your infrastructure is always aligned.

IaC is help organizations to achieve faster digitalization goal. However, it requires detailed planning and standard practices to manage overall life cycle of infrastructure. Below are the few best practices which can be implemented while considering IaC at organization level:

3. IaC Benefits

Implementing IaC bring lot numerous benefits for organizations and their growing businesses need. Some of the benefits are below:

4. Digital Transformation with IaC Tools

Digital transformation is the process of using technology to fundamentally change how an organization operates and delivers value to its customers. Infrastructure as code (IaC) plays a key role in digital transformation by enabling organizations to deploy and manage their infrastructure, as well as automate and integrate with other systems more easily and quickly.

Infrastructure as code (IaC) is a software development practice enables manage infrastructure via code to automate infrastructure deployment, configuration, and management. Approach offers several benefits that can help improve the speed, reliability, and efficiency of digital transformation efforts.

One of the primary advantages of IaC is its ability to ensure improved reliability and consistency by ensuring infrastructure is consistently configured and deployed in a repeatable manner, reducing the risk of errors. This approach also fosters collaboration and coordination among teams, with the use of version control and tracking changes to infrastructure in the same way as software code, leading to improved communication and reduced risk of conflicts and errors.

IaC also enables greater flexibility and scalability, making it easier for organizations to scale their infrastructure to meet changing demand and experiment with new technologies and architectures, leading to increased adaptability. Also lead to improve speed and agility by reducing the time it takes to deploy and scale infrastructure and applications.

IaC is also well-suited for integration with DevOps practices, enabling the adoption of collaboration, automation, and continuous delivery, and taking advantage of the benefits they offer, such as improved agility and faster delivery of applications and services. Finally, IaC is particularly useful in cloud computing environments, where it can help manage and deploy infrastructure more efficiently and take advantage of the scalability and flexibility of the cloud.

Overall, IaC can be a powerful tool for enabling digital transformation by improving the management and deployment of infrastructure, while also enhancing the reliability, security, and flexibility of systems.

IAC has gained popularity in recent years due to it has many benefits such as increased automation, improved consistency, and easier scalability. To implement IaC, developers and operations teams use a variety of tools that can help them write, manage, and deploy their infrastructure code. These tools range from simple text editors to full-fledged Integrated Development Environments (IDEs) and cloud-based services. Some of the popular tools include Terraform, Bicep, Chef, Azure Resource Manager (ARM), PowerShell etc.

These tools have revolutionized the way organizations manage their infrastructure by enabling them to define and provision resources programmatically.

Terraform is a widely used open-source provisioning tool written in the Go language by HashiCorp that facilitates cloud resource provisioning. DevOps teams primarily use it to automate various infrastructure tasks. One of Terraform’ s primary use cases are public cloud provisioning on major providers, making it a cloud-agnostic tool. Additionally, terraform enables multi-cloud deployments, further extending its functionality beyond just single-cloud provisioning. Below are key features, advantages, limitations, License and Cost:

Figure 3: Terraform Flow

Source: Infosys

Bicep is a domain-specific language developed by Microsoft specifically for deploying Azure resources. It offers a more readable and streamlined syntax than the equivalent JSON ARM template. Bicep templates are easier to write and maintain.

Below are key features, advantages, limitations, License and Cost:

Figure 4: Bicep Flow

Source: Infosys

As an example, let us look at a Bicep template for creating a user assigned managed identity:

Figure 5: Bicep Example

Source: Infosys

ARM templates are a form of IaC, a concept where one can define the infrastructure to be deployed. You no longer need to click around the portal creating virtual machines or writing scripts to deploy a storage account. Instead, the template defines the resources, and the Azure ARM management layer is responsible for creating the infrastructure.

Below are key features, advantages, limitations, License and Cost:

Figure 6: ARM Template Flow

Source: Infosys

Example:

Figure 7: ARM File Example

Source: Infosys

(Command-Line Interface): it is a cross-platform command-line tool. Helps to connect to Azure and execute administrative commands on Azure. It allows the execution of commands through a terminal using interactive command-line prompts or a script.

Example:

Figure 8: CLI Example

Source: Infosys

Above section explained the major and popular tools for IaC. Beside the above tools, below are the other tools, organization can select tools based on the features, limitation, advantages, and cost:

5. Managing infrastructure at scale with IaC

In the digital transformation process, IaC is valuable to maintain infrastructure at scale. By using code to define and manage infrastructure, IaC enables to automate tasks and easily replicate their infrastructure across multiple regions and environments. This is especially advantageous for organizations with complex and sprawling infrastructure that needs to be consistently deployed and maintained across various locations.

This can be particularly useful for organizations with a large and complex infrastructure that needs to be consistently deployed and maintained across multiple geo locations. When managing infrastructure at scale with IaC for digital transformation, it is important to adopt best practices such as modularity, code reuse, and testing to ensure the reliability and maintainability of your infrastructure. Additionally, it is crucial to properly secure and manage access to your infrastructure and leverage tools like Azure DevOps to streamline and automate the management process. By following these best practices and harnessing the power of IaC, organization can effectively manage their infrastructure at scale and ensure the smooth and successful deployment of your applications.

There are several steps you can follow to effectively manage infrastructure at scale via IaC:

By following above steps, you can use IaC to effectively manage your infrastructure at a scale and support your digital transformation goals.

6. Conclusion / Summary

Infrastructure as Code (IaC) has become an indispensable aspect of modern cloud infrastructure and resource management, providing the agility, reliability, and scalability for efficiently infrastructure management. Adopting IaC principles enables organizations to automate the process of deploying and managing infrastructure, making it repeatable, predictable, and consistent. This not only reduces human error but also enables teams to focus on higher-value tasks such as application development and innovation.

As a global leader in IT services, we passionately believe that IaC is key player of any digital transformation strategy. Therefore, we highly encourage our clients to adopt it as part of their overall digital transformation journey. By embracing IaC and taking advantage of the latest technologies and tools, organizations can gain significant operational efficiencies, reduce costs, and achieve better business outcomes.