DevOps is changing how the software gets built as well as delivered. But after years of adoption, companies are facing some issues due to multiple tools and the complexity in using them. Teams are spending a huge amount of time on the infrastructure rather than the actual development. Well, Platform engineering has emerged as a powerful solution, and it is reshaping the entire DevOps world.
In this article, we will discuss in detail the reasons why platform engineering is becoming central to DevOps. But to understand this, one should have basic knowledge of DevOps, which can be learned by taking the DevOps Online Course. This online course helps understand the problem that DevOps created. So let’s begin discussing this in detail:
The Problem DevOps Created
DevOps brought development and operations teams together. It introduced automation, continuous integration, and faster releases. These were huge improvements over the old way of working.
But DevOps also created new problems. Each team built its own pipelines. Everyone has chosen different tools. Developers spent hours configuring infrastructure instead of writing code. New team members took weeks to get productive.
Companies realized they needed structure. They needed consistency. They needed platform engineering. For professionals taking a DevOps Training, understanding this shift is now essential.
What Platform Engineering Actually Is?
Platform engineering builds internal developer platforms. These platforms give developers self-service tools and standardized workflows. Instead of every team reinventing the wheel, they use a shared foundation.
Platform engineering is the process of developing tools, workflows, and infrastructure that can be used by developers as a service. The heavy work gets handled by the platform. Developers focus on building features.
How Platform Engineering Fixes DevOps Problems
Platform engineering solves specific pain points that DevOps created.
Centralized tooling
This can help end the chaos. Instead of 50 different CI/CD setups, you get one platform everyone uses. Platform engineering offers a single integrated platform where DevOps developers get all the tools, services, and processes.
This doesn’t mean limiting choices. It means providing good defaults. Developers who need something special can still customize. But most people use the standard path because it works.
Golden paths:
It may guide developers to success. These are pre-built workflows that include best practices. Need to deploy a new service? The golden path template includes security checks, monitoring, testing, and deployment scripts.
Golden paths strike a balance between speed and control, allowing faster onboarding for new developers. New team members become productive in days instead of weeks.
Self-service capabilities:
It can eliminate waiting. Developers don’t need to file tickets and wait for operations teams. They provision infrastructure themselves through the platform. The platform enforces security and compliance automatically.
This speeds everything up. Teams deploy when they’re ready, not when operations have time to help them.
Reduced cognitive load
This will let the developers focus. They don’t need to understand Kubernetes internals, cloud networking, or security compliance. The platform handles it. They just write code and ship features.
94% of organizations believe that platform engineering enables them to exploit the full potential of DevOps.
Developer Experience Becomes Central
Platform engineering puts developer experience first. This marks a major shift in thinking.
Traditional operations teams focused on stability and security. Developers often saw them as obstacles. Platform teams improve this relationship. They exist to make developers productive.
Developer experience (DevEx) is predicted to take center stage, with organizations increasingly focusing on developer satisfaction and overall productivity as key metrics of success. Good platforms measure developer satisfaction. They track how long it takes to deploy. They monitor how often developers hit obstacles. They use this data to improve continuously.
This approach works. Elite platform teams achieve multiple daily deployments with low failure rates, with developer productivity up 40-50%. For those pursuing DevOps Training in Gurgaon or other cities, understanding developer experience metrics is now part of the job.
Skills Platform Engineers Need:
There are several skills that a platform engineer may need, and traditional DevOps knowledge will not be enough for the same. You need a deep understanding of cloud services across multiple providers. Taking the DevOps Certification Course now includes advanced concepts that one need. Also, they will gain knowledge regarding developer workflows as well as pain points.
Product management skills matter too. Platform engineers need to understand users, gather requirements, prioritize features, and measure success. Technical skills alone aren’t enough.
Conclusion:
Platform engineering is not here to replace DevOps. This takes the principles that made DevOps successful and adds the structure, product thinking, and developer focus. For companies, investing in platform engineering pays off through faster delivery, happier developers, better security, and controlled costs. For the professionals developing platform engineering skills open the doors to challenging as well as well-paid roles.