DevOps is a set of practices developed for IT that combines software development (Dev) and information-technology operations (Ops), which aims to shorten the systems development lifecycle and provide continuous delivery with high software quality.
Source: Parallel Wireless
CI/CD is a set of practices that enables how software, in our case RAN software, gets delivered. Continuous Integration is the practice of merging all developers’ working code to a shared mainline several times a day. Every merge is validated before merging to uncover any issues.
CD stands for Continuous Delivery/Deployment, which is the practice in which software teams produce reliable software in short cycles that can be released (delivered) at any time, which can then be deployed. As a result, any software can be released much faster, more frequently and reliably into production networks. The benefit of CD is more predictable deployments that can happen on demand without waiting for an “official” upgrade cycle - this is now thing of the past.
Any RAN software in a CD environment is always ready to be released, since every single change is delivered to a joint staging environment using complete automation and the feedback loop to ensure that any RAN application can be deployed into a live network with the push of a button when it is needed, based on the business goals for a particular set of RAN sites based on geography or other factors.
Source: Pivotal.io
By including a CI/CD approach as a part of RAN deployments, RAN software changes can be delivered in a faster and automated way. As a result, mobile operators now can bring a webscale application approach into wireless network architectures. CI/CD helps to solve the challenges of multi-node complex RAN environments with the added Kubernetes virtualization approach, where a mini-data center can be brought to the edge and be properly managed and upgraded when needed.
Operators can use x86-powered virtualized infrastructure.
The potentially complex integration of DevOps toolsets to enable a microservices-based flexible and agile environment should not frighten mobile operators that want to decompose monolithic VNFs into a microservices-architecture. The result can deliver constant innovation, optimal RAN performance for subscribers, and increased agility for an MNO. There are a few real-life deployment examples of DevOps in telecom networks.
In this blog written two years ago, Rakuten took a page from Humble’s and Farley’s book by explaining how mobile operators can implement CI/CD principles and processes and what pitfalls to avoid when implementing CI/CD.
Source: Rakuten
Rakuten believes that in order to achieve successful CI/CD, organizational culture needs to be changed, saying: “to be realistic thought, it would be obvious true that it is pretty much tough or highly costly that let more than thousands developers across more than hundred development teams align to the same software development cycle based on single idea without authorized suppressing, especially for large organization like Rakuten.” They advise “to do small start with the deployment in the feedback loop related stages in CD pipeline, which somehow works to many developers to get them on a same compliance. As for CI, for the time being, it wouldn’t be big deal let developers do on their own even it is unique way until the thought of CD sink into developers, since most of the issues in CI should be related to developer’s matter.”
Rakuten targets to empower their operational teams with open CI/CD applications and interfaces to help them react faster to their customer demands and continually enhance network resiliency while introducing new services.
During his keynote speech at TIP Summit 2019, David del Val Latorre, Chief Executive of Research & Development, Telefonica, focused on the need for a new outlook on infrastructure. New methodologies, like CI/CD, will free development from current technological limitations with CI/CD aiming to enable automated implementation and deployment throughout a network, resulting in the shorter release cycles and software-centric remote maintenance.
As a part of the Internet para Todos (IpT) initiative, Telefonica has advocated on the importance of opening RAN interfaces to open up the RAN vendor ecosystem. The implemented architecture in IpT has already shown an unprecedented potential in terms of minimizing the cost of operations while integrating different Open RAN vendors with multiple core networks and the reduced time to release new RAN features in the field. IpT embraces DevOps and automation best practices while adopting a microservice-based architecture. IpT is not only the largest Open RAN deployment today, but also the world’s largest implementation of a CI/CD solution for Open RAN in a telco cloud deployment. Telefonica and their supply chain vendors must work together to make the shift from the current siloed deployment to a DevOps cloud-centric approach.
Telefonica hosts one of TIP’s interoperability testing labs focused on implementing a CI/CD framework for OpenRAN at its R&D labs in Madrid, Spain. One of the fundamental architecture principles is aligning development and operational responsibilities across all hardware and software vendors to drive collaboration and innovation. Therefore, this platform is open by default, containerized, scalable, and fully automated.
CI/CD is showing great momentum in Open RAN environments by delivering faster, more efficient automated deployments. By embracing CI/CD, mobile operators embrace greater collaboration between different ecosystem members, which fosters innovation. This approach will help to minimize the risk through frequent delivery of new features and new optimizations, while increasing efficiency via automation that leads to faster introduction of new services.
The integration of many new tools might seem challenging when mobile operators first start deploying microservices-based, DevOps CI/CD-driven network implementations. As MNOs get ready for Phase 2 in their Open RAN journeys, that will include containers and microservices. Agile DevOps will simplify automation by providing validated stack templates for containers to host microservices. These will be automated to be secure, reliable, maintained, and supported to allow MNOs to easily define their own architecture and make Open RAN easier and more cost-effective to deploy and maintain.
