ABSTRACT
Automation is an essential component in building Defence capabilities. Automation makes it easier for teams to uplift to agile ways of working and respond to changing project requirements, while at the same time spending more time on higher-value project activities, and less time on mundane tasks.
Built on the open source Ansible project, Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform enables Defence to operate across lines-of-business and operations teams, as well as support strategic partners and Australian Industry Capability to automate the deployment and sustainment of Defence capabilities.
As an automation platform, Ansible lends itself well to service integration and management (SIAM) operating models, such as those currently used by CIOG. Ansible Automation Platform provides a central platform that service integrators can use to automate multi-disciplinary workflows, using the same automation language across Windows, Linux, network devices, applications exposing RESTful APIs, and security products, such as Splunk and CheckPoint.
Ansible Automation Platform has been adopted by the British armed forces, automating application and service delivery within the British Army’s Information and Application Services branch. It has also been successfully adopted internally at Microsoft, automating Microsoft’s internal network provisioning and configuration.
This presentation will look at Ansible Automation for both tactical edge services as well as SIAM ICT delivery models; analyse Ansible success stories relevant to Defence; and provide a demonstration of Ansible automation workflows integrated with IT Service Management (ITSM) platforms.
BIOGRAPHY
Shane Boulden is a Red Hat Solution Architect supporting Defence capabilities and major programs. Formally a Royal Australian Navy officer, he now supports Defence programs to adopt open source technologies.
Recently he's worked with the Compliance as Code open source project to codify Australian compliance baselines, and make this available to Australian organisations to better secure hybrid cloud workloads.

BIOGRAPHY
With over 28 years in the IT industry particularly in the Government sector, Satian has helped various organisations identify, plan, design and deliver business outcomes that matter across ANZ. Satian utilises his unique blend of experience in every facet of IT, from infrastructure to cloud native development approaches, to ensure successful projects. His focus areas include Automation, Multi-Hybrid Cloud and edge deployment strategies. Satian brings the view of measuring technical and societal impact of IT particularly on how these impact, Government policies, agility, security, risk, cost, efficiency and ultimately citizen focussed outcomes.