What is continuous integration and continuous delivery/deployment (CI/CD)?

CI/CD is a software development principle that introduces automation into the entire lifecycle software development

Continuous integration (CI) and continuous delivery/deployment (CD) — together referred to as CI/CD — is a software development principle or method in which automation is introduced into the entire lifecycle of software or application development, from testing to deployment. The automatic and continuous nature of CI/CD allows organizations to get software more quickly, efficiently and reliably into production and then out into the market.

More specifically, continuous integration means merges all validated working code into a shared mainline code several times a day, while continuous delivery refers to the practice of producing reliable software in short cycles that can be released — or delivered — at any time. The other “D” (deployment) comes into play here, because once the software is delivered, it can then be deployed. CD results in more predictable and on-demand software deployments.

Why operators need it: CI/CD is key for automation

CI/CD has historically been used for IT and enterprise applications; however, as critical network functions continue to move from hardware to virtualized software instances in cloud environments, telecom operators have started to consider automated development, delivery and deployment of software as a vital undertaking.

“Telecoms CI/CD is about the automation of the telecom software lifecycle,” explained Gareth Price, a member of Ericsson Consulting’s leadership team, in a blog post. “We can add network capabilities much more often without making the engineering or operational support more complicated with automation. We can choose how much of the network to change, allowing us to gradually migrate to new software while reducing the risk of change.”

He added that CI/CD is “critical” to 5G because it delivers the “granularity of change” necessary for next-generation networks. “Smaller, frequent changes get more value to customers more quickly without the non-linear risk. However, the higher granularity of network software composition, higher frequency of update, and higher customization of network services increases the total test burden — that’s where CI/CD is critical to 5G’s success. The delivery of more customer value more quickly with fewer risks demands automation,” he said.

Network disaggregation means more software changes

Open RAN, which disaggregates Radio Access Network (RAN) functionality from specialized hardware to vendor-neutral hardware and software-defined technology, promises a new level of flexibility and innovation for operators. However, more vendors in the mix means integration challenges, as well as more software upgrades to keep on top of. A CI/CD environment that is developed specifically for Open RAN across many hardware and software vendors will address this challenge by ensuring the speedy and automatic delivery of RAN software upgrades.

With CI/CD, any and every single change made to the RAN software is delivered to a joint staging environment — a replica of a production environment for software testing — using automation and the feedback loop. This means that at any time, RAN software in the CD environment is ready to be deployed with the push of a button.

Looking for more insights on CI/CD and continuous testing? Register for our upcoming webinar on the topic and stay tuned for the accompanying editorial special report.