What Does a DevOps Consultant Actually Do? A Real‑World Walkthrough

Motivation

The author writes to clarify what a DevOps role truly entails, emphasizing that it is not limited to a single specialty like Java, front‑end, or system administration, but rather a broad, interdisciplinary field.

What a DevOps Consultant Does

Background before DevOps

The author’s early IT experience includes a 7‑month stint with a 4‑month summer internship using ASP.NET, Razor templates, and SVN, followed by a junior research role on virtualization in RTOS for a Siemens project, highlighting the importance of virtualization knowledge for infrastructure work.

Career Path in DevOps

Working at the consulting firm Fiercely, the author tackled industrial IoT projects, freely choosing languages and frameworks that fit architectural and business needs. Key technologies used include Python Flask, Docker (first exposure), network management, ARM cross‑compilation, RAM optimization, and hardening software against physical failures.

Additional responsibilities involved automating OpenERP (Odoo) deployment with Python scripts, adopting configuration management tools such as Vagrant, LXC (later Docker), and Ansible to ensure consistent developer environments and avoid the “It works on my machine” pitfall.

Configuration Management

Effective configuration management requires deep knowledge of operating systems, scripting (Bash, PowerShell, etc.), and software architecture. The author stresses that modern DevOps tools evolve quickly, so the focus should be on understanding concepts rather than memorizing specific tool versions.

CI/CD

The author extensively uses Git workflows, Jenkins pipelines (written in Groovy), and custom scripts that let users define pipelines in YAML, reducing the need to write Groovy directly. Continuous integration and delivery are portrayed as perpetual, never‑out‑of‑date practices.

Security and Access Control

Identity and access management tools such as LDAP, Keycloak (with SAML, OAuth, etc.) are essential. The author recommends Keycloak as a comprehensive solution for authentication and authorization.

Infrastructure as Code (IaC)

Beyond Docker and Vagrant, the author experiments with Ansible, Terraform, and briefly with CloudFormation and ESXi automation. While many companies seek “Terraform experts” or “Azure DevOps ninjas,” the author argues that true DevOps expertise lies in understanding the problem space, not just mastering a single tool.

Load Balancers and Reverse Proxies

Experience with Nginx, HAProxy, and Traefik is presented as a baseline; the author also mentions configuring load balancers primarily as reverse proxies, which inevitably involves certificate management.

Application Development

Full‑stack development with Java and JavaScript is highlighted as valuable, reinforcing the DevOps principle of building and operating the same applications you develop.

Databases

The author works with Elasticsearch, PostgreSQL, MySQL, handling connections, ACLs, backups, and management, while cautioning against becoming a narrow‑focused DBA.

Mindset

Beyond technical skills, the role involves mentoring engineers to adopt a DevOps mindset, simplifying processes, and bridging gaps between development and operations teams.

Conclusion

DevOps is a “jack‑of‑all‑trades” discipline that blends development, operations, security, and infrastructure automation. The author does not claim mastery of any single area but emphasizes continuous learning and the broad, evolving nature of the field.

For further reading, the author references the DevOps roadmap from roadmap.sh.