This document proposes a cell-based reference architecture for building agile integration in a microservices environment. It describes challenges with existing layered and microservices architectures, and introduces the concept of grouping components into independently deployable and managed "cells". The architecture aims to provide structured agility through versioned cells with dependency management and automated governance. Reference implementations and measures of success are discussed to demonstrate how a cell-based approach can support agile development practices and organizational transformation.

1. Asanka Abeysinghe
Cell-based Architecture
An Emerging Architecture Pattern for Agile Integration
Vice President, Architecture - CTO Office
WSO2 Inc.

2. Motivation

3. Centralized & Layered
picture credit: https://www.flickr.com/photos/kaktuslampa/

4. Not enough support for Agility

5. Brownfield > Greenfield
picture credit: https://www.apstra.com/home/landscape-of-meadow-field-with-the-changing-environment-2/
Legacy, monolithic Microservices, sprawl

6. Reference Implementations
picture credit: https://www.marinersmuseum.org/

7. picture credit: http://unlocked.footlocker.com/
Underutilization of the Technology

8. Gap: architecture | development | deployment
picture credit: https://www.flickr.com/photos/28994379@N02/

9. picture credit: https://www.solarpowerworldonline.com/2017/07/georgia-contractor-sells-farmers-solar-tough-market/
Dependency management

10. picture credit: https://www.flickr.com/photos/tiocfaidh_ar_la_1916/
Architecture Patterns

11. Timeline

12. Background: Layered Architecture

13. picture credit: https://www.flickr.com/photos/23119666@N03/
A platform with an agile team
100 APIs, 60 message flows, 80 services, n DBs
Multi-tenanted, 3 active tenants
First release after 3 years

14. picture credit: https://www.flickr.com/photos/imcountingufoz/
Rise of Microservices

15. Pragmatic Microservices
Netflix: APIs
Uber: Edge Gateway
eBay: API Facade
Gartner: Mini Services

16. Background: Layered Architecture with MSA

19. Background: Segmented Architecture
BS-1 BS-2 BS-n
G-1 G-2
US-1 US-n

20. Platform of Platforms
Platform (shared capabilities)
Project1
Project2
Project3
Projectn
Platform (shared capabilities)
Project1
Project2
Project3
Projectn
Platform (shared capabilities)
Project1
Project2
Project3
Projectn
Platform (shared capabilities)
Project1
Project2
Project3
Projectn
CI/CD
User
Store

21. picture credit: https://www.flickr.com/photos/ableman/

22. Making of……
picture credit: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Frank_Schulenburg CC BY 3.0

23. picture credit: https://sportzwiki.com/football/sir-alex-ferguson-reveals-best-player-managed-man-united/

24. 2014
2018

26. Building the
Concept

27. Business vs technical services
picture credit: https://www.flickr.com/photos/arpadlukacs/

28. Service: Technical definition
A code exposes through an
interface that describes a
collection of operations that
are network accessible using
a standardized messaging
protocol.

29. Microservice: Technical definition
A microservice must have a
single purpose and be loosely
coupled in design and
deployed independently of
other microservices.
"Micro" is a concept of scope
rather than size.

30. Service: Business definition
Software components that
can be spontaneously
discovered, combined, and
recombined to provide a
solution to a business
problem.

31. Microservice: Business definition
Microservices is an approach to
application development in
which a large application is built
as a suite of modular
components or services.
These services are built around
business capabilities.

32. Group of (Micro)services

33. The cell is the basic structural,
functional, and
biological unit of all known
living organisms

34. Cell-based
Reference Architecture

35. Component: Atomic Units
A component represents a
process or business logic
running in a container,
serverless environment, or an
existing runtime. A component
is designed based on a specific
scope, which can be
independently run and reused
at the runtime.

36. Cell: Units of Enterprise Architecture
A cell is a collection of
components, grouped from
design and implementation
into deployment. A cell is
independently deployable,
manageable, and observable.

37. Cell:Component
1:M
1:1

38. Connected Cells
picture credit: https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/

39. Control Plane:
- Signaling of the network
- Makes decisions about the traffic flow
Data Plane:
- Forwards traffic between hops
- Takes data packets
picture credit: https://www.flickr.com/photos/teflon/

40. Inter and Intra Cell communication

41. Connected Cells
Cell gateway (ingress)
Sidecar (egress)
Adaptor (egress)
Ambassador (egress)

42. API-centric Architecture

43. Gateway Pattern
picture credit: https://www.flickr.com/photos/ell-r-brown/

44. Automated Governance (Re)-enables Flow
Policy Store
(Registry)
Observability
(Monitoring/
Analytics)
Policy
Enforcement
(GW)
Automated governance is made
of three things:
A source of truth:
Policy store/registry
Enforcement of the policy
Gateway or plugin attempting to keep
the desired state
Observability
How close to the desired state are we?

45. Security of Cells
picture credit: https://www.flickr.com/photos/laurelfan/ https://www.flickr.com/photos/sahdblunders/

46. Security of Cells

47. Developer Experience (DX)
of a Cell

48. Creating Cells
Brand new Cell
Existing (micro)services
Update an existing Cell
Create a new version

50. Lifecycle of a Cell

52. picture credit: https://www.flickr.com/photos/rincon_de_lula/

53. Structured Agility
Versioned Components
Versioned Cells
Dependency managed
Autowired
Reusable
Enhanced MSA & CNA

54. Cell-based Enterprise
Architecture

56. Reference Implementation L0

58. Reference Implementation L1

60. Cells and Podular Organizations

61. Measure the success
picture credit: https://www.marketingdonut.co.uk/direct-marketing/running-a-direct-mail-campaign/getting-the-measure-of-your-marketing

62. https://www.tasktop.com/blog/5-best-metrics-youve-never-met/
https://dzone.com/articles/reducing-mttr
Mean Time to Repair

63. Self-contained
Deployable as a unit
Independently elastic
Data plane and control plane
Summary: Cell-based Reference Architecture

64. picture credit: https://www.flickr.com/photos/josephmorris/
Just a (steady) start
https://github.com/wso2/reference-architecture

65. picture credit: https://www.flickr.com/photos/vasile23/
From Theory to Practice
https://github.com/wso2/reference-methodology

66. Transformation is a journey
without a destination. - Marilyn Ferguson
picture credit: https://www.flickr.com/photos/zoomzoom/

67. WSO2.COM
THANK YOU