At Hexon Global, we strongly believe in the importance of a Well-Architected Review (WAR). By systematically evaluating your cloud setup against best practices, we help clients identify areas for improvement, optimize performance, and mitigate risks. Conducting WARs isn’t just a routine task; it’s an important step in our commitment to crafting robust solutions.

In this post, we delve into a recent WAR conducted for Code Wizard by Replicacia, a software development platform. We’ll show you how Hexon Global implemented meticulous planning and problem-solving to architect solutions that made Replicacia well-placed for scalability and sustainability.

Hexon Global WAR: Crafting a Flexible Solution

The base challenge was to develop a versatile application serving both B2C and B2B needs. Our mission was to create a platform that not only empowered users to autonomously generate code but also provided seamless integration with GitHub for efficient collaboration and deployment.

Our journey commenced with a clear objective: to design and deploy a dual-purpose application hosted on AWS, offering users the freedom to select their preferred technology stack for both the user interface (UI) and web services.

The Existing Setup

Our preliminary investigation of Code Wizard’s setup came with the following insights on features and product flows:

Tech Stack Selection

• Users can choose their preferred tech stack for UI and web services, including Angular, React, Node.js, AWS Lambda, and more.
• User selections are stored for future reference.

Customizable Data Storage

• Users can configure data storage options like S3, SQL databases, ElasticCache, and NoSQL databases.
• User-defined configurations for data storage are stored.

Code Generation

• A code generation engine looks at user selections and configurations to create code templates.
• Generates code for UI components and web services based on chosen tech stack.
• Automatically creates GitHub repositories for generated code and pushes code to the repository.

GitHub Integration

• Automatically creates a GitHub repository for each code generation request.
• Provides users with a link to access their GitHub repository for code download, customization, and deployment.

Dockerized Code Generation

• Implemented Docker containers for the code generation engine.
• Deployed Docker container on AWS EC2 instances.

Authentication and Authorization

• Implemented mechanisms for authentication and authorization to regulate access to the application and GitHub repositories.

Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment (CI/CD)

• Established continuous integration and deployment pipelines.

Identifying Challenges: The Roadblocks Encountere

Despite the project’s success, we recognised several challenges that demanded immediate attention:

• Configuration Management: Managing configurations across multiple modules running on separate EC2 instances posed a significant hurdle, particularly in maintaining consistency and reliability.
• Load Balancing: Efficiently distributing incoming requests to idle EC2 instances based on workload proved essential for optimizing resource utilization and ensuring scalability.

Hexon Global’s Proposed Solutions: Building for Scalability and Resilience

To address these challenges head-on, we devised a set of solutions aimed at enhancing scalability and reliability:

• Centralized Configuration Management: Managing configurations for multiple modules running on separate instances of EC2 was a challenge. Each module may have had unique settings and requirements, and efficiently configuring and maintaining these settings across the infrastructure was essential for reliability and ease of maintenance. In the existing setup, when the Docker instances running in EC2 were shut down and restarted, the IP address of the instances changed, requiring developers to modify the IP address configuration in the module’s code to map to the newly spun instances.
• Load Balancer Integration: Routing incoming requests to the idle EC2 instances based on workload was essential for optimizing resource utilization, minimizing response times, and ensuring system scalability. The challenge was to design a load-based routing mechanism that can efficiently distribute incoming requests to idle instances, preventing overloading of heavily used instances while ensuring responsiveness and cost-effectiveness.

The Path to Success: Implementation and Results

With meticulous planning and execution, Hexon Global successfully implemented the proposed solutions, witnessing tangible improvements in scalability, reliability, and overall system performance. Our centralized configuration management system streamlined operations, while load balancer integration facilitated efficient workload distribution and scaling.

How Hexon Global Can Help You With A Well-Architected Review

Hexon Global is an AWS Advanced Consulting Partner, equipped with expertise and experience in navigating the complexities of cloud infrastructure. Our team of seasoned professionals is dedicated to empowering businesses like yours to maximize the value of their cloud investments while optimizing costs effectively. Make Hexon Global your trusted AWS ally. Reach out to us for examples of successful WARs that we have conducted.