Success Stories

DNR Wildlife Health

The DNR Wildlife Health system is a comprehensive web-based application designed to manage wildlife health cases, laboratory testing, animal tracking, and disease surveillance for the Department of Natural Resources (DNR). The system enables wildlife health professionals to document sick or deceased animal cases, track laboratory test results, manage banked biological samples, coordinate with interested parties, and monitor disease patterns across wildlife populations.

Business Value

• Centralized Case Management: Consolidates all wildlife health case data in a single system, eliminating fragmented spreadsheets and paper records
• Disease Surveillance: Enables early detection of disease outbreaks and trends through comprehensive data analysis and reporting
• Laboratory Coordination: Streamlines communication between field staff and laboratories, tracking samples from collection through final results
• Public Engagement: Provides a public portal for citizens to report sick animals, facilitating rapid response to potential disease events
• Regulatory Compliance: Maintains detailed records for regulatory reporting and scientific research requirements
• Improved Decision Making: Provides wildlife managers with timely, accurate data for population management decisions

CoE Use Case Overview

The DNR Wildlife Health system underwent a significant modernization initiative, marked by a complete architectural transformation during its migration from Azure DevOps (ADO) to GitHub Enterprise Cloud (GHEC). This transition was not merely a change in source control or CI/CD tooling—it represented a paradigm shift in how the system is designed, deployed, and maintained.

Previously, the system operated on a traditional on-premises, multi-tier architecture, which relied heavily on static infrastructure, manual deployments, and tightly coupled components. This model, while functional, posed challenges in scalability, maintainability, and compliance with modern security standards.

With the migration to GHEC, the system embraced a cloud-native, container-first architecture, leveraging modern DevSecOps practices and infrastructure-as-code principles. This transformation enabled:

• Microservices-based design for modularity and scalability
• Containerization for portability and consistency across environments
• Automated CI/CD pipelines for faster, more reliable deployments
• Improved observability and monitoring for proactive system health management

A critical enabler of this transformation was the adoption of paved paths within the Indiana Internal Development Platform (IDP). These paved paths are pre-approved, secure-by-default development and deployment patterns that align with state IT policies, including Executive Order 25-19 and NIST 800-53 Rev. 5 compliance.

By leveraging the IDP’s paved paths, the development team was able to:

• Accelerate development by using preconfigured environments and reusable components
• Ensure security and compliance through built-in controls, automated scans, and policy enforcement
• Reduce operational overhead by standardizing infrastructure and deployment practices
• Promote consistency across teams and projects, making onboarding and maintenance more efficient

The IDP also provided seamless integration with GHEC, enabling secure code management, automated testing, and deployment pipelines—all within a governed, enterprise-grade platform.

Detailed Legacy vs CoE Comparison

Backend Technology

Frontend Technology

Infrastructure & DevOps

Technical Features

Authentication & Authorization

Infrastructure Security

Architecture Scalability

Development Velocity

Cost Analysis - Development Costs

Cost Analysts - Operational Costs