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Arrange access

Developers will need access to several resources and communication channels in order to be productive.

Access to some resources can take time to arrange, so it's important to start this process as soon as possible.

Azure AD administrative account

FCP environments are hosted on Azure. Access to the Azure Portal is restricted to those with an Azure AD administrative account.

These accounts follow the naming convention a-<initials>.<surname>@defra.onmicrosoft.com or <initials>.<surname>@defra.onmicrosoft.com.

The must be requested from ServiceNow under the catalogue item O365/AzureAD Platform Admin.

The comments should make clear that the request is for a a- Microsoft administrative account for Azure Portal.

Access to the Azure Portal

Once the account has been created, the user will be able to access the Azure Portal.

A request should be raised in ServiceNow for CCoE to provide access to the FCP Azure subscriptions.

FCP environments are split across three Azure tenants, Development, PreProduction and Production.

If a developer has Security Clearance, they can request access to the PreProduction and Production tenants. Otherwise they will only be able to access the Development tenant. The request should make clear which environments the developer requires access to.

Evidence of Security Clearance will be requested by CCoE prior to completing the request

OpenVPN

Access to cloud resources from devices is restricted to VPN access only and requires the installation of the OpenVPN client.

A request should be raised in ServiceNow for CCoE to provide access to OpenVPN and all FCP networks.

Access to Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS)

As AKS is the primary compute hosting platform for FCP, developers will need to be added to the appropriate Kubernetes Cluster role. This will allow access to Kubernetes using client tools such as kubectl or Lens.

As with the Azure Portal, developers can only be added to the PreProduction and Production clusters if they have Security Clearance.

A read only role, is all that is permitted for developers in PreProduction and Production.

A request should be raised in ServiceNow for CCoE to provide access to the FCP AKS clusters.

Jenkins

Jenkins is used for Continuous Integration pipelines in FCP. Developers will need a @dtz.local account to access Jenkins.

Jenkins is hosted on an Azure Virtual Machine and can be accessed on the Defra network or via OpenVPN.

A request should be raised in ServiceNow for CCoE to provide access to Jenkins.

Snyk

Snyk is used for security scanning of code dependencies.

An FCP organisation has been created in Snyk and developers will need to be added to it.

Contact one of Defra's Principal Developers to arrange access.

GitHub

FCP uses GitHub for source control within the Defra organisation.

As per GDS standards, code is open source by default.

Developers will need to be added to the FFC GitHub team.

Two Factor Authentication (2FA) and commit signing are mandatory for all GitHub accounts.

Contact one of Defra's Principal Developers to arrange access.

SonarCloud

SonarCloud is used for static code analysis during Continuous Integration pipelines in FCP.

FCP projects are hosted in the SonarCloud Defra organisation. Within the Defra organisation an FCP group has been created to manage access to all FCP projects.

In order to be added to the FCP group:

  1. Sign up to SonarCloud with your GitHub account
  2. Contact one of Defra's Principal Developers to be added to the FCP group

Azure DevOps (ADO)

Azure DevOps is used for Continuous Delivery pipelines in FCP. ADO is also used for work item tracking and Wiki creation.

Developers will need to be added to the DEFRA-FFC project.

A request should be raised in ServiceNow for CCoE to provide access to ADO.

Microsoft Teams

Microsoft Teams is the primary communication tool used across Defra.

Teams supports access from third party teams tenants to allow collaboration across corporate boundaries.

Developers should be added to the following Teams chat channels:

DEFRA FCP - Platform Support - Teams Chat

This chat is used for general support and collaboration across all services using the FCP Platform.

FCP Payments, Documents, Demo and Progressive Reductions releases

This chat is used to arrange and coordinate releases across the majority of FCP services. As other services onboard to the FCP Platform, they can also use this chat.

Contact one of Defra's Principal Developers to arrange access.

Slack

ffc-notifications.slack.com

Jenkins will publish alerts to Slack in the ffc-notifications.slack.com workspace. Developers will need to be added to the following channels:

#masterbuildfailures

Notifications of failures relating to main branches.

#generalbuildfailures

Notifications of failures relating to feature branches.

#secretdetection

Notifications of detected secrets found in public GitHub repositories for review.

Contact one of Defra's Principal Developers to arrange access.

defra-digital.slack.com

The wider Defra Digital Slack workspace is used for collaboration and support across all of Defra's digital services.

Whilst not essential to be part of this workspace, it may be beneficial for cross Defra collaboration.

Developers are recommended to join the following channel:

#development

This channel is used for general development discussion and support across all of Defra's digital services.

For FCP Platform or service specific support, the above Teams chats should be used instead.

Anyone with a defra.gov.uk or an ALB email address can join the Defra Digital Slack workspace automatically.

For those with other email addresses, a request should be raised in the #slack-support channel by someone with access.

SharePoint

SharePoint is Defra's primary document library.

An FCP SharePoint site has been created.

Not all developers will need access to SharePoint and it may not be possible for external suppliers to be provided with access.

Should access be required, it should be request to an FCP Programme Delivery Manager.

Confluence

Whilst ADO Wiki's are preferred, much historic content exists in Defra Confluence.

New licenses are often challenging to obtain, but should be requested through the defra-digital.slack.com Slack workspace in the #jira-support channel.