Slides from BlueMix Meetup in Boston on 5/15/14.

1. Introduction To BlueMix
By: Ryan Baxter
@ryanjbaxter
http://ryanjbaxter.com

2. How Long Would It Take You To...
 Install runtime, container, and all libraries
 Install needed services (databases, messaging, mobile, etc)
 Bind the services to the application, handle IP/port assignments
 Setup dynamic routing and load-balancer
 Setup four layers of built-in High-Availability
 Setup streaming logging aggregation
 Setup application performance monitoring
 Scale the application up to X instances
 Then repeat for dev, test, and production
1

3. What Is BlueMix?
 A platform for running virtually any application in the cloud
without having to worry about the hardware, software, and
networking needed to do so.
 This definition is usually what we refer to as a platform-as-
a-service or PaaS
 BlueMix is similar to other platforms you may have heard
of
 Heroku, Google Cloud Environment, OpenShift, Pivotal One
2

4. How Everything Fits Together
 A PaaS is software that is
usually running on top of an
IaaS and abstracts the
complexities of the IaaS away
 BlueMix runs on top of Softlayer
 Your app runs on top of
BlueMix and has no knowledge
of the IaaS layer
3
IaaS (Softlayer)
PaaS (BlueMix)
Your App

5. Why Not Just Use IaaS?
 It might be just as easy to get started at the IaaS layer if
you use a prebuild image
 Over time though the maintenance of this image
increases the cost
 OS updates, security updates, new versions of libraries, DNS and
networking changes, configuration and maintenance of other
services like DBs, etc
 At the PaaS layer all of this cost disappears! The platform
takes care of it for you!
4

6. Benefits Of Using BlueMix
 Save time by just worrying about the code and not the
infrastructure
 Quickly get your app in the hands of your users –
deploying your app is a matter of running a single
command
 Easily add functionality to your application using IBM and
partner provided services
 Use the languages, runtimes, and frameworks that you
are most familiar with
 Softlayer – Global Data Centers
5

7. BlueMix Open Beta
 BlueMix is currently in open beta, you need to register to
get going
 During the beta you get 8GB of memory to use across as many
apps as you want and can provision up to 20 services
 Register at bluemix.net, you need an IBM ID
 After you have registered, you can begin deploying apps
using any number of tools
6

8. Cloud Foundry And BlueMix
 BlueMix is built upon an open
source project called Cloud Foundry
 IBM contributes to the project and is a
founding member of the Cloud Foundry
Foundation
 All tools, documentation, and
samples for Cloud Foundry are
relevant and can be used with
BlueMix
 Buildpacks, Services, CLI, Scaling,
etc are Cloud Foundry concepts
7

9. You Choose The Runtime!
8

10. Buildpack Anatomy
9
Runtime
Container Libraries
Application
Buildpack

11. BlueMix Services
 Services allow you to add
functionality to your application
with minimal cost and effort
 Select service and plan, then bind
to your application
 Once a service is bound to your
application information to use
the service is available in an
environment variable called
VCAP_SERVICES
10

12. Scaling
 BlueMix allows you to scale
your application horizontally
and vertically within minutes
 If the load on your application
increases/decreases you may
want to adjust the number of
instances to handle the load
 If you find the resources
available to your app is tight
you can increase the memory
11

13. Resources
 Documentation:
https://www.ng.bluemix.net/docs/index.jsp
 developerWorks: http://developer.ibm.com/bluemix
 Sample Apps & Tutorials:
https://www.ibmdw.net/bluemix/docs/articles/,
https://www.ibmdw.net/bluemix/docs/sample-code/
 Developer Forum:
https://www.ibmdw.net/answers/?community=bluemix
 Blog: https://www.ibmdw.net/bluemix/blog/
 Twitter: #BlueMix
12

14. Virtual Meetup
 Please encourage all partners and customers to attend
our Virtual Meetup on May 21st
 Technical meetup targeting developers looking to get
started building apps
 http://bit.ly/introbluemix
13

15. Thank you.
Join the beta at: www.bluemix.net