The Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) Operations Center (OC) posted a request for information (RFI) yesterday seeking industry assistance with the development and planning of MilCloud2 Rapid Cloud Migration. Specifically, DISA is interested in conducting market research to understand what capabilities exist in the private sector related to automated cloud migration techniques.
Moving to the cloud is nothing new for DISA; however, with the new RFI, the agency is looking to streamline and simplify the migration process. The current migration strategy unfolds in one of two ways. One option is to manually clone, convert, and provision server images into the new cloud environment. The other option is to provision, build, and configure applications on virtual servers from scratch. Neither option is pain-free.
With the RFI, DISA is seeking an automated migration solution that accurately duplicates the suite of servers with an application from its current environment to a cloud environment. The RFI specifies that the cloud environment is built on Apache CloudStack technology and KVM hypervisor. “The scope of duplication includes all applications used with the system, configuration of network and network security controls when proper APIs are exposed, and identification of interactions within the application system and to external systems when needed network traffic is made available for analysis,” the RFI explained. DISA is open to using vendor-provided tools or analytic capabilities, as long as packet captures or other network monitoring information is provided by the vendor.
DISA specifies that the cloud migration service should include the following technical characteristics:
- “Automation of operating systems migration to the new environment with proper device drivers and network configuration;
- Capabilities to not migrate selected setting and applications to the new environment;
- Automation of replication and synchronizing of workload image data, across disparate hardware platforms, in a way that maintains transaction image consistency;
- Like automation techniques for both physical and virtual servers;
- Automation integration with CloudStack APIs;
- Automate the data and application transfers between the source and destination environments and automate the data placement to proper file systems directly between the origin and target servers or using a store and forward through the automation platform;
- Automate the delta synchronization between the source and destination environments directly between the origin and target servers or using a store & forward through the automation platform; and
- Capability of the migration automation platform to migrate at least 20 operating environments concurrently. Duration of the migrations is dependent on the size of the operating environments as well as the source and target infrastructures.”
Responses are due by Sept. 10, DISA said.
