This document discusses building data environments for microservices using Geode. It describes Health Care Service Corporation, which operates Blue Cross Blue Shield plans across several states. It operates a digital portfolio including REST APIs, web apps, and mobile apps using microservices and data services. The microservices each have their own data stores for high performance. Tools like Ansible, Concourse, and Jinja2 are used to automate infrastructure configuration and pipelines. Variables allow dynamic configuration. The talk concludes that each microservice should have its own data, everything about the data stores should be automated, and configuration should be treated like code.

1. Building Data Environments
For Production Microservices with Geode
By Ryan Hunt
Health Care Service Corporation
ryan_hunt@hcsc.net

2. Unless otherwise indicated, these slides are © 2013 -2018 Pivotal Software, Inc. and licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by -nc/3.0/ 2
#6on Diversity MBA’s
50 Out Front for Diversity Leadership Best Places
to Work for Women & Diverse Managers
Operating Blue Cross and
Blue Shield plans in FIVE
states: IL, MT,
NM, OK, TX
Health Care Service Corporation
OUR PURPOSE
To do everything in our power to stand with our
members in sickness and in health®
1936
year founded
+$1billion
in IT spend
Over
21,000
employees
15million
members
2,100
IT employees
208.3million
claims processed
annually
LARGESTcustomer-owned
health insurer in the U.S. and
4th largest overall

3. Unless otherwise indicated, these slides are © 2013 -2018 Pivotal Software, Inc. and licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by -nc/3.0/ 3
The Digital Portfolio
Products
• RESTful APIs
• Web Applications
• Native Mobile
• Data Services
Methodology
• Engineering + Product + Design
• Extreme Programming
• Test Driven Development
• Pair Programming
3
Creating new digital products and rebuilding legacy ones across the enterprise

4. Unless otherwise indicated, these slides are © 2013 -2018 Pivotal Software, Inc. and licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by -nc/3.0/ 4
The Digital APIs
API Consumers
MOBILE APIWEB
MS MS
MS
MS
API API
SERVICES
API GATEWAY
Information APIs
• data + business rules
• source of truth
• read only
• microservices
• high performance

5. Unless otherwise indicated, these slides are © 2013 -2018 Pivotal Software, Inc. and licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by -nc/3.0/ 5
Microservice Architecture
SOURCE DATA
API Consumers
MOBILE APIWEB
MS MS
MS
MS
API API
?
SERVICES
API GATEWAY

6. Unless otherwise indicated, these slides are © 2013 -2018 Pivotal Software, Inc. and licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by -nc/3.0/ 6
Microservice Architecture
SOURCE DATA
SERVICES
API GATEWAY
API Consumers
MOBILE APIWEB
MS MS
MS
MS
API API

7. Unless otherwise indicated, these slides are © 2013 -2018 Pivotal Software, Inc. and licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by -nc/3.0/ 7
Microservice Architecture
SOURCE DATA
SERVICES
API GATEWAY
MS MS
MS
MS
API Consumers
MOBILE APIWEB
API API
TRANSFORM
READ-ONLY
DATASTORES

8. Unless otherwise indicated, these slides are © 2013 -2018 Pivotal Software, Inc. and licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by -nc/3.0/
More databases, more ...
8
Operational Challenges
• Distributed infrastructure gets complicated.
• Data stores are a mix of configuration and code.
• Distributed monitoring and analytics.
• Developers own it all.
Approaches
• Automate things aggressively.
• Use pipelines for all changes.
• Treat configuration like code.
• Do versioning.

9. Unless otherwise indicated, these slides are © 2013 -2018 Pivotal Software, Inc. and licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by -nc/3.0/
Tools
9
Concourse Ansible Jinja2

10. Unless otherwise indicated, these slides are © 2013 -2018 Pivotal Software, Inc. and licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by -nc/3.0/
Ansible
10
prepare_filesystem.yml
- name: create geode base
file:
state: directory
path: /opt/geode
owner: geode-service
mode: 0644
An automation tool for IT infrastructure with a host of built-in commands.
Also YAML.
start_services.yml
- name: enable locator service
systemd:
name: geode-locator
state: started

11. Unless otherwise indicated, these slides are © 2013 -2018 Pivotal Software, Inc. and licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by -nc/3.0/
Concourse the “continuous thing-doer”
11
jobs:
- name: job-hello-world
public: true
plan:
- task: hello-world
config:
platform: linux
image_resource:
type: docker-image
source: {repository: busybox}
run:
path: echo
args:
- hello world
Simple YAML configuration And a web UI

12. Unless otherwise indicated, these slides are © 2013 -2018 Pivotal Software, Inc. and licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by -nc/3.0/
Jinja2
12
A configuration is passed through template code to generate content. Available as a
python library and cli.
config.yml
greeting: hello
people:
- name: alice
- name: bob
template.yml
messages:
{% for p in people %}
- {{ greeting }} {{p.name }}
{% endfor %}
output.yml
messages:
- hello alice
- hello bob
$ jinja2 config.yml template.yml > output.yml

13. Unless otherwise indicated, these slides are © 2013 -2018 Pivotal Software, Inc. and licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by -nc/3.0/
Concourse + Jinja2
13
name: build things
plan:
{% for thing in things %}
-get: {{thing.name}}
resource: {{thing.name}}-s3
{% endfor %}
Iterators can cut down on code and keep things consistent.
name: build things
plan:
-get: thing1-s3
resource: thing1-s3
-get: thing2-s3
resource: thing2-s3
-get: thing3-s3
resource: thing3-s3

14. Unless otherwise indicated, these slides are © 2013 -2018 Pivotal Software, Inc. and licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by -nc/3.0/
Flow control
14
- get: geode-build-version
trigger: true
{% if serial == true %}
passed:
- test-cluster-{{environments[loop.index0-1].name }}
{% endif %}
Basic logic adds some flexibility

15. Unless otherwise indicated, these slides are © 2013 -2018 Pivotal Software, Inc. and licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by -nc/3.0/
Variables all the way down
15
params:
ENVIRONMENT: {{env.name}}
LIB_RESOURCES:
{% for resource in lib_resources -%}
- {{ resource.name }}
{% endfor %}
Pass dynamic data down into tasks and shell scripts

16. Unless otherwise indicated, these slides are © 2013 -2018 Pivotal Software, Inc. and licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by -nc/3.0/
A Demonstration
16

17. Unless otherwise indicated, these slides are © 2013 -2018 Pivotal Software, Inc. and licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by -nc/3.0/
In Conclusion
• Give your microservices their own data
• Automate everything about the data stores
• Treat configuration and provisioning like code
• Use pipelines for operational tasks
• Create templates and generate pipelines for reuse
17

18. > Stay Connected.
Reach me at ryan_hunt@hcsc.net
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