A Survey of DevOps in the South African Software Context

This study investigated DevOps practices and experiences in the South African software development context, along with associated perceptions of benefits and challenges. Survey data collected from a sample of 80 software development professionals showed that more frequent builds, earlier detection of bugs and reduced project lead times were the top three benefits, while getting DevOps capable members into a team, finding experienced professionals to support DevOps practice and changing deep-seated company culture to support DevOps were the top three challenges. DevOps practices are still emerging. Although 85% of respondents report continuous integration as a frequent practice, only 54% report using continuous deployment frequently. The biggest reported impacts of DevOps on software development culture were in making development team members aware of operational faults, responsible for quality assurance, and responsible for deployments. Realisation of benefits from DevOps depends largely on a culture change. Results are useful for guiding organisations considering DevOps adoption

Investigating the use of 3-D full-waveform inversion to characterize the host rock at a geological disposal site

The U.K. government has a policy to dispose of higher activity radioactive waste in a geological disposal facility (GDF), which will have multiple protective barriers to keep the waste isolated and to ensure no harmful quantities of radioactivity are able to reach the surface. Currently no specific GDF site in the United Kingdom has been chosen but, once it has, the site is likely to be investigated using seismic methods. In this study, we explore whether 3-D full-waveform inversion (FWI) of seismic data can be used to map changes in physical properties caused by the construction of the site, specifically tunnel-induced fracturing. We have built a synthetic model for a GDF located in granite at 1000 m depth below the surface, since granite is one of the candidate host rocks due to its high strength and low permeability and the GDF could be located at such a depth. We use an effective medium model to predict changes in P-wave velocity associated with tunnel-induced fracturing, within the spatial limits of an excavated disturbed zone (EdZ), modelled here as an increase in fracture density around the tunnel. We then generate synthetic seismic data using a number of different experimental geometries to investigate how they affect the performance of FWI in recovering subsurface P-wave velocity structure. We find that the location and velocity of the EdZ are recovered well, especially when data recorded on tunnel receivers are included in the inversion. Our findings show that 3-D FWI could be a useful tool for characterizing the subsurface and changes in fracture properties caused during construction, and make a suite of suggestions on how to proceed once a potential GDF site has been identified and the geological setting is known