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If you’re looking to implement Terraform, are you aware that Terraform alone isn’t going to cut it? Sure, it’s a great tool, but have you thought about how it integrates with your IT landscape? And about retraining your operational engineers? To help you, we present 5 building blocks to really

future-proof your infrastructure with a successful implementation of Terraform.

We’ve tried it all before, haven’t we: in order to reduce complexity, we introduce another piece of technology and think we’ve found the holy grail. Only to discover a few months later that the technology in itself is just another piece of equipment. You’re not going to repair any leaks just by having a wrench in your shed. But, it is

a great tool if you know what you’re trying to achieve and

if you know how to use it effectively.

The same’s true for HashiCorp’s Terraform. IT Is a great piece of equipment for managing your infrastructure, lean and mean. Nevertheless, if you just buy the tool, but have no clue how it best serves your business, you’ll be wasting your money. Which of course, is a shame, because the opportunities Terraform offers are a game-changer for any company wanting to safely provision, and easily manage and scale a multi-cloud infrastructure using only code.

But not to worry, we’ve got you covered. We offer you the five building blocks for successful implementation and use of any Terraform roll-out:

1. Coding your infrastructure with Terraform

It’s a bit of an open door of course, but in order to work with Terraform, you’ll need to learn how

to work with it. Obviously, you could experiment yourself, it’s that easy; but if you want someone to show you the ropes, you can always follow our training. We’ll teach you how to build, change, and destroy infrastructure. But you won’t just learn how to work with the easy, human-readable configuration language, because the training will cover the following aspects.

2. The role of testing in successful infrastructure as code

Thinking about testing before

you embark on your infrastructure as code journey is important for two distinct reasons. First: Your developers have a clear idea about the goals you want to achieve and the requirements the infrastructure needs to meet. They’ll be checking their way through their work and that’ll be very satisfying. Second: you’ll make sure the written code actually does what it should do, and

you’re ensuring that connected, previously written code isn’t negatively impacted.

3. Knowing what you did and when with GIT version control

It’s not only testing that ensures that your infrastructure as code works, we encourage you to use GIT for version control as well. GIT enables you to track the changes you’ve made to your code. This is essential if you want to know exactly what you have changed over time. Reverting to specific versions is also possible with GIT. When you’re working as a team on the code, GIT can combine changes made by multiple people, merging them into one version. In other words: GIT helps you keep control over your infrastructure as code.

4. How does Terraform land in your ecosystem?

Terraform is never a standalone product but is often integrated with other on-prem and cloud technologies. Therefore, before you deploy Terraform, you need to know its dependencies and how well it all works together. Plus: have you considered the open source nature of Terraform and your journey to the cloud? Terraform is not only a fine tool for managing your single-cloud infrastructure, but it’s ideal for managing all your clouds. You’ll be able to match different workloads with different clouds, making it possible to build a vendor-independent infrastructure, ensuring that your company is agile, flexible and scalable.

5. Building a developers’ culture

Last, but certainly not least: when you’re adopting infrastructure as code and terraform, you have to think about retraining your operational engineers and

building a culture in which thinking in code is encouraged. For example: a machine is not a pet, but more like a herd of cattle. This means that you don’t manually manage each machine, but use code to manage all

your Machines. Future-proof your company by thinking like a developer, solving issues with code, and scaling up as you grow.

How we can help

These 5 building blocks will help you successfully implement Terraform and use it to achieve your goals. As we’ve said, our Terraform training will not only help you understand its syntax, it will help you with all the other steps as well: start with testing, learn how to use GIT, let it land in your ecosystem and build a developers’ culture. Are you ready to take the next step towards a future-proof infrastructure?

Sign up for the training!

Free Software and Open Source never was “just a technology thing”, it’s a cultural shift; that’s why the movement also has a role model function

When I first got exposed to F/OSS, the world was mostly powered by proprietary software and I didn’t have access to the ‘source’ of the technology that powered my computer. I had no clue how a compiler worked, how a kernel was created or how a photo got rendered onto my screen. Then my good friend Lukas showed up with a bunch of SUSE Linux CDs, and the journey down the rabbit hole began. Countless nights of experimenting, reading manuals, building ‘Linux from Scratch’ and posting on Usenet evolved into being part of one of the leading F/OSS services providers in Switzerland.

Attending conferences, meetups, events, trainings, being involved in non-profit organizations like CH Open, TDF as well as working on a small Linux distribution have all been very rewarding experiences. I made countless friends from all over the world, who showed me new tricks and opened my horizon to new ideas. Through conversations, I also learned to see the world through their eyes. It became clear to me, that F/OSS is not just a technology thing: the movement is about bringing people together, removing barriers and making IT more useful for society.

At Adfinis we try to create an environment where people interested in working on F/OSS find a place where inclusion is one of the main pillars. No matter your gender, age, cultural background, sexual-orientation, political or religious orientation: we welcome you at Adfinis!

Inclusiveness is common sense, and we believe it should be something every organization should not only strive for, but actually fight for. There is no place for toxicity, mobbing and exclusion.

Whilst we are not involved in the current FSF discussions, we urge the board of FSF to find a solution to the severe impact their actions have had on the global free software and open source community.

With Leadership comes responsibility. If leaders do not fully embrace inclusion, they damage their cause and weaken their organization. We therefore ask FSF to take a clear stand on being an inclusive and friendly organization and to live up to its own role model function.

Written by Nicolas Christener, CEO & CTO at Adfinis

It’s with great pleasure that the jury can announce the winners of the LibreOffice Template Contest 2020.

We got over 30 different template submissions and it wasn’t an easy task to narrow the list down to six winners. Thanks to the diverse jury team consisting out of a total of nine people from the community (5), the Document Foundation (2) and Adfinis (2) we came up with a balanced view regarding the three major evaluation criteria (creativity, usefulness and technical expertise) and are happy to announce the winners of this year’s contest!

• Ahmad Bayhaqi, “Line Impression” template for Impress
• David W. Snow, “DWS Novel” template for Writer
• Hervy Qurrotul Ainur Rozi, “ZamZam” template for Impress
• Benjamin Peng, “Minimalist Resume” template for Writer
• Ermind Alita, “Bumi Samudra” template for Impress
• Sven Hielscher, “Style / Feature Preview and Boilerplate” template for Writer

Congratulations to the winners!

Thanks again to everybody who contributed in this contest, we will raffle hoodies, shirts and backpacks among all participants!

We’re still checking with the awesome people from the Document Foundation how and if we can make the templates available to a broad audience. In order to get any template into the upstream LibreOffice installation package, a lot of work needs to be done (especially in terms of internationalization) – one other possibility is to use the LibreOffice Extension functionality and thanks to Heiko Tietze all the sumissions are now available through the extension directory (see at the bottom for the complete list).

Furthermore, we also discussed to blog a bit more about what users should consider regarding templates (e.g. don’t use direct formatting and instead use styles, or work with master slides, etc.). If you’d like to step in and help us with that: feel free to contact me directly.

Thanks again to all the awesome people who made this possible! I hope we can organize a follow-up contest later on this year and will communicate it on the usual channels.

The Adfinis team wishes the whole LibreOffice community all the best and says “THANK YOU!” for making this such a wonderful F/OSS project!

The sumitted templates (winner first, then no particular order):

• [winner] Ahmad Bayhaqi, “Line Impression” template for Impress
• [winner] David W. Snow, “DWS Novel” template for Writer
• [winner] Hervy Qurrotul Ainur Rozi, “ZamZam” template for Impress
• [winner] Benjamin Peng, “Minimalist Resume” template for Writer
• [winner] Ermind Alita, “Bumi Samudra” template for Impress
• [winner] Sven Hielscher, “Style / Feature Preview and Boilerplate” template for Writer
• Peter Grilj, “Vaux” template for Impress
• Mohammed Altaher Bettayeb, “Tiles” template for Impress
• David W. Snow, “DWS Technical Book” template for Writer
• Kálmán Szalai, “Speed Advantage Blue” template for Writer
• Mohammed Altaher Bettayeb, “Safari” template for Impress
• Peter Grilj, “Conference White Paper” template for Writer
• Jun Nogata, “Project Green” template for Impress
• Luís Monteiro, “Weekly Meal Plan” template for Writer
• Daniel Maluszczak, “Sunny GradientTemplate” template for Impress
• Ilija Culap, “Simple Blue” template for Writer
• Utku Berberoğlu, “Signs” template for Impress
• Kálmán Szalai, “Retro 64” template for Writer
• Miha Kočar, “Love OpenSource” template for Impress
• Kálmán Szalai, “Clear Advantage Blue” template for Writer
• Peter Grilj, “Business Modell Canvas” template for Calc
• Jun Nogata, “Marketing Blue” template for Impress
• Rainiero Herrera Guzmán, “Dinamic Format Tables” template for Calc
• Mohammed Altaher Bettayeb, “About Me” template for Impress
• Kálmán Szalai, “Greenfield Documentation” template for Writer
• Benjamin Peng, “Basic Syllabus” template for Impress
• Mohammed Altaher Bettayeb, “We Care” template for Impress
• Kálmán Szalai, “Well Documented Grey” template for Writer
• Andreas Kainz, “Simple” template for Writer
• Brice Hardy, “CV” template for Writer
• Ilija Culap, “Orange Ribbon” template for Writer

Note: many templates need additional fonts to shine and look how the designer intended; the fonts are F/OSS and can be found on the usual place (GitHub, Sourceforge, Google Fonts, etc.) or using your prefered search engine. As most fonts are quite big nowadays (some are >1GB) we didn’t bundle them with the documents.

We kindly ask all contributors to register on the extension platform and ask the admin to take over the maintainership of his/her extension.

Getreu dem Motto: “Branding erfordert Hingabe; Hingabe, sich stetig neu zu erfinden” haben wir uns entschlossen, im Rahmen unseres Rebrandings auch unsere Vision und Mission aufzufrischen. Für einmal bedeutete CI/CD also nicht Continuous Integration und Continuous Delivery, sondern Corporate Identity und Corporate Design. Was hat sich bei der Adfinis  in diesen Gefilden in letzter Zeit getan?

So viel Vorweg: Wir sind immer noch voll und ganz Open Source verschrieben und kämpfen eifrig  dafür, den Vendor Lock-In proprietärer Lösungen zu reduzieren.

Corporate Design

Wie schon 2020 kommuniziert, wurde aus der Adfinis SyGroup, neu die Adfinis. So neu ist dieser Name jedoch gar nicht, denn vor der Fusion (2012) gab es sowohl die Adfinis, wie auch die SyGroup. Wieso also wieder “Adfinis”? Ganz einfach: Ein Grossteil unserer Kunden und Partner nannten uns bereits einfach “Adfinis” und zudem erschien uns ein kürzerer Name schlicht handlicher.

Komplett neu ist aber unser Logo, mit dem wir unsere Identität auch visuell ausdrücken und transportieren. Auf den ersten Blick vermag es nur ein “A” für Adfinis zu sein, auf den zweiten oder dritten Blick  lässt sich aber erkennen, dass sich hinter der einfachen Struktur weit mehr Tiefgang verbirgt. Zum einen lässt sich ein offenes Schloss erkennen,  welches  das Aufschliessen des Vendor Lock-Ins symbolisiert und  so die Entfaltung des Potentials unserer Kunden in den Mittelpunkt rückt. Zum anderen verbirgt sich darin  auch Tux, das Maskottchen von Linux, womit wir auch unser Fundament: Linux und Open Source als wichtigen Baustein unserer Identität widerspiegeln.

Corporate Identity

Auch wenn das neue Design viele unserer Werte impliziert, haben wir mit der neuen Vision und Mission, sowie mit dem neuen Claim unsere Corporate Identity etwas geschärft.

As a company, we shape a world of innovative, sustainable and resilient IT solutions built on trustworthy open source technology to unlock the full potential of our customers.

Mit unserer Vision beschreiben wir unser hochgestecktes Ziel; dort wollen wir hin und dafür setzen wir uns täglich ein. Mit dem Einsatz quelloffener und vertrauenswürdiger Technologien erbauen wir eine Welt, von innovativen, nachhaltigen und resilienten IT-Lösungen mit denen unseren Kunden ihr Potential voll ausschöpfen können. Im Mittelpunkt stehen dabei unsere Kunden und das Wissen, dass wir mit Open Source nicht nur zu ihrem Erfolg beitragen, sondern durch unsere Contributions auch die IT-Welt als solche zu etwas Besserem mitgestalten. Cool, oder?

Our mission is to foster Open Source technology, deliver high-quality work, and run mission-critical systems around the clock so our customers can focus on their core business. By working with us, customers are liberated from vendor lock-in and are one step ahead of their competition.

Mit der Mission beschreiben wir unser tägliches Tun. Daran halten wir uns fest, wenn wir kurz die Orientierung verlieren. Höchster Qualitätsanspruch und 24/7 Support zeichnet uns aus, denn nur so können wir versichern, dass unsere Kunden sich auf ihr Kerngeschäft konzentrieren können. Zudem befreien wir sie von Vendor Lock-In und unterstützen sie dabei, ihrer Konkurrenz einen Schritt voraus zu sein – sei es mit Cloud Native Technologien, klassischen IT Lösungen oder durch von uns entwickelter Software.

Kurz also – At Adfinis we:

plan innovatively. build sustainably. run resiliently.

Claim:

Potential. Unlocked.

Wir nehmen unsere Kunden mit auf eine Reise, welche wir mit innovativen Lösungsansätzen planen und so umsetzen, dass sie langfristig und nachhaltig beständig sind. Zu guter Letzt begleiten wir unsere Kunden aber auch noch lange nach der Umsetzung, damit sie für alle zukünftigen Herausforderung mit einer robusten Lösung gewappnet sind. Wir helfen unseren Kunden ihr volles Potential zu entfalten – ihr Potential zu “öffnen”. Metaphorisch – indem wir proprietäre Lösungen mit quelloffenen und nachhaltigen Open Source Lösungen ersetzen. Aber auch wortwörtlich – in dem wir unseren Kunden den ganzen IT-Bereich abnehmen und sie sich wieder auf ihr Kerngeschäft konzentrieren können.

Wenn du noch mehr zu unserem Rebranding, zu unserer Vision, Mission und unserem Claim erfahren willst, dann schau auf unserer Webseite vorbei und folge uns auf Twitter und LinkedIn.