Skip to content

📘 Capstone Project — TechOps Inc. Cloud-Native Build

🚀 Project Introduction

Welcome to your final capstone project!
Over three days (22 hours), you and your team will function as a mini company inside TechOps Inc..
Each team receives its own AWS account and must collaboratively design, provision, configure, deploy, and operate a cloud-native application pipeline with real-world tools.

Unlike earlier labs, this project is end-to-end:
You will build everything from infrastructure to application monitoring while working in assigned roles (IAM, Architect, Network, SysAdmin, Storage, Monitoring, Developers, DevOps, Scrum Master).

The ultimate goal:
Deliver a working web application running in both staging and production, deployed via Jenkins pipelines, containerized with Docker, monitored with Prometheus/Grafana or Nagios, and backed up with runbooks and recovery plans.

🎯 Learning Objectives

By the end of this Capstone, you will be able to:

  • Provision infrastructure as code using Terraform Cloud.
  • Manage users, roles, and permissions with AWS IAM.
  • Build and configure a self-hosted Jenkins server.
  • Create CI/CD pipelines that build Docker images, push them to Docker Hub, and deploy to staging & production.
  • Deploy a containerized web application on EC2.
  • Implement monitoring & alerting with Prometheus/Grafana or Nagios.
  • Configure backup & restore workflows for Jenkins.
  • Write runbooks for incidents, outages, and recovery.
  • Collaborate as a real DevOps team using GitHub + Jira under Scrum practices.

🏗️ Project Architecture

Your system will include:

  • IAM & Governance: Roles for each function, least-privilege policies.
  • Networking: VPC, subnets, routing, security groups.
  • Infrastructure: EC2 instances for Jenkins, staging app, production app, monitoring server.
  • Configuration Management: Ansible for Jenkins and host setup.
  • Application Layer: Sample web app (frontend + backend + SQLite DB).
  • CI/CD: Jenkins pipelines (checkout → test → build → push → deploy).
  • Container Registry: Docker Hub (team namespace).
  • Monitoring: Prometheus + Grafana (or Nagios) with dashboards and alerts.
  • Storage: S3 buckets for backups and (optionally) Terraform state.
  • Collaboration: GitHub repo for code + Jira for agile tracking.

👥 Roles & Responsibilities

Each student assumes a dedicated role, simulating how real small companies work:

  • Project Owner / IAM Engineer — Sets up AWS account, IAM policies, Terraform Cloud workspace.
  • Architect — Designs repo structure, ensures staging/prod separation, defines standards.
  • Network Engineers — Build VPC, subnets, and SGs with Terraform.
  • SysAdmin / Infra — Provision EC2 (Jenkins, apps, monitoring), bootstrap with Ansible.
  • Storage — Manage S3 buckets, EBS volumes, and backup workflows.
  • Monitoring — Deploy Prometheus/Grafana (or Nagios), configure exporters & alerts.
  • Developers — Write app code, Dockerfiles, and unit tests.
  • DevOps — Create Jenkins pipelines, integrate GitHub & Docker Hub, manage staging → prod rollout.
  • Scrum Master — Manage Jira board, coordinate tasks, ensure team velocity.

🔧 Tools You Will Use

  • AWS — EC2, IAM, S3, VPC
  • Terraform Cloud — Infrastructure as Code (IaC)
  • Ansible — Configuration management
  • Jenkins — CI/CD orchestrator
  • Docker + Docker Hub — Containerization and registry
  • Prometheus + Grafana / Nagios — Monitoring and dashboards
  • SQLite — Lightweight DB for app
  • GitHub — Version control
  • Jira — Agile project tracking

📅 Execution Plan (3-Day Intensive)

Day 1 (4 hrs)
- Setup AWS account & Terraform Cloud workspace.
- IAM roles/users created; team onboarded.
- Provision networking (VPC, subnets, SGs).
- Initialize GitHub repo with Terraform structure.

Day 2 (9 hrs)
- Provision EC2 hosts (Jenkins, staging app, prod app, monitoring).
- Jenkins installed & configured (Ansible).
- Developers build & dockerize app.
- Jenkins credentials configured for Docker Hub.
- First Jenkins build runs (build → push).

Day 3 (9 hrs)
- Extend pipelines: deploy to staging & production.
- Deploy monitoring stack (Prometheus/Grafana or Nagios).
- Configure alerts & dashboards.
- Setup backup jobs (Jenkins → S3).
- Conduct incident drill & finalize runbook.
- Deliver final demo: app live in staging & production.

📦 Deliverables

  1. GitHub Repo containing:
  2. Terraform code (network, infra, Jenkins, monitoring).
  3. Ansible playbooks.
  4. Application code (frontend + backend + SQLite).
  5. Jenkinsfiles.

  6. Documentation (architecture.md, runbook.md, README.md).

  7. Terraform Cloud Workspace with remote state.

  8. Working Jenkins Instance with CI/CD pipelines.
  9. Live App in staging & production.
  10. Monitoring Dashboard (Grafana/Nagios).
  11. Final Demo & Presentation.

📝 Evaluation Rubric

  • Infrastructure & IAM setup — 20%
  • Jenkins CI/CD pipelines — 25%
  • Application deployment (staging + prod) — 20%
  • Monitoring & backup/recovery — 15%
  • Team collaboration & documentation — 20%

📚 Labs — Table of Contents

- [Lab 01: Pre-Requisites & Local Setup](lab01.md) — All Roles
- [Lab 02: GitHub Repo & Project Structure](lab02.md) — Architect
- [Lab 03: AWS IAM Setup](lab03.md) — IAM Engineer
- [Lab 04: Terraform Cloud Setup & Workspace](lab04.md) — IAM Engineer, Architect
- [Lab 05: Networking with Terraform (VPC, Subnets, SGs)](lab05.md) — Network Engineers
- [Lab 06: Provision Jenkins EC2 with Terraform](lab06.md) — SysAdmin / Infra
- [Lab 07: Bootstrap Jenkins with Ansible](lab07.md) — SysAdmin / Infra
- [Lab 08: Configure Jenkins Credentials](lab08.md) — SysAdmin / Infra, DevOps
- [Lab 09: Build Sample App & Dockerize](lab09.md) — Developers
- [Lab 10: Push Images to Docker Hub](lab10.md) — Developers, DevOps
- [Lab 11: Jenkins Pipeline Setup (CI)](lab11.md) — DevOps
- [Lab 12: Deploy to Staging (CD)](lab12.md) — DevOps
- [Lab 13: Deploy to Production (CD)](lab13.md) — DevOps
- [Lab 14: Monitoring Setup (Prometheus/Grafana or Nagios)](lab14.md) — Monitoring
- [Lab 15: Configure Alerts & Dashboards](lab15.md) — Monitoring
- [Lab 16: Backup & Restore Jenkins](lab16.md) — Storage, SysAdmin
- [Lab 17: Incident Drill & Runbook Validation](lab17.md) — All Roles
- [Lab 18: Final Demo & Presentation Prep](lab18.md) — All Roles

✅ Final Note

Think of yourself as an engineer in a small DevOps company. Your team’s success depends on collaboration, documentation, and working systems — not just theory. By the end, you’ll have portfolio-ready, real-world DevOps experience.