Interoperability

Welcome to Architect Insight

2010

When the Enterprise is the size of a Western Nation

OrDelivering a pan- government IT solution to

benefit the whole of the UK

Andy James : CTO SolidsoftCharles Young : Principal Consultant Solidsoft

• When our critical life circumstances change, we may have to contact government many times, often to give the same information.

• An estimate of 35 types of changes of circumstance have been found and these give an average of 4.5 contacts per event.

• Birth, bereavement and change of address are not typical as they have an above average impact, but are exemplary nevertheless.

• For birth the number of contacts was found to be 15, affecting 11M people per year; for bereavement: 12 contacts, affecting 7M; and change of address: 9 contacts affecting 16M.

Introduction

• In November 2006, the Government published Transformational Government – Enabled by Technology

• This set out an agenda of three key transformations:– services enabled by information technology must be designed

around the citizen and business– there must be an increased culture of shared services to release

efficiencies– there must be a broadening and deepening of government’s

information technology professionalism• In the report Sir David Varney recommended an approach to

put a citizen centric view on government services and simplify them for the citizen.

Varney Report

• To meet the aspirations of the Varney Report the Tell Us Once Programme was born

• By it’s very title the nature of the programme was for the Citizen to only have to tell government once for the whole of government to know

• The focus became Change of Circumstance Events• In particular: Birth, Death and Change of Address

Tell Us Once

• Tell Us Once Pilot IT project is live in 15 councils about to be extended to 60

• Tell Us Once National System is in development

• Today we are here to talk about the challenges of delivering an enterprise solution on this scale

Today

• Security, security, security!• Stakeholder Agreement!• Scalability• The timelines• Meeting the diverse requirements of over 400

councils• Providing a lasting architecture• Continue to deliver more services

The Challenges

The Aspiration

• Great citizen experience• Re-use key Government resources• Use industry standard products and protocols• Provide a framework for future services• Rules driven approach to meet the ever

changing landscape of government• Applicable across the whole of the UK

The Principles

• The starting point is a face-to-face registration process

• Citizen given option to provide further information

• Citizen provides necessary information only once

• Government departments and agencies ‘subscribe’ to the information they require

• Finally information only retained for a short period

• Service Provider – this is a local or central government endpoint that provides a service to the citizen. For example: DWP and Pensions

• Citizen – the customer• Change of Circumstance – a major life change

that requires a citizen to inform government about a change

• Informer – the citizen who is providing the information

A few terms we may use

• DWP – both birth and death• HMRC – both birth and death• Identity and Passport Service – death• DVLA – death• UK Councils – death and birth

Stakeholders

• For death councils can receive information on over 10 different services

• Large councils segment data across services

• Small councils consolidate all services together

• Some government departments want manual access some want integrated, pushed data

Stakeholder Issues

• ‘Organic’ approach focused on the citizen• A limited prototype deployed across 15 councils• A number of additional ‘paper driven’ initiatives• Develop the National System based on the

experience of the prototype• Controlled take-on of councils• 3 channels

The Approach - IT

• Only delivering bereavement

• Limited exposure• Prototyping approach and

architectural concepts• ‘Live’ delivering real value• Life became far longer than

expected

The Prototype

• 25 different benefits / services supported• Including:

– Pension– Attendance allowance– Housing benefit– Council Tax– Library services

• Service Provider breakdown for death:– Councils – 10 services– DWP – 10 services– HMRC – 3 services– Passport Service – 1 service– DVLA - 1 service

Services Supported

• Need for 3 channel approach• Process ideally breaks into two:

– Capture Process– Distribution Process

• Rules drive everything– UI– Capture– Distribution

• Security concerns– Access – username password not enough– Data build up leading to IL4

The Results

• Capture Data in as painless way for the citizen as possible, providing multi-channel, channel hopping and the Tell Us Once paradigm

• Take data – tell citizen who we are going to pass it too

• Process data and distribute in the service provider requested manner

Architectural Drive

The Capture Process

RegisteredData

RegisteredData

TUO(Capture)

The Distribution Process

TUO(Distribution)

DataStore

Rules

Distribution

Process Management

SubmissionEvent

The High Level ArchitectureTUO Application

TUO Portal

Data Capture Portlets

AdministrationPortlet

Event Data ViewPortlet

Case ManagementPortlet

Service Bus

External Portal

InternalPortal

Data Management PortletsManagement Portlets

MIReporting

Common Services

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External Interfaces (Service Bus)

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The High Level Architecture

TUO Application

TUO Portal

Data Capture Portlets

AdministrationPortlet

Event Data ViewPortlet

Case ManagementPortlet

Service Bus

External Portal

InternalPortal

Data Management PortletsManagement Portlets

MIReporting

Common Services

Aud

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Serv

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External Interfaces (Service Bus)

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Reference Data Interfaces

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Serv

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• SOA based• Microsoft stack• BizTalk powered ESB at the

heart• Rules based UI• Rules based data capture• Rules based data

distribution

• This is one of the key features of the system• 3 methods of data distribution:

– Web Portal– ‘Push’ distribution via government gateway

infrastructure– ‘Pull’ from TUO secure web service

• Distribution granular to the level of service

Distribution

• Abstracted from application• Supported by portal framework • Same style UI used for all channels• UI rules assist in collecting the data only once:

– If informer lived with deceased then no need to take second address

• Rules used to dynamically generate the page contents:– If deceased below pensionable age, for example, don’t ask

if they had a pension!• Branded as DirectGov

Presentation UI

Presentation Layer

Tell Us OnceBecause your time matters

The Application

Data Store

Data Store

IL4 IL3

• TUO configuration• BTS configuration• BTS rules• TUO service directory• TUO MI Data

• TUO Data Store• BTS Message Box• TUO Archive• TUO Audit• Registered Data Cache

Reference DataQAS

• Event-Driven

• Not real-time!• Low throughput

– Value is in distribution

Rules for an EDA

Event/DetectionReporting

EventProcessing

Event Distribution

• System composes a large number of policies– 400+ councils – avg. of 10 services– 150+ additional service providers

Policies

Policy Capture / Management

Policy Composition

Policy Deployment

• Flow Rules• Enabling

– Authorisation– Service Bus

• routing • governance

– Intrusion detection• Data Distribution

Rule Categories

Event/DetectionReporting

EventProcessing

Event Distribution

Capturing Decision Requirements

What candidate service providers

exist for this event?

Do we have enough event

data to dispatch to the service

provider?

Does the service provider require distribution via

GG?

What type of event is this?

Who is the relevant local

authority?

Event

CoC Event Type Definitions

Local Authority Lookup

National Service Provider Matrix

LA Service Provider Matrix

Service Provider Distribution Requirements

Service Provider

LA Services

Local Authority

National Services

EventDistribution

List

Gateway

KEY

Knowledge

Decision

Data

Distribution Pre-Processing

• Common rule patterns across multiple event types

• Versioned and audited policies• Traceability• Security• Automated composition and translation• Dynamic deployment

Policy Management Framework

• Approached on many levels:– Data collected is only stored for

a limited period:• Registered data for 28 days• Submitted data for 35 days –

archived after that

– Only the data a department is entitled to is provided

– Personal data held at IL4

Security

• Approached on many levels:– Main system accessed over GSI– Government Users require two

factor authentication– Application has security built at

its core

Security

• Designed to scale from inception• Built using products designed for the enterprise• Partnering with infrastructure/hosting partner

with track record of supporting this level of solution – ATOS Origin

• Architecture segmented to deliver best performance to meet the differing requirements

• Using existing scalable building blocks such as Government Gateway

Scalability

• Delivery of first National Release Oct 2010• Full integrated release April 2011• Next Change of Circumstance – Address

Change• System to be the basis for future cross

government citizen projects

The future

• A different approach to delivering a national IT system

• Focus has been primarily on the citizen• Pilot has had a huge success and great

feedback from the users• National roll-out builds on that approach• Realistic vision, although timescales still tight• No attempt was made ‘To boil the ocean’

Summary

Who are we…

• Microsoft’s No 1 Integration, SOA and BPM Gold Partner

• 17th year of trading

• Services

– Solution development– Consultancy– Support

• www.solidsoft.com

Andy James – CTO Solidsoft

Charles Young – Principal Consultant Solidsoft

Blogs: http://blog.solidsoft.com/