by Cody Stevens | Oct 18, 2018
Background:
CMS is a large Federal Agency dedicated to payment processing for Medicare and Medicaid patients. Their initiative, the Social Security Number Removal Initiative (SSNRI) renamed to the New Medicare Card, is an initiative aimed at removing Social Security Numbers from public forms and information that a beneficiary will need to provide when either registering or updating information with CMS.
The Challenge:
There are multiple policies, procedures, and discussions that were in development for implementing the New Medicare Card initiative. These included both technical discussions, as well as the tracking and managing of form reviews and SSN removals. A tool which provided these centralized capabilities was required in order to properly track and manage the development and implementation of these policies.
The Solution:
Ascend Integrated, working with Platinum Business Solutions implemented a Jira Software and Confluence instance, installing and configuring Ubuntu 16.04 AWS EC2 instances with PostgreSQL 9.6, Jira Software and Confluence. SSL certificates were installed, set up and configured on the servers to allow for secure traffic across the Jira instance. Licenses were purchased, updated, and the application was ready for use for the CMS personnel.
Outcome:
The Jira and Confluence instances are still in use today by CMS for tracking and managing policies, procedures, and technical implementations. Ascend Integrated continues to support the application, providing updates and design configurations for CMS.
by Mike Brown | Oct 15, 2018
Background:
AGIA Affinity is a technologically advanced, multi-faceted, full-service broker, marketer, and administrator managing insurance and non-insurance benefit programs for over 100 affinity groups representing over 30,000,000 members.
The Challenge:
AGIA’s fast-growing organization quickly outpaced the IT tools it was using for tracking and managing both projects and help desk tickets. Currently using a legacy mainframe-based application and an open source tool, MANTIS for tracking and managing project management tasks and help desk tickets.
The Solution:
AGIA engaged with RightStar, a large Atlassian Solutions Provider and Ascend Integrated to migrate the MANTIS and legacy tickets to a new application, JIRA Service Desk, JIRA Software, and Confluence. Ascend worked with AGIA in mapping out their current processes, implementing process improvements, and migrating configurations/tickets from Mantis to JIRA. Ascend also provided infrastructure support, installing, configuring, and developing/updating the JIRA and Confluence applications.
Outcome:
Ascend Integrated continues to support and maintain the AGIA Atlassian Tool Suite, including providing support for JIRA Software, JIRA Service Desk, and Confluence. Ascend is continuing to work with AGIA to define new project management processes and begin implementing ITIL v3 compliance across the enterprise.
by Mike Brown | Oct 15, 2018
Background:
KanTime Healthcare Software is software provided to help hospitals track and manage aspects of their business, including billing processing for Medicare, hospices, and pediatric software. They provide extensive training services to their clients.
The Challenge:
The training software that was used by KanTime needed to be updated due to the continued growth of the firm. The training application was required to have an FAQ/documentation, along with training videos embedded, quiz application, and training modules.
The Solution:
Ascend Integrated engaged with KanTime to develop a training solution based on the Confluence application. Implementing Confluence server with optimized performance capabilities, Ascend Integrated built out and deployed a secure training platform using multiple apps/add-ons for Confluence enabling training functionalities and quiz capabilities. Single Sign On (SSO) was enabled using OKTA configurations.
Outcome:
The training application implemented in the Confluence instance, increasing the number of clients successfully trained and engaged with their tools. Ascend Integrated continues to provide support to KanTime’s Confluence instance.
by Mike Brown | Oct 15, 2018
Background:
National Life Group is a diversified family of financial services companies offering life insurance, annuity, and investment products. They work with clients providing financial market support, advising services, and insurance.
The Challenge:
National Life Group looking to optimize its IT infrastructure, wanted to migrate their applications currently hosted on their local instances to the Microsoft Azure cloud. This included Jira and Confluence, tools they are utilizing across multiple teams for tracking and managing project tasks and documentation.
The Solution:
Ascend Integrated was brought in to work with the IT directors at National Life Group to install Jira and Confluence in the Azure cloud instance, and successfully migrate both the data and attachments/files from the server instance hosted locally at National to the Cloud. This included setting up and documenting a migration process, performing the migration and testing it, and then coordinating and planning for a live production migration.
Outcome:
The migration was successful, with the local servers shut down and Azure currently powering the Jira and Confluence instances. Ascend also set up a separate DEV instance to test SEC compliance, and continues to support National Life Group for all Atlassian Tool configurations and updates.
by Mike Brown | Oct 15, 2018
Background:
Appalachian State University is located in Boone, NC. With 18,811 students and an endowment of approximately $94.6M, it is one of the largest colleges in the state of North Carolina. They use a combination of multiple tools and processes to provide IT services and support to students and faculty/staff.
The Challenge:
Appalachian State University was using multiple disparate systems for help desk ticketing, CMDB, and development task tracking and management. Appalachian State wanted to consolidate these systems into one Atlassian Tool Suite (Jira Software, Service Desk, Core, Confluence, and Bitbucket) and also receive enterprise-wide training services.
The Solution:
Appalachian State contracted with Ascend Integrated to provide process and tool guidance and support, process support, and training services. Using their expertise in implementing tools and processes across large organizations, Ascend Integrated provided coaching and guidance for ITIL v3 services and best practices, Agile (Scrum + Kanban) guidance, and Atlassian Tool Suite Data Center support for Jira Software, Service Desk, Confluence, and Bitbucket.
Ascend Integrated also worked to develop and implement Shibboleth SSO integration using the Atlassian Data Center. Ascend provided training to large audiences (over 20 attendees) for advanced JIRA and Confluence functions as Atlassian Training Partners.
Outcome:
With Ascend Integrated’s expertise, Appalachian State is successfully utilizing Jira, Confluence, and Bitbucket Data Center to support thousands of students and faculty members. The new implementation has made it easy for students to log tickets/issues and requests through a simple, refined portal. All faculty members were successfully trained on the use and functionalities of the Atlassian Tool Suite. Ascend continues to support the Appalachian State team following the implementation.
