SMALS : Open to a Shift

Belgian e-government’s journey to PaaS

15/10/2015

1

About Smals – “ICT for society”

In-house ICT for the Belgian government

Shared services for public institutions• Software development

• Infrastructure & 24x7 operations

• Staffing

Cost-sharing not-for-profit model• Technical standards

• Economies of scale

• Code re-use

• Flexible provisioning

• Develop & retain expertise

2

About Smals – Our history

• Focus on social security services & health care• Birth & child allowance

• Unemployment allowance

• Mutual health insurance

• Income guarantee

• Paid vacation leave

• Pension

• …

• Founded in 1939

• Over 75 years of shared services

3

About Smals – Today

• Strong pressure on governement budgets !!

• Very mission-critical applications

• Strong privacy requirements

Increased collaboration

ICT synergy program: Community Cloud (G-Cloud)- IaaS / PaaS / SaaS

- PaaS includes full Open Source stack

4

PaaS – Business challenge

• In 2014 we had a traditional infrastructure based on

WebLogic 10

• Need to migrate for technical reasons

• So first we looked at our business

5

6

In-house shared services for several institutions

Different steps needed to get to the result

By a specialist

Performed in sequence

We are flexible

7

“Any customer can have a car painted any colour that

he wants as long as it is black” (Henry Ford)

8

Our solution is best in class

in 1910...

Today’s customer wants fancy features :

• windscreens

• airbags

• safety belts

So we optimized the process via

custom automation

Non-functional needs

9

Security & reliabilitiy

10

Price

11

The need for PaaS – Conclusion

• Replacing the application server was not enough

• We needed a solution that is ...

– ready for change

– reliable

– cost-efficient

• ... and modify our processes to use it

So we chose Openshift Online Enterprise v2

12

A mindset-shift was need

Before After

Machine oriented Application oriented

Different environments in DEV, ACC, PRD

Same environment + INT

Process & # tools Self contained, 100% automated installation

Manual interventions Zero-touch deployment

1 enterprise-wide solution standard solution with room for extension

Development team & Middleware team & DB team & Servers team & ...

1 team to deliver the service to the customer

PaaS – Core concepts

• Self-contained applications

– Put all information into the application

• even database changes !

– Use that information during deployment

• Automate as much as possible

– 95% : some security and network related stuff remained manual

work

• Set up the solution with all teams involved

14

PaaS – Core concepts

• Full traceability

– Personal accounts

– Not for fingerpointing !

– Access to the logs based on the same security model

• Standard solution with room for extension

– To say it in Java : don’t make it final !

• Make it multi-tenant, even when you do it internally

15

Lessons learned : the tools

• Auto idling helps increasing your efficiency

• Throw-away setups allow complex tests to be executed

earlier in the workflow

• Scaled deployments simplify your life

• Multiple technologies offer the same interface

• The open source model works

– We already delivered patches to JBOSS EAP and OpenShift

• Standardization is key

16

Lessons learned : the process

• 95% automation -> All problems move to the last 5% !

• Providing a base solution :

– PRO : provides the needed flexibility

– CON : some people really love straight answers...

• More flexibility means more responsibility

• Changing a culture does not happen overnight

17

Lessons learned : the model

• Being a shared services provider requires more/other

features than just “being on-premise”

• Security model is key

• Pricing aspects become important

• Openshift v2 has a clear application model

– PRO : easy to start with

– CON : we needed more flexibility

18

PaaS – The road ahead

• Openshift v3

– We were part of the beta program

– Rolling it out at the moment in full multi-

tenancy

– Much more flexible... allows us to rethink

our view on infra

• Our infra team is setting up a cloud

with Openstack

– Line between IaaS and PaaS is blurring

• We’re grouping all initiatives into a

Belgian government cloud (G-Cloud)

19

Smals, ICT for society02 787 57 11

Fonsnylaan 20 / Avenue Fonsny 20

1060 Brussel / 1060 Bruxelles

Contact

Jef Verelstjef.verelst@smals.be

20

@Smals_ICT

www.smals.be