GitLab and Microsoft Azure DevOps are leading competitors in the software development lifecycle management category. GitLab holds an advantage due to its all-in-one platform approach and robust CI/CD pipeline management, whereas Azure DevOps is compelling for enterprises utilizing Microsoft products.
Features: GitLab offers comprehensive control over code repositories, CI/CD pipeline management, and seamless tool integration. It provides an all-in-one platform, ideal for teams seeking a streamlined workflow from development to deployment. On the other hand, Azure DevOps offers an extensive suite of tools covering the entire software development lifecycle. It boasts close integration with Microsoft products, providing significant advantages for enterprises within the Microsoft ecosystem.
Room for Improvement: GitLab could enhance its integration capabilities with AWS and container management environments and improve metrics and reporting for leadership teams. Azure DevOps needs improvements in reporting and dashboard features for better portfolio visibility and could benefit from more robust third-party integrations.
Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: GitLab supports flexible deployment models, including on-premises and hybrid cloud options, catering to diverse company needs. However, the immediacy of technical support depends on the subscription level. Azure DevOps eases deployments for Microsoft service users but poses challenges for on-premises solutions. Its comprehensive support leverages Microsoft's global reach and vast resources, making it reliable for enterprises.
Pricing and ROI: GitLab's free tier provides substantial capabilities, though higher tiers are costly for small teams. Its feature set delivers good ROI through increased efficiency. Azure DevOps is perceived as reasonably priced, particularly for existing Microsoft customers, offering flexible licensing models. The initial costs may be higher, but integration benefits yield significant ROI through streamlined operations.
Migrating to GitLab is bringing time-saving benefits, and everything is easier to automate.
We have saved time significantly, reducing deployment time from four hours to five minutes per deployment.
On a scale of one to ten, where ten is the best, I would say ROI is an eight.
I have interacted with architects for some advice during the implementation, and they were prompt in their response.
I have had meetings where they taught me, explained things, and provided guidance for starting from scratch.
We have rarely needed to escalate issues to technical support since GitLab usually runs seamlessly.
Resolving issues took time since understanding our unique problems was not always straightforward for support teams.
It has all the features required for our coding and deployment needs, which makes it scalable to our changing requirements.
We're transitioning to OpenShift for future scalability with increased user numbers.
The scalability has left me pleased, not just for our teams in Europe, the Middle East, and Asia, but as we expanded into North America, Africa, and even Australia.
I have not encountered any performance or stability issues with GitLab so far.
The solution is stable, and we did not encounter any stability issues.
It would be beneficial to have a user-friendly interface for setting up these configurations, instead of just writing YAML files.
The UI has remained the same for a couple of years and could benefit from an update with AI features and better customization.
GitLab is a great tool for developers, it lacks project planner features.
Those processes are a bit difficult for some customers who may not have technical knowledge and don't go through the entire documentation.
Enhanced system guidance highlighting best practices would be beneficial, especially if experienced personnel are not available for support.
The pricing of GitLab is reasonable, aligning with what I consider to be average compared to competitors.
The price is high, and it limits user accessibility.
Even when working in other small organizations, we opted for GitLab as it was cost-efficient.
They don't even provide a POC where you can have a sandbox or stuff that you can go through and see how exactly it's costing.
I find it to be expensive.
As we implement automated testing and DevSecOps, it speeds up the process by forty to sixty percent.
The Ultimate version offers enhanced features for security scanning through DAST and SAST analysis, which have greatly benefitted our project workflow.
We are utilizing the pipelines extensively and gaining significant benefits from GitLab.
I can't approve my own request and move the code around without a review.
Our company organized a training session with a certified Azure expert, which was extremely beneficial for adopting best practices during the initial three months.
GitLab is a complete DevOps platform that enables teams to collaborate and deliver software faster.
It provides a single application for the entire DevOps lifecycle, from planning and development to testing, deployment, and monitoring.
With GitLab, teams can streamline their workflows, automate processes, and improve productivity.
Microsoft Azure DevOps is a cloud service that enables developers to collaborate on code development projects and create and deploy applications quicker than ever before. The service helps unite developers, project managers, and software development experts through a collaborative experience while using the application. For the users' convenience, Azure DevOps offers the user cloud services through Azure DevOps Services or an on-premises service using Azure DevOps Server. In addition, it supports integration with additional services and adding extensions, including the ability for the user to create their own custom extensions.
Azure DevOps provides a variety of unified features that can be accessed through their web browser or IDE client, such as:
Benefits of Microsoft Azure DevOps
Microsoft Azure DevOps offers many benefits, including:
Reviews from Real Users
Microsoft Azure DevOps stands out among its competitors for a variety of reasons. Two major ones are its ability to forecast how long each task will take and the ability for users to follow the entire development process.
PeerSpot viewers note the effectiveness of this solution. An executive chief operating officer for a cloud provider notes, “We can forecast tasks and the number of hours a task will take and can compare it with how long a task actually takes.”
Carlos H., a product and system director at SPCM, writes, “I think the most usable thing is that you can follow the whole progress of the development process. This makes it very useful for us.”
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