DevOps Intro — Modern DevOps Practices Through One Project
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A 10-week practical introduction to DevOps at Innopolis University. You will package, ship, observe, harden, and deploy one Go service — QuickNotes — across every lab. The discipline you learn here is the spine of modern production engineering.
💬 "If it hurts, do it more often." — Jez Humble
Course Roadmap
10 weekly labs + 2 optional bonus labs:
| Week | Lab | Module | Key Topics & Technologies |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Lab 1 | DevOps Foundations & Git | DevOps history, fork → branch → PR, signed commits (SSH 2.34+), PR templates |
| 2 | Lab 2 | Version Control Deep Dive | Object model, reflog recovery, reset modes, signed tags, rebase, bisect |
| 3 | Lab 3 | CI/CD | GitHub Actions (matrix, cache, OIDC); Bonus: GitLab CI mirror |
| 4 | Lab 4 | OS & Networking | OSI, DNS, HTTP, TLS, ss/dig/tcpdump/journalctl debugging |
| 5 | Lab 5 | Virtualization | Vagrant + VirtualBox, snapshots, cloud-init |
| 6 | Lab 6 | Containers | Multi-stage Dockerfile, distroless, Compose, hardening |
| 7 | Lab 7 | Configuration Management | Ansible playbook to deploy QuickNotes to Lab 5 VM; ansible-pull GitOps preview |
| 8 | Lab 8 | SRE & Monitoring | Golden signals, Prometheus, Grafana, one good alert, Checkly |
| 9 | Lab 9 | DevSecOps | Trivy, OWASP ZAP, SBOM, govulncheck reachability |
| 10 | Lab 10 | Cloud Computing | ghcr.io push from CI, Hugging Face Spaces deploy (card-free), Cloudflare Tunnel comparison |
| — | Lab 11 | Reproducible Builds (bonus) | Nix flake for QuickNotes; deterministic OCI image |
| — | Lab 12 | WebAssembly Containers (bonus) | TinyGo + Spin/WAGI; perf comparison vs Docker |
The Project: QuickNotes
A small Go 1.24 notes API. You don't write the app — you operationalize it.
graph LR
C["💻 curl / browser"] -->|HTTP :8080| S["🟢 quicknotes<br/>Go 1.24"]
S --> F["📄 data/notes.json"]
S -->|GET /metrics| P["📊 Prometheus<br/>Lab 8"]
| Endpoint | Method | Returns |
|---|---|---|
/notes |
GET | All notes |
/notes/{id} |
GET | One note / 404 |
/notes |
POST | Created note (201) |
/notes/{id} |
DELETE | 204 / 404 |
/health |
GET | {"status":"ok","notes":N} |
/metrics |
GET | Prometheus text format |
Stack: Go 1.24 + standard library (net/http, encoding/json). No third-party deps in the core app. Static binary, tiny container, clean WASM target.
See app/README.md for run instructions.
Lectures
12 lecture files in lectures/ — 10 main + 2 bonus readings:
| # | Title | File |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Introduction to DevOps: From Conflict to Collaboration | lec1.md |
| 2 | Version Control Deep Dive: Git Internals & Recovery | lec2.md |
| 3 | CI/CD: From it works on my machine to it works on every machine |
lec3.md |
| 4 | Operating Systems & Networking: The Substrate Underneath | lec4.md |
| 5 | Virtualization: One Box, Many Worlds | lec5.md |
| 6 | Containers: Same Kernel, Different Worlds | lec6.md |
| 7 | Configuration Management with Ansible | lec7.md |
| 8 | SRE & Monitoring: Reliability Is an Engineering Discipline | lec8.md |
| 9 | DevSecOps: Shift Security Left | lec9.md |
| 10 | Cloud Computing: Ship QuickNotes to the Real World | lec10.md |
| R11 | Reading — Reproducible Builds with Nix (bonus) | reading11.md |
| R12 | Reading — WebAssembly Containers (bonus) | reading12.md |
Each main lecture has a 15-question post-quiz in EN + RU (uploaded to the course quiz platform — see Quiz leaderboards).
Technology Stack
Versions pinned to April 2026:
| Category | Tool | Version | Introduced |
|---|---|---|---|
| Application runtime | Go + std lib | 1.24 | Week 1 (provided) |
| Git | git | 2.49+ | Week 1 |
| CI/CD | GitHub Actions, GitLab CI | — | Week 3 |
| Hypervisor | VirtualBox | 7.1.x | Week 5 |
| VM provisioning | Vagrant | 2.4.x | Week 5 |
| Containers | Docker + Compose | 28.x | Week 6 |
| Configuration Mgmt | Ansible | 10.x | Week 7 |
| Metrics | Prometheus | v3.x | Week 8 |
| Dashboards | Grafana | 13.x | Week 8 |
| Security scan | Trivy | 0.59.x | Week 9 |
| DAST | OWASP ZAP | 2.16.x | Week 9 |
| Cloud | Hugging Face Spaces + Cloudflare Tunnel (card-free) | — | Week 10 |
| (bonus) Reproducibility | Nix Flakes | 2.x | Lab 11 |
| (bonus) WASM | TinyGo + Spin | 0.34 / 3.x | Lab 12 |
What Ships vs What Students Produce
The upstream course repo provides plumbing. Students produce skill in their forks.
| Path | Ships in repo | Students produce |
|---|---|---|
app/ (Go service + tests + Makefile + seed.json) |
✅ | |
lectures/ |
✅ | |
labs/labN.md (lab specs) |
✅ | |
.github/pull_request_template.md |
✅ Lab 1 | |
.github/workflows/ci.yml |
✅ Lab 3 | |
Vagrantfile |
✅ Lab 5 | |
app/Dockerfile, compose.yaml |
✅ Lab 6 | |
ansible/ (playbook, inventory, templates) |
✅ Lab 7 | |
monitoring/ (Prometheus + Grafana provisioning) |
✅ Lab 8 | |
docs/runbook/ |
✅ Lab 8 | |
Security headers middleware, .trivyignore |
✅ Lab 9 | |
cloud/ (deploy scripts, fly.toml) |
✅ Lab 10 | |
flake.nix, flake.lock |
✅ Lab 11 (bonus) | |
wasm/ (main.go, spin.toml) |
✅ Lab 12 (bonus) | |
submissions/labN.md |
✅ every lab |
Lab Structure
Every main lab (1-10) follows the same shape:
| Task | Points | Description | Required? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Task 1 | 6 | Core step that advances the project. Future labs depend on it. | Yes |
| Task 2 | 4 (3 in Lab 1) | Deeper dive into the week's topic. Skippable — won't affect future labs. | No |
| Task 3 | 1 pt | Lab 1 only — open-source community engagement (GH or GitLab) | Lab 1 only |
| Bonus Task | 2 | Extension for motivated students (flat 2 pts each, no difficulty weighting). | No |
Bonus labs 11 & 12: Task 1 (4 pts) + Task 2 (4 pts) + Bonus Task (2 pts) = 10 pts each.
Submission Workflow
graph LR
A[Fork course repo] --> B[Clone locally]
B --> C[git switch -c feature/labN]
C --> D[Complete tasks; sign commits]
D --> E[Push to your fork]
E --> F[Open PR → course main]
F --> G[Submit PR URL via Moodle]
PRs target the upstream course repo's main, not your fork's main.
Grading
| Component | Weight | What it rewards |
|---|---|---|
| Main labs 1-10 (Task 1 + Task 2 + Task 3-where-applicable) | 70% | Diligent project work — the floor for any serious student |
| Bonus tasks 1-10 (2 pts each, flat — no difficulty weighting) | 14% | Going above and beyond on weekly topics |
| Quiz leaderboards (5 rolling per-2-labs windows, top-10 share 1% pool each) | up to 5% | Engagement + excellence; rewards late-joining students too |
| Bonus labs 11 + 12 (4+4+2 pts each — 10 pts each, 20 raw total) | 20% | Mastering reproducibility + WebAssembly |
| Final exam | 30% | Optional path — written, comprehensive |
| Sum (capped at 100%) | 139% | Multiple paths to A |
What this produces in practice
| Profile | Main | L-bonus | Bonus labs | Exam | Quiz | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| All Task 1 only, nothing else | 42% | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0% | 42% |
| All Task 1+2, no bonuses, no exam | 70% | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0% | 70% |
| Add all weekly bonuses | 70% | 14% | 0% | 0% | 0% | 84% |
| + good quiz | 70% | 14% | 0% | 0% | 5% | 89% ← just short of A |
| + finish at least one bonus lab (10 pts → 10% of grade) | 70% | 14% | 10% | 0% | 5% | 99% (A) |
| + both bonus labs (20 pts → 20% of grade) | 70% | 14% | 20% | 0% | 5% | 109% (capped 100%, A) |
| Or take the exam instead of bonus labs | 70% | 14% | 0% | 30% | 5% | 119% (capped 100%, A) |
| Do everything | 70% | 14% | 20% | 30% | 5% | 139% (capped 100%, A with overflow signal) |
| Coast (Task 1 only + lucky quiz) | 42% | 0% | 0% | 0% | 5% | 47% |
Quiz leaderboards (the 5%)
Each lecture has a post-quiz on the course quiz platform. Quizzes feed 5 rolling leaderboards:
| Window | Labs covered |
|---|---|
| 1 | labs 1-2 |
| 2 | labs 3-4 |
| 3 | labs 5-6 |
| 4 | labs 7-8 |
| 5 | labs 9-10 |
Top-10 per window share 1% of the total grade.
Performance tiers
| Grade | Range | Required to reach |
|---|---|---|
| A | 90-100 | All main labs + at least one of: bonus labs / exam (multiple paths) |
| B | 75-89 | Main labs + most bonuses, no extension work |
| C | 60-74 | Main lab Task 1 across most labs |
| D | 0-59 | Below expectations |
Late submissions
- Within 1 week of deadline: max 6/10 for that lab
- After 1 week: 0
- Bonus tasks and bonus labs: no late credit
Required Software
| Week | Add |
|---|---|
| 1 | Git 2.49+, Go 1.24, an SSH client, a GitHub or GitLab account |
| 3 | (nothing new — CI runs in the cloud) |
| 4 | tcpdump, ss (iproute2), dig, mtr, jq, optionally Wireshark |
| 5 | VirtualBox 7.1.x, Vagrant 2.4.x |
| 6 | Docker 28.x (Compose v2 built in) |
| 7 | Ansible 10.x (Python 3.11+) |
| 8 | (Prometheus + Grafana run in containers — nothing host-side needed) |
| 9 | (Trivy + ZAP run in containers) |
| 10 | A Hugging Face account (free, no card); cloudflared for the Bonus tunnel |
| 11 (bonus) | Nix (Determinate installer recommended) |
| 12 (bonus) | TinyGo 0.34+, Spin 3.x |
Repository Structure
DevOps-Intro/
├── app/ # QuickNotes Go service (provided)
│ ├── main.go, store.go, handlers.go
│ ├── *_test.go # tests
│ ├── go.mod, Makefile
│ ├── .golangci.yml, README.md
│ └── seed.json
├── lectures/
│ ├── lec1.md … lec10.md # 10 main lectures
│ ├── reading11.md # Nix bonus reading
│ └── reading12.md # WASM bonus reading
├── labs/
│ ├── lab1.md … lab10.md # 10 main lab specs
│ ├── lab11.md, lab12.md # 2 bonus lab specs
└── README.md # you are here
Students add (in their forks):
├── .github/ # Lab 1, Lab 3
├── Vagrantfile # Lab 5
├── ansible/ # Lab 7
├── monitoring/ # Lab 8
├── cloud/ # Lab 10
├── flake.nix # Lab 11
├── wasm/ # Lab 12
└── submissions/
├── lab1.md … labN.md
Key Books & Resources
- 📕 The Phoenix Project — Gene Kim, Kevin Behr, George Spafford (2013) — DevOps via novel
- 📕 The DevOps Handbook — Kim, Humble, Debois, Willis (2nd ed 2021) — the practitioner's manual
- 📕 Accelerate — Forsgren, Humble, Kim (2018) — the scientific evidence behind DORA
- 📗 Pro Git — Chacon & Straub — free at git-scm.com/book
- 📗 Continuous Delivery — Humble & Farley (2010) — Jolt-award winner
- 📘 Site Reliability Engineering — Beyer, Jones, Petoff, Murphy — free at sre.google
- 📘 Docker Deep Dive — Nigel Poulton — practical containers
- 📘 Ansible: Up & Running — Lorin Hochstein & René Moser (3rd ed)
- 📘 Brendan Gregg — Linux Performance — the canonical map of Linux observability
Course Completion
By Week 10, you will have:
- Forked, signed-committed, and PR-merged your way through 10 weeks
- Built CI, containers, VMs, monitoring, security scans, and a real cloud deploy of the same Go service
- Filed a blameless mini-postmortem after each lab
- Maybe pushed yourself further with Nix and/or WebAssembly
The tools change every five years. The discipline doesn't. Welcome to DevOps.
🎯 Reference: this course's Spring 2026 structure mirrors the SRE-Intro standard (Innopolis University, completed Apr 2026). DevOps-Intro is the broader intro to how software is shipped; SRE-Intro is the deeper dive into keeping it reliable.