The Application Rationalization Dashboard is a new tool that Google is providing today that will assist you in making well-informed decisions regarding your application modernization journey.
An insight-gathering tool that analyzes your application portfolio is the Application Rationalization Dashboard. You can use it to determine which applications are most appropriate for modernization and cloud migration.
Utilizing information from CAST Highlight, the dashboard assesses your cloud maturity, finds any cloud blockages, remediation activities, software composition and health, and open-source risks by analyzing your code across tens or hundreds of apps. Using that data, the Dashboard automatically suggests segmenting the whole portfolio according to the application’s compute footprint and preparedness for cloud transition, providing planning and prioritizing for modernization projects.
After that, the Dashboard combines this data with information from the Google Cloud Migration Center to offer additional insights into the expenses associated with your application architecture. You can view the overall footprint of your apps with the aid of the Dashboard, which integrates both data sources and offers a range of visualizations. This section shows you which applications are the most likely to fail, which are the most complex, and which offer the greatest potential to save money.
Next steps are also suggested by the Dashboard. For instance, it can advise updating an application prior to cloud migration, or it might advise using the lift-and-shift technique to migrate an application in order to circumvent cloud blocks like hard-coded IP addresses that are concealed in your source code.
To sum up, the Application Rationalization Dashboard is a useful resource for any business thinking about modernizing or migrating to the cloud. You may use it to quickly and intelligently make decisions that will save you money, time, and resources.
How to Utilize the Rationalization Application Dashboard
If you have already registered with Google Cloud Migration Center and have used Migration Center Discovery Client to import your asset data, you can access the Application Rationalization Dashboard. It is also accessible to customers of Migration Center file import who have previously used CAST Highlight, which is offered here on the Google Cloud Marketplace, to analyze their application portfolio. An open source command line tool called Mconnect is responsible for handling the information export from Google Cloud Migration Center to Big Query.
Mconnect
Setting up the tool
Rationalization Application Dashboard makes use of Mconnect, a command-line tool for data export. The following actions must be taken before using MConnect:
Get the most recent binaries if you run Linux. Clone the migrationcenter-utils repository and use your local workstation to create MConnect for different OS platforms.
Establish a Google Cloud CLI login:
gcloud init
gcloud auth application-default login
Verify that the account you are using has the appropriate rights to add and remove groups in Migration Center and to add and remove BigQuery tables in the project you wish to utilize.
Transfer the files to the Migration Center
Transfer the application-related assets listed in your CAST report to Migration Center. This step can be skipped if you have already inventoried your infrastructure.
Form groups inside the Migration Center
In Migration Center, establish groups using the apps that were mentioned in your CAST report. Enter the following command into your local machine:
mconnect create-groups –path=ANALYSIS_PATH –project=PROJECT_ID –region=REGION
Once the groups are formed, you can filter the Migration Center groups view by using the label mconnect:mcoonnect to view the generated groups.
Give organizations access to resources
Assign your assets in Migration Center to the appropriate application groups. The Migration Center UI allows you to accomplish this.
Export data from the Migration Center and the CAST report to BigQuery
Export information to BigQuery from your CAST report:
mconnect export –path=ANALYSIS_PATH –project=PROJECT_ID –region=REGION
The following functions are executed by the command:
- It creates the mcCast database, a brand-new BigQuery database.
- The CAST report data is added to a new table named castResults that BigQuery builds.
- It creates three tables named assets, groups, and preference_sets before exporting your Migration Center data to BigQuery.
Create views in BigQuery
Make the matching views using the data you uploaded to BigQuery:
mconnect create-views –project=PROJECT_ID –dataset=mcCast
The command creates three views:
migrationcenterinfra_vwcastreadiness_vwmccastreadinesscombined_vw
The output of this command provides a link to a Looker Studio report using the mccastreadinesscombined_vw view.
Assemble the report from Looker Studio
The resulting Looker Studio report can be configured in two different ways, which are covered in the following sections.
By using the supplied link
Open your web browser and copy the link you got in the previous step.
Next, select Acknowledge and save after clicking Save and Share.
You can use the new dashboard as soon as the Looker Studio setup is complete. Many visualizations in the Looker Studio report make it simple to see the larger picture. You can discover which apps offer the greatest potential for cost savings, which are the most complex, and which have the biggest failure risk.
For any firm thinking about modernizing its applications or moving to the cloud, the Application Rationalization Dashboard is an invaluable resource. Making well-informed decisions can help you avoid wasting time, money, or resources.
