What is The Target of Your CI/CD Pipeline?

None, Dev, Test or Production?

My typical article ranges from 800 to 1500 words. Starting with this one, I am experimenting with a short series of about 400 words, each titled with a thought-provoking question.

“CI/CD” and “CI/CD Pipeline” are common terms we hear a software team nowadays. I just did a job search (on an Australian job site), there is even a “CI/CD Pipeline” criteria for a low-paid support analyst job.

https://www.seek.com.au/jobs?keywords=CI%2FCD&jobId=76400655&type=standard

We know the “I” in CI stands for “Integration”. The shorthand CD can refer to either Continuous Delivery or Continuous Deployment.

I have asked some colleagues this question, “What is the target of your CD pipeline? In other words, Deliver or Deploy to where?”

There are three typical answers:

1. No idea or Never Thought this way.
   They call the CI (or CD) server the “Build Server”. Some Developers triggered a run to get a build package (manually), that’s all.
2. Deliver to the “dev” environment
   (By the way, dev environment is like a Developer Playground)
3. Deliver to the “test” environment
   Ready for manual testers and business analysts to verify.
   This is better than №2, at least dare to show the build outside the developers. Typically, executing some unit and…