What is the DevOps lifecycle? Walk through its phases (Plan → Code → Build → Test → Release → Deploy → Operate → Monitor).

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The DevOps lifecycle is a continuous loop with eight phases — often visualized as an infinity (∞) symbol because there is no 'end'. 1. Plan — define features, user stories, sprints. Tools: Jira, Linear, Azure Boards. 2. Code — write source code, manage in Git. 3. Build — compile, package, build artifacts and container images. Tools: Maven, Gradle, npm, Docker. 4. Test — automated unit, integration, security, and performance tests. 5. Release — promote artifacts through environments with approvals. 6. Deploy — push to production. Tools: Argo CD, Spinnaker, Helm, Jenkins. 7. Operate — run production: scaling, on-call, configuration management. 8. Monitor — collect metrics, logs, traces. Insights feed back into Plan . Critical insight: monitoring closes the loop — production data drives the next iteration of planning. The DevOps lifecycle is usually drawn as an infinity loop. The key insight: it's continuous, with monitoring feeding back into planning. Many candidates list the phases but miss the loop closure.