AWS Partner Network (APN) Blog
Using Miro to enable collaborative DevOps on AWS
By Martin Drewes, Partner Solutions Architect, EMEA ISVs – AWS
By Margot Mazur, Head of Partner Marketing – Miro
By Steve Miller, Head of Partnerships – Miro
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Large and small enterprises using Amazon Web Services can use Miro to enable collaborative DevOps on AWS. Companies are interested in improving operational efficiency through collaboration with their internal teams and external clients, yet 31% of business leaders say legacy tech is getting in the way of innovation at their company. Miro supports collaboration on AWS workflows like well-architected reviews, architecture visualization, and infrastructure cost optimization through AWS-specific resources and integration.
Miro is an online workspace for innovation, available on the AWS Marketplace , which enables distributed teams of any size to collaborate on AWS workflows. Miro includes a full suite of capabilities, including diagramming, wireframing, real-time data visualization, workshop facilitation, and built-in support for agile practices, workshops, and interactive presentations. Miro enables organizations to reduce the number of standalone tools, reducing information fragmentation and cost. Miro is an AWS Software Partner, and has achieved the AWS Well-Architected Partner Program differentiation.
Collaborative DevOps is an approach that brings together the best of AWS and Miro’s visual workspace for innovation, enabling seamless communication, faster iteration, and tighter collaboration within product development teams. DevOps teams use a significant number of different tools to monitor and optimize architecture, which may hinder efficiency and effective collaboration. Miro gives teams a single way to visualize cloud architectures, get alignment from cross-functional teams and make cost optimization decisions, together.
Use Cases
In the following sections, we will explore how Miro can revolutionize the way AWS customers and partners approach cloud projects. By leveraging advanced visualization and collaboration capabilities, organizations can streamline critical workflows across the cloud lifecycle – from initial architecture design to ongoing cost optimization and Well-Architected reviews; enabling teams to accelerate innovation by fostering seamless cross-functional collaboration within a unified digital workspace. Ultimately, this collaborative approach to cloud development empowers AWS users to drive business value faster while maintaining architectural excellence. Let’s examine how these solutions can transform key use cases and unlock new possibilities for cloud-driven innovation.
Architecture Visualization
Miro allows for intuitive advanced technical diagramming, including AWS architecture diagrams. Miro’s Business & Enterprise plans include AWS shape packs with the current versions of AWS service icons. Users can map out their infrastructure from scratch, or leverage the Miroverse to find hundreds of ready-made diagramming templates, including AWS-specific diagrams. Shapes are broken down by group, as shown in figure 1, and relevant shapes and templates can be discovered through keyword searches. Teams collaborate on architecture visualization by adding notes and comments to enrich their diagrams, adding links to other resources, and having sessions where multiple attendees make changes to the architecture diagram. This means that all team members always have access to the most up to date diagram.
Figure 1 – Using the AWS Shape Library for creating AWS architecture diagrams
Cost Estimation
A further common use case is to estimate the cost of a cloud architecture. AWS makes available the AWS Pricing Calculator to assist with this, a web-based tool in which the cost of using resources is estimated based on their quantities and dimensions, which are input through a form.
Estimating architecture costs is easier with an architecture diagram directly on a Miro board. Miro’s AWS Cost Calculator App can be used to directly submit the resources described in the architecture diagram to the calculator. You no longer need to enter resources and their configurations into the calculator, saving time and allowing for faster experimentation cycles. For example, different architectural approaches can be tried and evaluated for cost end efficiency, and rapidly iterated in a collaborative team session. The cost of resources highlighted in the diagram can aggregated per hour, month or year after setting details like instance type that affect the price, as shown in figure 2.
Figure 2 – AWS Cost Calculator in Miro allows the cost of the components of the architecture diagram
Well-Architected Review Remediation
The AWS Well-Architected Framework helps cloud architects build secure, high-performing, resilient, and efficient infrastructure for a variety of applications and workloads. Built around six pillars—operational excellence, security, reliability, performance efficiency, cost optimization, and sustainability—the AWS Well-Architected Framework provides a consistent approach for customers and partners to evaluate architectures and implement scalable designs.
The AWS Well-Architected Tool is designed to help you review the state of your applications and workloads against the Well-Architected Framework, identify opportunities for improvement, and track progress over time. One of the outcomes of the review is a list of potential risks found in your workloads, with associated guidance for addressing these issues.
The Miro AWS Well-Architected Tool Integration allows teams to more easily import the items identified for remediation from the AWS Console into a Miro board. These risks are then available as resources for collaborative working, and can be tracked like any other tasks in Miro, or automatically transformed into tasks in a dedicated tool linked to Miro. The Well-Architected Framework Template on Miroverse allows you to seamlessly run reviews with clients or internal teams, to collaborate on required architecture changes and project manage risk mitigation.
Below figure shows an example of a remediation associated with the item COST1 of the SaaS Lens in the Well-Architected Framework. On the right part of the screen are tasks imported from the Well-Architected remediations as items on the board. On the left is one of the tasks, with further task-related insights from the AWS console added.
Figure 3 – Example of a remediation task imported into Miro from the Well-Architected Tool (example is SaaS Lens item COST1)
In a collaborative environment, Miro can be leveraged for instant project management as you can drag and drop these tasks into a Kanban board. Miro empowers you to assign tasks to DevOps team members efficiently, foster interactive discussions through annotations and comments, create connections between related tasks, and enrich tasks with visuals and supporting documents. With Miro, you can seamlessly monitor and guide each task’s journey to successful completion. Besides built-in task management support, Miro also offers bi-directional integrations to leading issue-tracking tools to help align teams and move projects along faster, as well as integrations with diagramming tools like Draw.io, PlantUML, Mermaid, and others.
With Miro’s AWS Well-Architected Tool, any distributed DevOps team can collaborate on discussing and implementing recommendations to align their AWS workload with best practices.
Conclusion
Miro is a visual workspace that enables infrastructure, cloud engineering, and architecture teams to stay aligned, make well-informed decisions, and mitigate security and compliance risks, with support for enterprise features like single-sign on and integration into AWS AppFabric. The platform’s infinite canvas enables teams to lead engaging workshops and meetings, design products, brainstorm ideas, and more. Miro is available on AWS Marketplace as a SaaS solution.
Embrace collaborative DevOps with Miro and AWS. Try out the integration features that are covered in this blog post and get your teams collaborating seamlessly.
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Miro – AWS Partner Spotlight
Miro is an AWS Partner is the innovation workspace that empowers AWS cloud architects, DevOps teams, and cloud consultants to accelerate cloud transformations from discovery to delivery, with built-in AI tools for architecture design, agile product development, and client engagement.