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NSWSoftware EngineeringQuick questions
Module 4: Software Engineering Project
Quick questions on Continuous integration and deployment explained: HSC Software Engineering Module 4
12short Q&A pairs drawn directly from our worked dot-point answer. For full context and worked exam questions, read the parent dot-point page.
What is definitions?Show answer
CI is universal; continuous delivery is common; continuous deployment is used by mature teams with deep test coverage.
What is the pipeline?Show answer
A typical CI/CD pipeline runs every stage in order. Any failure halts the pipeline.
What is a worked GitHub Actions pipeline?Show answer
A ci.yml for a Python project:
What is a worked deployment pipeline?Show answer
A deploy.yml triggered on push to main:
What is quality gates?Show answer
CI is the place to enforce standards across the team:
What is rolling deployments and rollback?Show answer
A production deployment should be safe. Patterns:
What is monitoring?Show answer
Deployments are not done when the new code is running. Watch:
What is benefits?Show answer
:::worked Worked example A team is deploying a new version of an e-commerce site for a Black Friday sale. Describe a CI/CD strategy that minimises risk.
What is treating the pipeline as optional?Show answer
A failing pipeline must block merging, or the pipeline is theatre.
What is deploying without rollback rehearsed?Show answer
Rollback only works if you have practised it. Test rollback in staging.
What is long-running pipelines?Show answer
A pipeline that takes 45 minutes wastes developer attention. Aim for under 10 minutes by parallelising and using test-impact analysis.
What is storing secrets in the pipeline definition?Show answer
Use the CI provider's secrets store. Never check secrets into source control. :::