AWS CodePipeline Reviews

The best thing about AWS CodePipeline is that we don't have to manage agents. I have worked in Jenkins for three years, but when it comes to AWS CodePipeline, you don't have to manage agents. We pay for the agents only when the build occurs. In the case of Jenkins, we have to provision a standardized node to work as an agent.

In Jenkins, we can use custom plugins from the open-source market to integrate the pipeline with any third-party application. In AWS CodePipeline, we can only use certain tools for which AWS provisions plugins. Otherwise, we have to create Lambda functions and write our own Lambda code to make those tools compatible with each other.

We recently used a DAST tool called Rapid7, for which we didn't have a plugin. We have a plugin for Rapid7 in Jenkins, but we don't have a plugin in AWS CodePipeline. We had to write a Lambda function using the Requests module to do all the authentication.

I have been using AWS CodePipeline for the last one year.

AWS CodePipeline is a stable solution.

Around 30% of our entire workforce works with AWS CodePipeline.

Sometimes, the support person is very highly qualified. They help us resolve the issue and suggest additional best practices. Other times, we encounter a support person who is not qualified enough.

Neutral

I previously worked with an open-source tool called Jenkins. I feel that AWS CodePipeline is a better solution than Jenkins. Managing the Jenkins server and nodes is a bigger headache than AWS CodePipeline.

My client is a US client, where the deployment is done in Lambda. In CodePipeline, the first stage will be source code. The source code will be pulled from GitHub using AWS CoStar. We pull code from source code using CoStar connections. Then comes the build stage, where we run the npm run command to build the front end.

We push the build artifact and index. html to S3 bucket. We host the front-end website using S3 bucket and CloudFront. Back-end applications are node-based applications that are deployed in Lambda. There, CodeBuild builds the application using npm. After that, we use the built artifact as a layer for the Lambda function.

The deployment happens in the cross-account. We have separate accounts for each environment, and we create an IAM role in all those accounts. We give STS permission for those roles. In principle, we are giving the CI account.

We have a centralized CI account that has AWS CodePipeline. In this CodePipeline, we will assume the role created in the other account. Assuming that role, we are going to deploy in that account.

The solution's initial setup is a bit hectic, but these things need to be done to maintain security. An easy deployment might result in some security lapses.

I would recommend the solution to other users. AWS CodePipeline is worth the price. AWS CodePipeline is quite easy to learn and work on.

Overall, I rate the solution an eight out of ten.

I use the solution for making pipelines. I use it for deployments and CI/CD to make applications as required. I push code on CodeCommit. With the help of CodeCommit, I trigger the code to build and implement. Then, it will be deployed in Kubernetes using ECR and EKS.

Code deployment is the best feature. All the features in CodeCommit, CodePipeline, and CodeDeploy are important for automating the deployment process.

The support team’s response time must be improved.

I have been using the solution for one and a half years.

I rate the tool’s stability eight to nine out of ten. If I put everything correctly, it works.

I rate the tool’s scalability a seven out of ten. The product can be improved by implementing features available in other tools like Jenkins.

The support persons are experts in what they do. However, I must wait longer than expected to solve my issues.

Neutral

The initial setup felt difficult at first. However, as I learn how things work, it looks like something I can work on. The time taken for deployment depends on each project.

The product is quite expensive compared to other solutions.

Jenkins is much easier than CodePipeline. It is quite complex to build pipelines on CodePipeline compared to Jenkins.

Sometimes, I use CodePipeline to integrate applications on my EC2 server. Sometimes, I use it with AWS Lambda. I am working as a DevOps engineer. I provide technical support to customers who are using the product. I have to demonstrate the customers' issues and try to resolve them. I recommend the solution to experienced people. If someone uses Amazon’s DevOps tool, I will recommend the solution. Otherwise, I will not recommend the product. Overall, I rate the product a seven to eight out of ten.

I have used AWS CodePipeline as part of my work deploying applications, particularly an e-commerce app for a customer on AWS. I designed the process starting with building Docker images on a local machine and then pushing them to AWS ECR (Elastic Container Registry). 

After that, I configured the necessary infrastructure using Terraform and used AWS CodePipeline along with other services like CodeDeploy and CodeCommit to manage the deployment process.

AWS CodePipeline has improved our deployment efficiency, allowing us to orchestrate services such as CodeBuild, CodeDeploy, and CodeCommit seamlessly within AWS. Its native integration with AWS makes it easier to manage processes and improve deployment workflows within our organization.

AWS CodePipeline's most valuable feature is its seamless integration with other AWS services, making it easier to orchestrate deployment processes. It scales easily, and since it's native to AWS, most functionalities are integrated naturally, providing a consistent environment. The fact that alternatives like Jenkins and GitHub Actions require more effort to integrate makes CodePipeline the preferred choice.

AWS CodePipeline works effectively, and I haven't identified any specific areas needing improvement as it has been quite satisfying in terms of deployment needs. Feedback from clients has also been positive, indicating satisfaction with the service.

I have been using AWS CodePipeline for over two years now.

I have not encountered any stability issues with AWS CodePipeline since I began using it. It has been quite efficient and reliable for all my deployment tasks.

AWS CodePipeline scales easily and effectively, supporting various deployment models and workloads. It offers significant flexibility whether deploying on EC2 instances or using container services.

AWS support is excellent. Whenever I encounter issues, the support team is always available and helpful.

Positive

In the past, I have used solutions like Jenkins and GitHub Actions. However, AWS CodePipeline is more integrated within AWS, making it the preferred choice for projects hosted on AWS.

AWS CodePipeline and its associated services do not incur significant additional charges. The cost primarily comes from deploying other AWS resources like EC2 and S3 alongside the pipeline.

I have considered Jenkins and GitHub Actions as alternatives. However, the native integration of AWS CodePipeline within AWS makes it much easier to use in that environment.

I recommend AWS CodePipeline, but it depends on the type of project and needs of the customer. Based on my experiences, a rating of seven or eight out of ten reflects its capabilities. It's essential to consider the use case when recommending solutions.

Our primary use case for CodePipeline is speeding up our development process. The solution is highly automated and allows us to build and deploy code without any effort. It's automatically initiated once I commit my code. 

CodePipeline also helps me to find bugs quickly, increasing my release speed. On the other hand, it helps our customers receive our releases regularly and incrementally. CodePipeline helps us out with our delivery and our customers are happy to see our results in real time through it.

The solution is a continuous integration and delivery mechanism that helps us a lot in delivering our software. This is the most powerful benefit we get from using CodePipeline. It's one of those DevOps concepts recommended for use within the software development lifecycle.

I find performance to be the most valuable CodePipeline feature. It works perfectly and smoothly. We can also transition between the environments with CPLEX. I think CodePipeline is brilliant. 

CodePipeline allows you to focus on your program or your software, rather than worrying about deployment and the build stuff. We save quite a bit of time with CodePipeline.

The only area in my opinion that needs to be improved is the time between build and deployment. AWS should improve build time. We wait up to seven minutes for deployment.

In the next release, I would like to see fewer timeout errors.

I have been using AWS CodePipeline for around three years now.

I have had timeout errors in CodePipeline before. However, this has been acceptable for me as it was in development time and not in production.

My opinion is that this solution is scalable. It's good and it accepts a wide range of programming languages. I can manipulate the order and manage it regardless of the technology I'm using. It's very scalable. It's brilliant; a solution I like very much. It saves a lot of build and deployment effort if we compare it to old-style development. We consume a lot of time building and deploying, just to see our products running.

I have not contacted their tech support.

My impression is that this product is easy to set up. Everything including the documentation is provided.

I would recommend this solution to others as it is one of the most valuable products that can help any DevOps environment for software.

Overall, I would rate this solution a nine, on a scale from one to 10, with one being the worst and 10 being the best.

The primary use case is for CICD pipelines. It is used to connect CodeBuild and CodeDeploy in a streamlined solution. The AWS CodePipeline only works with the code build and code deploy.

The integration with other services and notifications, along with the approval method for the production environment, helps ensure that the pipeline runs precisely when it should, avoiding unnecessary runs.

The integration with other services is valuable, just like CodeBuild and CodeDeploy. Also, the notification and approval approach in the production environment are very useful.

A bit more control over AWS CodePipeline would make it a better tool. Improved enhancements and features could make it more intuitive.

I have been working with CodePipeline for four years as an MSP and consultant.

If everything is set up properly, CodePipeline is a stable and reliable product. It depends on CodeBuild and CodeDeploy stability.

I would rate the scalability of CodePipeline as low since it is very dependent on CodeBuild and CodeDeploy. Its scalability is limited.

I have not communicated with the technical team of CodePipeline.

Neutral

I would rate the initial setup of CodePipeline as nine out of ten. It is generally easy, but there could be challenges in the first attempt.

I would rate the pricing for CodePipeline at a five out of ten. It depends on other services being used in conjunction with it. The pricing is a bundle.

I advise to go with test runs and see how everything is functioning. It's best not to integrate everything in one go. Challenges might arise while setting up initially.

I'd rate the solution seven out of ten.

I use the solution in my company to create an end-to-end flow for the clients' pipelines and to host different applications in different languages.

The tool improves the functioning of my company and makes continuous delivery seamless. Once we set up the pipeline and you connect it to your branch, you can make any changes to different branches anytime. The tool provides an easy way of scanning the entire setup packages and the applications we work with within our company.

The solution's most valuable feature revolves around migration. The tool makes it easy to deliver the software. You don't need to sign in to any script to do anything, so you can just package everything in the tool.

AWS continuously improves the tool's UI.

One downside in AWS is that when you attempt to push a change in, it misses that part, or it could be because some variables are not set correctly. When AWS CloudFormation Stack goes for an update, it gives a failed status. Most of the time, you have to delete the stack and run your pipeline to create a new stack. You can't go back to reverse those changes with the AWS pipeline if a stack fails when you've pushed a change that didn't match up so well.

It is not true that our company doesn't have a backup solution, which will help save everything in case something goes wrong. It is not that a backup is missing but more of a configuration based on how AWS CodePipeline is set up, like how AWS CloudFormation works.

I have been using AWS CodePipeline for over two years.

It is a very stable solution as long as the developers don't add anything that will end up breaking the pipelines. If we communicate with the developers about everything we do in our company, then breakages do not really happen.

Linux is where you may have some limitations on the number of pipelines you can create through the tool. If you want to have more pipelines than the limit, you just need to add a new stack file. One stack file can accommodate a particular number of stacks, so you add a new one, then reference each of the pipelines to that stack, and then continue creating pipelines.

Everyone has their own deployment strategy, depending on their needs. But I think it's pretty popular, especially when you are doing AWS-type deployments. The tool is used by the developers, including the front-end and back-end ones, along with the DevOps engineers.

Currently, I think we are quite comfortable with whatever we have, but I think with time, we may extend its use depending on the needs of our management.

The solution's technical support responds whenever you have an issue, especially whenever you need something sorted out from their side. The engineers are always ready to help. If you have done a wrong configuration, the solution's technical support team will help you have uptime and support when you are offline for an extended time period. I rate the technical support a nine out of ten.

Positive

I use IBM QRadar.

When you are done setting it up, sometimes a dev pushes a change and then ends up missing something or adding a variable that doesn't really exist in the stack. Then it won't update, and it won't go through so that it will fail.

The initial deployment process is not very easy, but then you have to set so many things up. You need to have quite a number of files when you are setting up the CI/CD pipelines. You also need to know the approach that you want to use so that you don't end up using a strategy that will not work out very well with the expectations or with the requirements that have been set.

The solution is deployed on the cloud. You can deploy the application on VMs. For most of the production setup, it has to be a private cloud. For other test purposes, you can go to the public cloud to deal with different types of instances. If there are front-end applications that need to be accessed by the users, then it is better to go with the public cloud option as long as one does not have sensitive data.

The type of strategy we have when deploying the tool is something that will depend on the type of front-end and back-end applications. You have your branches where you are deploying from, and then you have a main area where you add all these configurations that you have added in the individual branches when you run to execute the creation of the pipelines and the deployment of the applications. For a well-prepared user, the tool is easy to deploy.

To deploy the tool, you just need to discuss it with your front-end application developer and hire a new back-end developer for the two applications that you need to deploy if you are doing both front-end and back-end there.

I don't have to maintain the tool once the pipeline is set up. As long as one observes exactly what the setup is like, which involves not adding new variables without communicating to the DevOps engineer, everything is pretty seamless.

For the maintenance part, there is a need to basically ensure that if there are any new variables that need to be added, the developers communicate to you with the actual variable or the value. With the variable names and the values, if you are doing deployments on an EC2 instance, you would need to have a look at if there are any changes in the libraries. You would need to also update your AMI. If you use AWS, then you would need to update your Amazon Machine Images (AMIs) so that when you are evaluating your pipeline, there is no clash because of the different versions of the libraries you run.

AWS charges you based on the number of pipelines you have and how active they are, and I also think that the root account user knows about all the price-related metrics. The tool offers the best value for the money one pays for it.

The configuration and setup of the tool are good areas.

For now, I think the tool has more advantages than disadvantages.

The tool is very easy to use for the setup, deployment, and continuous integration processes, so it is an effective product. There is not much need to maintain it. Initially, you need to know exactly how you want to map everything.

I rate the tool a nine out of ten.

We use the solution to deploy different applications and connect third-party APIs to various projects. I commonly use the Jenkins CI/CD pipeline. I've used it to set up servers. The architecture is very complex and needs a lot of connections, storage, security, and network. We need CodePipeline to complete these processes faster.

I love the fact that the tool can be integrated with different applications. For example, we can integrate pipelines with Slack to schedule tasks and run a bot. If we want to get notified about changes in our server, we can link the pipeline with Slack. It creates a channel where we receive updates on what's happening on the server. It notifies us if the IP address has changed or if there is something wrong with the server. The integration with other applications is fabulous.

The setup time is a bit long. We need a lot of experience to work with it. We need a lot of troubleshooting experience. We need to contact support if things get out of hand.

I have been using the solution for a year and a half.

The tool is very stable. I have not had any issues with the applications I have deployed. I only faced issues during deployment.

The tool is very, very scalable. I rate the scalability a nine out of ten. We need only one engineer to do the updates.

The support team is good. The response is good. I've not had very complex problems, but for the problems I faced, I received good support.

Positive

The initial setup is straightforward, but it is a bit difficult. The deployment takes five to ten minutes. It has a good latency.

People using the solution for the first time must have good experience in troubleshooting. If we do something wrong, we should be patient enough to solve it. We should not get frustrated. A good networking experience in AWS and a good knowledge of IP addresses will also be helpful. Overall, I rate the product a nine out of ten.

When you do the microservices, you can build from the source code and package it to the docker image. After that, you can deploy the docker image to the container which is also situated in the AWS CodePipeline. 

The product is a one-stop solution that you can use to integrate, deploy and host your application. 

AWS CodePipeline doesn't offer much room for customization. 

I have been using this solution for three years. 

I would rate the product's stability a ten out of ten. 

I would rate AWS CodePipeline's scalability a ten out of ten. We use the solution every day, 24/7 to its maximum potential. 

AWS CodePipeline's technical support is good but it comes with a price. It will take you seven percent to ten percent of your total monthly cloud consumption.

Positive

We used Jenkins, GitHub, and GitLab. We switched to AWS CodePipeline since we have an AWS environment and it is more convenient. 

I would rate the product's setup a seven out of ten. There is a lot of work to be done if you need to integrate it with other tools. The solution's setup takes only a couple of hours to complete. We automated the tool's deployment and maintenance. 

The product is cost-effective. 

I would rate the product's pricing a five out of ten. 

I would rate the product an eight out of ten. If you have a multi-cloud infrastructure, then you need to consider Jenkins, GitLab or GitHub.