If you want to break into DevOps and land a job quickly, here’s the structured learning path I’d recommend:
1️⃣ Learn the Basics (1-2 Months)
✅ Linux Fundamentals – Master the CLI, file system, package managers, system processes.
📌 Learn: Bash scripting, SSH, crontabs, systemd.
🛠️ Tools: Ubuntu, CentOS, Fedora, WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux).
✅ Networking & Security – Understand networking concepts, protocols, and security best practices.
📌 Learn: DNS, HTTP/HTTPS, TCP/IP, Firewalls, Load Balancing, VPNs.
✅ Version Control (Git & GitHub/GitLab) – You must know Git inside out.
📌 Learn: Branching, Merging, Rebasing, Pull Requests.
🛠️ Tools: GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket.
2️⃣ Master Scripting & Automation (1-2 Months)
✅ Shell Scripting (Bash) – Automate repetitive tasks.
✅ Python – Used for automation, infrastructure as code, and scripting.
📌 Learn: Loops, Functions, APIs, JSON Parsing, File Handling.
🛠️ Tools: Python, Bash, PowerShell (if on Windows).
3️⃣ Learn CI/CD Pipelines (1-2 Months)
✅ Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment – Automate build, test, and deployment processes.
📌 Learn: CI/CD principles, Blue-Green Deployments, Canary Releases.
🛠️ Tools: Jenkins, GitHub Actions, GitLab CI/CD, ArgoCD, CircleCI.
4️⃣ Infrastructure as Code (IaC) & Configuration Management (2-3 Months)
✅ Infrastructure as Code (IaC) – Automate cloud resource provisioning.
📌 Learn: Terraform (preferred), AWS CloudFormation.
🛠️ Tools: Terraform, Pulumi.
✅ Configuration Management – Automate server setup and configurations.
📌 Learn: Ansible (preferred), Puppet, Chef.
5️⃣ Cloud Computing (AWS/GCP/Azure) (2-3 Months)
✅ Learn the fundamentals of cloud computing & cloud services.
📌 Learn: IAM, VPC, EC2, S3, RDS, Lambda, Auto Scaling, CloudWatch.
🛠️ Tools: AWS (preferred), Google Cloud, Microsoft Azure.
6️⃣ Containers & Kubernetes (K8s) (2-3 Months)
✅ Containers (Docker) – Learn to containerize applications.
📌 Learn: Dockerfile, Volumes, Networks, Docker Compose.
🛠️ Tools: Docker, Podman.
✅ Container Orchestration (Kubernetes) – Manage and deploy scalable applications.
📌 Learn: Pods, Deployments, Services, Helm Charts, Ingress.
🛠️ Tools: Kubernetes (K8s), Minikube, K3s, OpenShift.
7️⃣ Monitoring, Logging & Observability (1-2 Months)
✅ Monitoring & Alerting – Ensure system reliability and performance.
📌 Learn: Metrics, Logs, Tracing, Alerting.
🛠️ Tools: Prometheus, Grafana, Datadog, New Relic, ELK Stack (Elasticsearch, Logstash, Kibana).
8️⃣ Security & Compliance in DevOps (Ongoing)
✅ Cloud Security – IAM, Secrets Management, Network Security.
📌 Learn: HashiCorp Vault, AWS IAM, Security Best Practices.
✅ DevSecOps – Shift security left in the pipeline.
📌 Learn: SAST, DAST, Vulnerability Scanning.
🛠️ Tools: Trivy, SonarQube, OWASP ZAP.
🎯 Bonus: Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) (If You Want to Specialize Later)
Service Level Objectives (SLOs) & Indicators (SLIs).
Incident Response & Postmortems.
Load Balancing & Traffic Engineering.
🔥 How to Get Hired Faster?
✅ Hands-on Projects – Build real-world projects using DevOps tools.
✅ Certifications (Optional, But Useful) –
AWS Certified DevOps Engineer – Professional
Certified Kubernetes Administrator (CKA)
Terraform Associate
✅ Networking & LinkedIn Presence – Share your learnings, contribute to open-source, and apply strategically.
🎯 Final Opinion
If you want a high-demand, well-paying, and future-proof career, DevOps is the way to go in 2025. Start with Linux, Git, Cloud, and CI/CD, then move into IaC, Kubernetes, and Observability. If you later want to transition into SRE, you can build on top of your DevOps knowledge.
🚀 "Learn fast, build projects, and apply—don’t overthink!"