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Did you know that 56% of defects are introduced during the requirements and design phases of the software development lifecycle? Detecting and addressing these errors sooner can significantly optimize the entire development process.
This is where the shift-left approach comes in. If you're curious about it and how it can benefit your team, you’re in the right place!
In this blog post, we’ll discuss everything you need to know about shift-left, including its importance, how to implement it, and more.
Let’s begin.
Shift-left refers to moving testing activities to the earlier stages of the software development lifecycle (SLDC). Hence, the term ‘shifting left’.
Automation is a critical aspect of shift-left, helping you catch bugs early.
Besides, a study by the IBM System Science Institute analyzed the cost of fixing defects at different stages of the development lifecycle. According to their findings, defects identified during the design phase are 15 times cheaper to fix than those detected during the testing phase.
As such, the shift-left approach makes the entire software development process more cost-effective.
Agile inherently supports the shift-left approach by integrating testing and quality assurance earlier in development. Testing is performed throughout each sprint, which allows for early bug detection and faster issue resolution.
On the other hand, the Waterfall model is less suited to the shift-left approach. In Waterfall, testing typically happens late in the process, typically during the verification phase. This means that defects are discovered later in the life cycle, which can lead to more time-consuming and costly fixes.
Shift-left security means conducting security testing earlier in the software development process rather than waiting until later stages. In traditional DevOps, the SLDC typically follows this order:
Plan → Code → Build → Test → Deploy → Monitor
As you can see, security testing traditionally occurs after the software is built. With the shift-left in security, testing is moved upstream to catch vulnerabilities, coding errors, and potential weaknesses during the early phases of development.
SAST is a key component of shift-left security. It reduces the risk of security breaches by scanning and analyzing the source code early to identify bugs and other flaws before the application is deployed.
DevOps recommends the shift-left approach because it’s far easier and cheaper to address issues when they are discovered early in the development process. Fixing problems later, especially after the code is deployed, can be resource-intensive, time-consuming, and disruptive.
For example, developers significantly outnumber security and operations teams in most organizations. Typically, there are about 100 developers and 10 operations team members for every security professional.
Traditional models like waterfall or hybrid approaches such as ScrumFall—where teams adopt agile development practices but still rely on structured security, QC, CAB, or other gating—typically defer security testing to later stages.
Traditional models like waterfall or hybrid approaches such as ScrumFall—where teams adopt agile development practices but still rely on structured security, QC, CAB, or other gating—typically defer security testing to later stages, which places a heavy burden on security personnel.
As everything becomes dependent on a limited number of experts, this can easily overwhelm them and increase the likelihood of errors slipping through.
However, with a shift-left approach, QA is involved earlier in the process, and developers actively contribute to identifying and addressing security concerns at each step of the development life cycle. This collaborative effort minimizes the risk of errors and delivers optimized products.
Shift-left transforms how modern software development teams approach quality assurance and release management. For example, with Behavior-Driven Development (BDD), teams use plain language (like Gherkin) and tools like Cucumber to make testing a natural part of the process, not an afterthought. This helps devs, testers, and stakeholders stay on the same page and catch issues early.
It offers multiple advantages:
Shift-left focuses on early testing during development to catch issues sooner, improving speed and quality. Shift-right emphasizes post-production testing, like monitoring and user feedback, to ensure reliability in live environments.
As such, they have different strategies that fit these goals.
Let's summarize this:
|
Concept |
Shift-Left |
Shift-Right |
|
Definition |
Moving testing and quality processes earlier in the development cycle (before code is written) helps detect defects early, improving development efficiency. |
Performing testing and quality evaluations in production or post-deployment to optimize application performance under real-world conditions. |
|
Focus |
Ensuring code quality and performance before deployment. |
To ensure app reliability and performance by evaluating its ability to withstand actual user load while maintaining the same high levels of quality. |
|
Key Activities |
|
|
|
Tools |
|
|
|
Team Involvement |
Developers, QA engineers, and security teams |
DevOps teams, operations teams, and sometimes end-users for feedback |
To integrate QA early in the process, you must follow the below strategies:
One of the first steps in implementing a shift-left approach is breaking work into smaller batches. This makes it easier to identify issues earlier in the development phase. As a result, your development team can receive feedback faster, which helps them fix problems before they escalate.
Automation is essential for scaling a shift-left strategy. With continuous integration (CI) and continuous deployment (CD) tools, your team can automate critical processes like:
This allows more frequent source code testing, accelerating the entire development lifecycle. Consequently, the products are released faster, ensuring high quality with minimal human error. Moreover, around 25% of companies implementing test automation reported experiencing an "immediate return on investment."
As your team grows, your processes need to scale accordingly. The shift-left approach requires implementing scalable processes like automated testing, continuous testing, and DevOps practices. This ensures that quality control remains robust even as the software development lifecycle becomes more complex.
Incorporating static code analysis into the shift-left approach allows developers to identify potential vulnerabilities, security flaws, and performance issues before running the code. This proactive approach reduces the risk of bugs in production and promotes better code quality from the outset.
The testing strategy for shift-left should cover all types of testing, including:
A successful shift-left approach requires close collaboration between developers, QA teams, and operations teams. Developers should understand the principles of testing methodology, and testers should be familiar with the development workflow.
This shared knowledge ensures a more efficient feedback loop and allows teams to address quality issues earlier and more effectively.
Instead of relying solely on a dedicated QA team to test everything at the end of the process, the shift-left approach advocates for testing by department. This means that each department takes responsibility for quality within their domain.
For instance, developers should handle unit and integration tests, while operations teams should focus on deployment processes, performance testing, and monitoring.
Shift-left DevOps is a game-changer for modern software development. Your team can catch defects before they become expensive problems by shifting quality assurance and testing earlier in the development cycle. In addition, it enables your team to innovate while ensuring customer satisfaction by ensuring faster release cycles and more stable software.
Axify offers several features designed to support shift-left DevOps, including:
Shift-left DevOps is a game-changer for modern software development. Your team can catch defects before they become expensive problems by shifting quality assurance and testing earlier in the development cycle. In addition, it enables your team to innovate while ensuring customer satisfaction by ensuring faster release cycles and more stable software.
Axify offers several features designed to support shift-left DevOps, including:
Ready to implement Shift-Left and see your ROI skyrocket? Book a demo with Axify today!
