Speeding up software delivery at Channel 4 Where we were, are and going to be

•  Terrestrial UK broadcaster •  First terrestrial on-demand service in the UK •  We build, deploy and manage

–  Websites –  Web services –  VoD Services –  Device apps –  Data services

•  Ad funded commercial model

Background to C4

•  We want to create the best personalised user experience

•  To deliver the best experience we need to innovate and get enhancements into production efficiently

•  Application architecture, tools, practices constraining us.

Business Problem

•  Early adopter of cloud (circa 2009) •  Cloud first strategy •  Templated stacks via custom deployment

framework (Bash + xml)

Where we were…

•  Monolithic programme metadata DB •  Deficiencies in cloud management •  High test and deployment overhead •  Onerous release process •  Dev dependency on sys engineering

Problems!

•  Tactical & Strategic •  Bolts and braces •  PoC, evaluate, drop or adopt •  MVP

Approach

•  Tag, query, manage •  Open up access

– Tools – Config

•  Release more – Get everyone ready

Tactical

•  Decompose the monolith •  CI/CD approach •  Self service and more automation •  Change mind-sets •  Promote shared responsibility

Strategic

•  Micro service architecture

Where we are

The Monolith!

The Micro!

•  First class CI/CD orchestration tool •  Integrate testing into an automated pipeline •  Standardise development practices

–  TDD •  Swagger

–  Framework use –  Improve operational support within apps

•  Metrics •  Operations endpoints

–  Docker implementation

Move towards CI/CD Practices

Bamboo + Jira

Automated Pipeline

Tooling

PMCF  

•  Spec -> Build Test -> Cut Code

Swagger

Embedded Ops Support

Standard Dockerfile

•  Improved efficiency •  Change & product lifecycle visibility •  Better understanding of Docker •  Happy people J

Outcomes

•  Implement feature branching / toggling across our apps

•  Fully self service project initialisation •  Harvest metrics, store and expose •  Docker clustering •  Service virtualisation

What we’re going next

New pipeline

•  Move towards continuous deployment •  Canary releasing

– Backwards compatibility – Traffic shaping

•  Scorecard deployments –  Leverage metrics, central logging etc – Fail fast, fix forward

What we’re doing next next

•  Highly distributed architecture – Dependency management –  Inter process comms overhead

•  Our experience with Storm – Fault tolerance

•  Docker scheduling logic •  Support model

Nuts we’ll need to crack

•  brendanfoxen@gmail.com •  https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanfoxen

Thanks! J