End-to-End Developer Workflow
Connect GitHub Actions CI/CD, Azure Container Registry, Container Apps, and Application Insights into a complete developer inner loop from commit to observable production.
The Modern Azure Developer Loop
A modern Azure developer workflow connects source control, CI/CD, container infrastructure, and observability into a seamless inner loop from code commit to observable production. The key components are: GitHub (source), GitHub Actions (build and deploy pipeline), Azure Container Registry (image store), Azure Container Apps (runtime), and Application Insights (observability). Each change moves automatically from developer laptop to production within minutes, with quality gates at every step.
Step 1: Source Control and Branching Strategy
Organise your code in a GitHub repository using a trunk-based development or GitFlow branching strategy. For most microservices, trunk-based development (short-lived feature branches merged to main daily) reduces integration conflicts and keeps the pipeline simple. Use branch protection rules on main to require pull request reviews and passing CI checks before merging. A CODEOWNERS file ensures changes to critical services require approval from the relevant team's senior engineers.
# Example .github/CODEOWNERS
# Require payments-team review for any changes under /src/payments/
/src/payments/ @payments-team
/infrastructure/ @platform-teamAll lessons in this course
- Managed Identity for Passwordless Auth
- Azure Service Bus for Decoupled Messaging
- Azure Container Apps
- End-to-End Developer Workflow