A key highlight of The State of the Database Landscape Report for every data professional was that nearly three quarters (73%) of organizations have adopted Database DevOps or are planning to do so. This affirmation of the advanced development practices now being implemented shows how integral the database has become to application development. The database that sits behind many front-end applications needs to be developed and managed in a similar Agile way or performance overall suffers.

The pace at which Database DevOps is adopted, however, varies sector by sector. It rises to 78% in Financial Services, for example, and 92% in Healthcare. Perhaps surprisingly, it remains at 73% for those in Technology & Software, and 27% have no plans to adopt it or are unsure, compared with 24% across all sectors.

Just as the pace that Database DevOps is being introduced is similar to other sectors, so is the journey to get there. The drivers for doing so, for example, are now widely recognized and the top three for those in Technology & Software are:

• Increasing the speed of delivery of database changes
• Minimizing application downtime
• Freeing up developer time for more added-value work

This is broadly the same across all sectors, with IT teams in every business seeking to release database changes faster and resolve issues sooner while keeping data safe. The obstacles are consistent as well, with the top three for those in Technology & Software being:

• Lack of appropriate skills in the team
• Disruption of existing workflows/business
• Lack of understanding of DevOps in general

This lack of skills and the need to increase understanding of advanced software development practices emerged as a major insight in the main State of the Database Landscape Report, which found that:

Across every area the report looked into, one glaring finding emerged: the need for skills diversification. Rather than having a deep well of knowledge in one area, data professionals are now expected to have a broad knowledge across many areas and they’re finding it hard to keep up.

Those in Technology & Software are not immune to this and, like every business in every sector, will need to consider how they can equip their staff with the skills needed to manage the more complex IT infrastructures now in place.

While there are obstacles and challenges on the journey to Database DevOps, there are good reasons to embark on the journey. DORA’s Accelerate State of DevOps Report has consistently found that high performing IT teams deploy changes faster and have a lower change failure rate. It’s the same story when DevOps is introduced to database development.

For those in Technology & Software, 57% can deploy database changes in one week or less, compared with 53% across all sectors, and 33% can do so in one business day or less, compared with 31%. That's a good benchmark to aim for – and one to exceed to stay ahead of your peers.

Across every sector, there has been a marked increase in the take-up of multiple database platforms. 79% of organizations now use two or more different database platforms compared with 62% in 2020, and over 40% use four or more.

This has been driven by the rise in the use of semi-structured data like emails, HTML code, and XML docs, alongside unstructured data like videos, images and audio files. Traditional relational databases are not best suited to handling data like this so IT teams are turning to other databases like MongoDB, Snowflake and Elasticsearch.

Among those in Technology & Software, however, the move to multiple databases is, like the adoption of DevOps, more cautious. Here, over a quarter (27%) still use only one database type, and those using more than four falls to 27%. At the top end of the scale, just 9% use more than five databases compared with 29% across other sectors.

Surprisingly, perhaps, despite the slower introduction of multiple database platforms, the drivers and challenges for doing so are the same for those in Technology & Software as other sectors. The top four drivers are:

• Differing needs/use cases
• Increased flexibility
• Vendor requirement
• Cost saving

Interestingly, vendor requirement moves into third place ahead of cost savings which we see across other sectors, indicating that some of those in Technology & Software are being obliged to introduce a different database platform in order to use a particular application. An example is WordPress installations which typically require a MySQL database on the web server.

When it comes to the challenges of introducing multiple database platforms, they too are the same for those in Technology & Software as organizations across all sectors, the top three being:

• Skillset requirements and individual team training
• Data integration complexities
• Monitoring and troubleshooting

Despite the same drivers and challenges, it appears that those in Technology & Software are resisting the move to a wider number of database platforms. Perhaps because they are seeking fewer ways to work with multitude types of data rather than many ways. A clue to the reason for this is the increased reliance they place on monitoring and troubleshooting their databases for availability, performance and other issues.

Unlike other sectors, apart from Financial Services where we see this same divergence, there is far more importance placed on virtually every measure in which databases can be monitored. Alerts and notifications, performance metrics and logs, database health checks, and log analysis and anomaly detection are all relied on far more.

Tellingly, there is significantly more use of real-time monitoring tools, dashboards and visualizations and third-party monitoring services. IT teams in Technology & Software want to know more, more often, in more ways about the ongoing health of their database estates.

A reasonable conclusion here is that the desire to move to more database platforms is being held back by the wider recognition that those database platforms need to be monitored constantly and comprehensively in order to guarantee their availability and performance.

The move to the cloud has been well documented and Redgate research has shown that the percentage of those who host their databases mostly or all in the cloud has jumped from 18% in 2020 to 36% in 2023. At the other end of the spectrum, those who host their databases mostly or all on-premises has fallen from 53% in 2020 to 31% in 2023.

This is driven by the desire to gain scalability and flexibility, high availability and reliability, and cost efficiencies, and it’s no different for those in Technology & Software. Only a quarter (25%) now host their databases all or mostly on-premises compared with nearly a third across other sectors, for example. Just like other sectors, over a third (35%) also have mostly or all cloud infrastructures.

When looking into where those in Technology & Software plan to be in the future, an interesting position emerges. It appears that many have already made their plans and are now working towards them. 12% have already fully migrated, for example, double that seen in other sectors, and only 22% have no migration plans or are still evaluating options, compared with 32% elsewhere. 41% are also planning a hybrid approach in the future with a combination of cloud and on-premises, compared with 36% across other sectors.

The caution that we have seen in the introduction of Database DevOps and multiple database platforms is replaced here by a more certain and assured approach.

AI has landed and over the past year and more, with a lot of commentary about how it is changing the way organizations are writing code, creating content and generating images. It might be expected that those in Technology & Software will have embraced it fully, but a more nuanced picture emerges.

20% of those across all sectors are using AI, for example, and 35% are considering it. In Technology & Software this falls to 14% and rises to 41% respectively. Once again, the measured approach that we’ve seen earlier is being repeated with, notably, 15% of those in Technology & Software having decided that AI is not applicable to their current environment, compared with 10% in other sectors.

While those in Technology & Software are holding back from using AI, when they do use it, it is in the same way as every IT team in every sector. In testing and development, they are exploring its capability in a broad range of tasks, from working with database schema to simulating testing scenarios, and from analyzing and optimizing database queries to generating sample code or snippets. Just as we’re seeing in other sectors, its value is being considered across all areas, rather than being reserved for one or two particular areas.

The benefits being sought for those in Technology & Software are broadly the same as other sectors:

• Automation
• Enhanced security
• Streamlining tasks/efficiency

What’s really interesting here, however, is that across every other sector streamlining tasks is the number one benefit. In Technology & Software, automation and security are ahead of the streamlining of tasks – and by a wide margin – showing that more practical outcomes are being sought after.

When it comes to the concerns about using AI, there is a consensus of opinion among those in Technology & Software that matches all sectors. Data security and privacy, accuracy and reliability and ethical concerns are consistently cited, along with the need to improve training and expertise.

To ensure the accuracy, reliability and quality of database development, developers need a copy of their existing production database to test their changes against. This needs to be as close to the original as possible in terms of its size, distribution characteristics and referential integrity, in order for the tests to truly replicate what will happen when the changes reach production.

This does, though, flag up concerns about the privacy of the Personally Identifiable Information (PII) in the database copy, so sensitive data needs to be masked, de-identified or replaced with synthetic data. That’s the goal but it can take a lot of time, effort and space to provision copies of often large production databases to developers so short cuts are sometimes taken. As a result, personal data can be placed at risk.

As can be seen, 35% of those across all sectors have no approach for how they handle sensitive data and a further 6% are unsure. Leaving four in ten development and testing environments insecure.

In Technology & Software, those risks fall, with only 11% having no approach for sensitive data and 7% being unsure. This still leaves, however, one in six having insecure environments. Nearly a third (28%) also state they limit sensitive data to specific users, but security in testing and development is rarely as high as it is in production environments.

This would suggest that, even though data security measures are higher in Technology & Software than across other sectors, there are still measures that should be taken to ensure sensitive data is protected.