Case Study
App Integration through Mule Container Solutions
Challenge
A Midwest-based Fortune 500 insurance company wanted to overhaul its software application infrastructure. They wanted a platform that could integrate the use and management of applications (which numbered in the thousands) while limiting overall latency. Given the overall number and scale of applications, the task would have taken decades to fulfill. However, we were required to build, deploy, test, and release applications within a matter of days. Our main objective was to provide a platform that minimized the full application development lifecycle and allowed for swift consumption and app integration management.
Breakthrough
We engaged hundreds of developers in our primary task: simplify the Mule-based toolset to ensure an easier transition. We focused on lightweight applications which performed a single function. Our initial team consisted of ten people, led by one person who was new to the platform but could adapt to changing situations. Over several months, we collaborated on developing a MuleSoft infrastructure that allowed for rapid deployment, testing, and monitoring of the app integration environment.
Next, our development team created a self-service “Integration Package” deployment portal. Creating a server group with Puppet, our team created cluster images with Rabbit MQ and Mule Runtime on each node. Out team used Red Hat Package Managers (RPM) to provide installation files, creating server images, and installing those RPMs onto servers.
Results
After two years of work, our team created a reliable, efficient self-service Cloud-based app integration platform for thousands of employees. We also learned new strategies for establishing further Platform-as-a-service (PaaS) offerings for app integration.
