Implementation of DevOps with Gitlab CI/CD for the Management of a Large Satellite Simulation Software

The aim of this paper is to demonstrate the need and benefits of using Continuous Integration and Continuous Delivery (CI/CD) workflow for the testing, documentation, build and release of numerous GitLab projects (science modules) for the core VENQS® simulation library developed at DLR SI. The objective of this library and the supporting software development and management processes is to provide a simulation tool-chain for satellite mission design. It is crucial to have standardized workflows for a module versioning, dependency and release management system. A down-to-top and a top-to-down pipeline architecture are implemented to meet all the project requirements. Consequently, the error-free deployment of new features and/or modules has been accelerated from 3-5 weeks to less than a week. Concluding, this paper sheds light on the implementation of a CI/CD pipeline in a large software infrastructure. Moreover, the benefits we achieved in automating the DevOps of research software in GitLab CI/CD are discussed.