Linux & Terminal Basics
⏱️ Weeks 1-2DevOps is all about automating infrastructure. Since almost all servers and cloud platforms run on Linux, you must learn to navigate the command line (CLI), modify files, manage users/permissions, and understand the file structure before using any automation tools.
The absolute best free, interactive tutorial for complete beginners. Learn operating system layouts, shell navigation, permissions, script logic, and users in simple bite-sized modules.
Alternative Resources
🎮 OverTheWire Bandit Wargame Hands-On Game 📖 The Linux Command Line (PDF Book) Deep ReferenceGit Version Control
⏱️ Weeks 3-4Git is how developers save code changes, and it is how DevOps engineers write, collaborate on, and version-control infrastructure definitions (called GitOps). You need to learn commits, branching, merging, pull requests, and remote repositories like GitHub.
An interactive simulation game that visually explains Git merges, checkouts, rebases, and branching concepts. Invaluable for building a mental model of how Git branches work.
Networking Basics
⏱️ Week 5Every cloud application needs to communicate over networks. You must understand basic subnetting, DNS resolution, port routing, and standard web protocols like HTTP/HTTPS and SSL certificates to deploy cloud-native software safely.
Beautifully simplified guides explaining network layers, TCP handshake, IP addressing, DNS lookups, firewalls, and how the internet functions securely.
Containers (Docker)
⏱️ Weeks 6-7Docker isolates code packages into lightweight "containers." This ensures that applications run identically in local development and production. You must learn how to build Dockerfiles, configure networks/volumes, and compose multi-container configurations.
A highly visual and complete YouTube crash course covering Docker architecture, registry, image construction, networks, mounting volumes, and multi-container Compose setup.
Alternative Resources
🛠️ Play with Docker Playground Browser Lab 📘 Official Docker Documentation Official GuideCI/CD Pipelines (Workflows)
⏱️ Weeks 8-9Continuous Integration (CI) and Continuous Delivery (CD) are pipelines that automatically build, test, and deploy applications whenever developers commit code. Automated validation keeps code stable and avoids manual deployment mistakes.
Official reference guide to setting up YAML workflows inside GitHub. Easiest path to learn CI/CD pipelines since it integrates natively with Git repositories without hosting external servers.
Infrastructure as Code & Cloud
⏱️ Weeks 10-12Instead of manually clicking buttons on AWS, Azure, or GCP, DevOps engineers write declarative configuration text files to deploy networks and compute resources. This is Infrastructure as Code (IaC), mainly using Terraform.
The official interactive tutorials hosted by HashiCorp. Learn variables, workspaces, state management, modules, and multi-cloud provisioning with step-by-step guides.