State agency insights on public cloud platforms
Tuesday, May 22 11:15AM-12:15
Moderator: Bob Zych, Office of the Chief Information Officer
Panel Members:
• Grant Rodeheaver, Department of Transportation
• Michael DeAngelo, Department of Fish and Wildlife
• Michael Zimmerman, Department of Enterprise Services
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Strategic Action 3:
Encourage adoption of public cloud platforms where appropriate
OCIO Lead: Loren Kyllo, OCIO
Agency Lead: Grant Rodeheaver, WSDOT
Executive Sponsor: Bharat Shyam, OCIO
The following tasks are part of the cloud strategy:
– Negotiate purchasing relationships with cloud platform providers
– Identify workloads in state agencies appropriate for public cloud platforms
– Experiment with and adopt management toolsets
– Explore the concept of the Government cloud
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Cloud Technologies at WSDOT
Presentation to 2012 IPMA Forum
May 22-23, 2012
Grant Rodeheaver
Director
Information Technology Division
Paula Hammond
Secretary of Transportation
2012 IPMA Forum
May 22-23, 2012

The WSDOT Website
Internet Bandwidth: Jan. 15 - 21,
2012 vs. 2012 Daily Average
1 600,00 GB
1 400,00 GB
1 200,00 GB
1 000,00 GB
800,00 GB
600,00 GB
400,00 GB
200,00 GB
0,00 GB
Sun.
Mon.
Tues.
Wed.
Thur.
Fri.
Sat.
Jan. 15-21, 2012 798,49 1 001,4 1 351,8 1 290,8 1 133,5 918,22 409,32
2011 Average 230,39 400,14 448,24 465,67 456,95 406,72 255,18
2012 IPMA Forum
May 22-23, 2012
4

WSDOT Alternate Website
• IIS Web Server on
Amazon Web Services EC2
• Hosting static HTML site for use during maintenance & outages
• Redirection using DNS failover
(DNS provided by DNSMadeEasy, a 3 rd -party hosted DNS provider)
2012 IPMA Forum
May 22-23, 2012
5

WSDOT Public Website
• Burstable capacity for website traffic images
• Traffic images make up a significant percentage of website traffic
• Opportunity for cloud-hosted solution for burstable capacity
• Currently working with Amazon Web Services on a proof-of-concept
2012 IPMA Forum
May 22-23, 2012
6

WSDOT Public Website
• Hosted Solution for Traffic & Weather app
• Traffic & Weather application is one of the most popular pages on
WSDOT’s website
• WSDOT engaged with ESRI to conduct a Traffic & Weather website proof-of-concept using ESRI-hosted GIS base map and WSDOT data layers on WSDOT-hosted servers.
2012 IPMA Forum
May 22-23, 2012
7

WSDOT Public Website
• Findings of ESRI Traffic & Weather Beta
+ Improved mapping presentation and usability compared to WSDOT's current static maps.
+ Improved ability to expand roadside information versus current maps where the maps can get crowded with cameras and other information.
– Increase infrastructure cost for delivering mapping layers.
– May incur costs for base map provided by vendor.
– Increase of support by WSDOT GIS staff to provide flow layers.
– May not meet WSDOT business requirements such as web advertising.
Due to funding issues for the additional infrastructure software, hardware and operational support identified in this beta, WSDOT decided that this solution model will not be pursued at this time. WSDOT will continue to monitor technology offerings from web mapping service providers.
2012 IPMA Forum
May 22-23, 2012
8

Microsoft Office 365 / Lync Online
• WSDOT is researching / testing
Unified Communications (UC) solutions
• Participating in OCIO
Office 365 pilot
• Including Lync Online
2012 IPMA Forum
May 22-23, 2012
9

Looking Ahead
• Researching hybrid cloud and virtual private cloud solutions such as:
• Amazon Web Services Virtual
Private Cloud (VPC)
• Citrix NetScaler Cloud Bridge
• Microsoft Windows Azure
• VMware vCloud
2012 IPMA Forum
May 22-23, 2012
10

Seeding the Cloud with public data
• WSDOT currently provides data sources directly to the public via API & web services, including:
• Traveler Information API
• 10 different services, including Highway Alerts and Ferries info
• 154 registered subscribers
• March & April 2012 each had >2,000,000 requests per month
• Ferries
• Ferries Schedule available through WSDOT web service and
Google Transit Feed
• Ferries Maintenance Schedule
2012 IPMA Forum
May 22-23, 2012
11

Challenges of Cloud Adoption
• Network connectivity, especially for end-user cloud services, could require additional investment
– WSDOT has 230 sites, several with T-1 or DSL connections
– Capacity, redundancy are potential issues
• Any potential savings through reduction in labor should be evaluated, because many of the support roles when using a cloud service, such as provisioning and administration, may still remain
• Licensing costs may or may not decrease, if the provider requires you to still provide them
– Some software companies offer programs like Microsoft’s License
Mobility to use licenses you already own in the cloud
2012 IPMA Forum
May 22-23, 2012
12

Challenges of Cloud Adoption
• Although service levels are typically very high, ability to negotiate individual SLAs with cloud provider may be limited
– Versus a standard Usage Agreement when signing up
– Some consumer-oriented services do offer enterprise / corporate accounts – for example, DropBox for Teams
• Learning curve
– As with any new platform, it can be a process for people to learn to accept and embrace. You will likely encounter resistance.
– Understanding cloud service offerings, including different services within a provider’s offering, and new terminology
• Technical challenges
– Replicating data between on-premises and cloud, keep apps in sync
– Maintaining a common namespace and ability to shift demand easily between on-premises and cloud
2012 IPMA Forum
May 22-23, 2012
13

Conclusion
• Contact Us:
Tim Crabb
Infrastructure Services Mgr
WSDOT ITD tim.crabb@wsdot.wa.gov
360.705.7676
Grant Rodeheaver
Director, WSDOT ITD grant.rodeheaver@wsdot.wa.gov
360.705.7601
Chuck Dorsett
Infrastructure Server Support Mgr
WSDOT ITD chuck.dorsett@wsdot.wa.gov
360.705.7624
2012 IPMA Forum
May 22-23, 2012
14

Fisher Story
 Existed throughout northwest
 Over-trapping - protected since 1934
 8 yr survey found none in WA - extinct
 Listed by DFW in 1998
 Introductions (90) began in 2008 with DFW,
USFW, USGS, ONF
 Fisher has not yet recovered
 Tracking about 30 individuals
 Needing to know more about their preferred home range and underlining habitat
Historical Range of Fisher circa 1800

Fisher Home Range
In-house capability with $5k desktop
- Running data for one individual at a time
- 90 meter resolution
- Manually combining results to see aggregate
- About three weeks to compile data for five individuals
- Estimated 18 weeks to complete all 29 individuals
- Estimated cost:
HW dep = $360 labor = $15k
AWS capability
- Running data for all 29 individual at once
- 30 meter resolution
- Completed in 5 hours including two hours learning AWS
- Estimated cost:
Total AWS cost = $5.70
Labor = $250

Summary Results
 Accomplished more
 In a shorter period of time
 Higher accuracy
 At a lower cost

A small-group experience in leveraging services
DES Printing & Imaging Services
Michael Zimmerman, Business Solutions Developer
IPMA Forum 2012

Overview

What is myPRINT?
• myPRINT is a web application for submitting print requests
& web-to-print files, based on a COTS printing industry solution

What is myPRINT?
• Qualified government or non-profit customers can select from standard products or upload files to build their own print jobs with custom options and visuals that update to reflect their selections

What is myPRINT?
• myPRINT can have multiple branded storefronts, such as our public-facing myFulfillment store for distributing pre-made and print-on-demand items from other state agencies

What is myPRINT?
• As a web application, myPRINT is administered and configured by DES staff entirely online, like a sophisticated
Content Management System

myPRINT in the cloud
• myPRINT is fully hosted and maintained by our vendor in an
Application Service Provider model
– We have our own distinct configurations and database managed by the ASP host, so myPRINT is technically not part of a multi-tenant Software as a Service platform
• So, DES does not manage code or infrastructure, just the service

myPRINT in the cloud
• Core data on each order from myPRINT flows from the ASP host back to our print MIS application hosted inside the SGN at DES
– Monarch, our MIS software, is owned by the same vendor who develops myPRINT’s underlying Digital Store Front application
– SGN connectivity was an early challenge but has been working well since go-live in 2009

• With only 4 IT staff at the time, we needed to “punch above our weight”
– Focus limited resources on our business needs rather than infrastructure and code
• Quicker path to go-live
• Lower up-front investment
• More vendor involvement and support

• It is tempting to have more IT control, but keep your focus on refining business value to customers
• Find a way to maintain access to your raw data, even if read-only
• Be clear with vendor about having input on feature development in general vs. what requires customizations
• Pay attention to connectivity issues and the impact on your customers’ experience

Challenges
 Learning curve
 Many AWS services
 Each service with its own set of options
 Complex
 Connectivity back to the SGN
 Needed for managing licenses
 Access some data sets
 Account management / Billing
 User management – another set of credentials to manage
 Need an easier way to track usage for cost accounting
 Special projects have their own source of funding
 What is the right IT Service model?

Moderator: Bob Zych, Office of the Chief Information Officer
Panel Members:
• Grant Rodeheaver, Department of Transportation
• Michael DeAngelo, Department of Fish and Wildlife
• Michael Zimmerman, Department of Enterprise Services
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