EvolutionStack - USDABuilding a Bazaar in the Cathedral

The teamIntroductions….

Who we support...

USDA / NITCIn the beginning…

● NITC dates back to 1957● Primarily mainframe shop ● Grew into a traditional hosting center● Slow and steady

Shifting Customer Needs● Customers wanted fast, flexible, agile and

cheap hostingo Customer independence required!o Customers want Amazon but in Govt. space

Not Keeping Up● What customers got…

o Virtualized version of old Managed Hosting producto Lots of iterationso Long path to productiono IT / Business processes don’t align

HopeStackThe dream begins…

● Hallway convos, smoke breaks○ What is this “OpenStack” thing…?

● A few believe in the idea of a revolution

All bets on the table...● Zach shares idea

o Wagers parking space for 5 min. with the ACIO● Leadership vision

o They can see beyond the red tape!● Team is selected to evaluate idea

o Non-conformists recruited

Do or die in 90 days● Charged to research private cloud

o Greenfield opportunityo Given unlimited resources (with zero $$$)o Research and report back in 90 days

GO!

Day 1 Begins

Do the impossible...● Build a WORKING demo/POC

o SDN + OpenStack + Ceph

o Oh, and its got to do stuff that works…………...

No Funding!● Diverted gear destined for trash

● NO R&D capital to be foundo Budget = 0$

● Team doing two jobs

AngryStack● Endless possibilities in OpenStack

o If you can make them work

● Feature Greed!o Over-ran the docs that were ‘available’o Current problem are always solved in the next releaseo I always have a current problem

Mad Googling!

Day 30

“Sticky” room (Cloud Cave)● Burn through two

scrummasters● Whiteboards

filled with ideas● Whole team in

one room

Building a cloud…● They said it couldn’t be done

● 500 ways not to build a cloud discovered

● Late nights

Tech debt!● Things breaking!

● Every service is a huge victory!

● Atmos clap is developed

Inception

Day 60

On the heels of dev...● Literally 2 days behind Nicira developers

during our Quantum buildo We were begging for the next code bitso Plugins/integration with Open vSwitcho Scratching of heads

● Amazing support from Nicira

AwesomeStack● We got stuff to work!

o Main feature collection workingo VM’s deployed successfully via Horizono SDN to OpenStack successful!

Deploy networks and routers - Yourself NO MORE VLANS! Self directed FW’s!

Additions Made...● Because Open Source

o Boot from volumeo Instance deploy wizardo Monitoring - Atmos Monkey

1 day left - Do or Die

Day 89

Demo day...● Security group errors (quick refresh)● Ceph stable● Crossing fingers the HW will hold out

Winning!● The Impossible is done!

● Executive mgmt was beyond impressed!

A declaration is made...● This OpenStack thing is our future

o Mgmt said make it so!o The message is sent to the org.

● Wait… There's no moneyo Found a customer that would investo Pitched the dream and they bought in

Schism...● The Cathedral is completely freaked out!!!!!!

o Those OpenStack guys are trying to kill the unicorn factory!

o But.. But.. The customer can do whatever they want in the new thing!

o Why would you build such a thing!?

SolutionStack● Build a world class cloud

o Stableo Sustainableo Not able to hire like a RackSpace o Looked for companies that understand our visiono Long term support o Plan for FedRAMP

I am Zach’s Sleepless Nights

Operationalizing...● Piston

o Provisioningo Impressed by operational philosophy

● VMware NSXo Maturity o Troubleshooting capabilities

● Silicon Mechanicso Amazing fulfillment

Get what we want…

Questions?

AMA