Solution
The best solution for these requirements was creating this depository in the Cloud. An on-prem solution would have been prohibitive with the storage demands and the Bank wanted to integrate the best technology. The Bank consulted Synthesis Software Technologies, a long-term technology partner, Synthesis introduced a solution based on the Pimcore framework which is an open-source content management system. They ran this, together with the Bank as a DevOps agile solution.
“What I have thoroughly enjoyed with Synthesis is that it is a level that is at an expert level. We hire staff and often it is a case of getting them up to speed in the first week. With Synthesis it is quite the opposite. They come in and teach us from day one,” explains the Bank’s Head of Technology.
Using AWS Cloud allowed for extensive file sharing and version control that the Bank’s team envisioned. The Synthesis team implemented this framework with custom functionality coded by the Bank. The Synthesis team then helped deliver and fine-tune the AWS infrastructure, designed to handle large scale. They utilised AWS servers most appropriate for their requirements, configured the infrastructure, and then built out a model for an automated deployment pipeline.
“We wanted to ensure that the Bank’s team would not have to manually update the application of servers that were running. We built a pipeline so that from the point that the Bank’s developers committed code into its source repository, it would be picked up using AWS deployment tools. The system would run all the tests and configure and then deploy the latest updates onto the servers with as little downtime as possible and without any human interaction,” explains Jonty Sidney, Synthesis Cloud Engineer. The Bank’s team also used this project to gain further cloud knowledge.
“A key part of this project from an engineering point of view was the ability to create a proper DevOps environment using CICD tools. We now use automated testing in the CICD pipeline which makes it easy to develop and deploy quickly”, says the Bank’s Head of Technology.
The Synthesis team set up servers for the Bank’s custom-built mailing system to cloud so brand assets could easily be pulled in for customised mails, ensuring full marketing integration and speed.