ci-cd-patterns

CI/CD Patterns

Pipeline Structure

Every pipeline follows this ordered sequence:

install → lint → test → build → deploy

Each stage must pass before the next begins. Never skip a stage to speed up a deploy.

Core Principles

• Run on every push and every PR — no exceptions
• A failing pipeline blocks the merge; the branch is not deployable until green
• Cache dependencies between runs (node_modules, pip cache, Go module cache) to minimize install time
• Parallelize independent jobs — lint and unit tests can run at the same time; they do not need to be sequential
• Target a total pipeline duration of under 10 minutes for developer feedback loop

Testing in CI

• Use exactly the same test commands as developers run locally — no special CI-only flags
• Spin up real service containers (databases, queues) rather than in-process mocks for integration tests
• Use fail-fast mode: stop the test run on the first failure to surface signal quickly
• Store test reports and coverage artifacts for later inspection

# Example: GitHub Actions service container
services:
  postgres:
    image: postgres:16-alpine
    env:
      POSTGRES_PASSWORD: test
    options: >-
      --health-cmd pg_isready
      --health-interval 10s
      --health-timeout 5s
      --health-retries 5

Deployment

Environment	Trigger	Approval
Staging	Automatic on merge to main	None
Production	Manual trigger or scheduled	Required

• Use blue/green or rolling deployment strategies to avoid downtime
• Configure automatic rollback when the post-deploy health check fails
• Run database migrations before deploying new application code (migrations must be backward compatible with the old code version)
• Never deploy secrets via environment variables baked into the image — inject at runtime via a secrets manager or platform secret store

Rollback

• Health checks must be defined and passing before traffic is switched
• Keep the previous deployment artifact tagged and ready to re-promote — do not rely on rebuilding
• Document the rollback command or button prominently so any team member can execute it under pressure