☁️Infrastructure Guidance

Cloud deployment options and infrastructure requirements for AskGov

This guide provides cloud-agnostic infrastructure guidance for deploying AskGov in production environments. We focus on AskGov-specific requirements rather than general cloud setup instructions.

For AWS users: See our detailed AWS Production Deployment guide for specific instructions.

Architecture Overview

High-Level Architecture

Component Requirements

Component	Purpose	AskGov-Specific Needs
Load Balancer	Traffic distribution, SSL termination	Session affinity not required (stateless)
App Servers	Remix application	Node.js 20+, horizontal scaling
Database	Primary data store	PostgreSQL 14+ or CockroachDB
Weaviate	Vector search for Q&A	Requires 4GB+ RAM for vectorization
Redis	Caching and rate limiting	Session storage, search results cache

Infrastructure Sizing

Deployment Guidance

Small deployments (< 100k citizens):

• Start with minimal resources

• Single instances may be sufficient initially

• Monitor and scale as usage grows

Medium deployments (100k - 1M citizens):

• Multiple app server instances for redundancy

• Consider database clustering

• Implement caching layer

Large deployments (> 1M citizens):

• Full high-availability setup

• Multiple instances of each component

• Consider geographic distribution

Key Principle: Start small and scale based on actual usage metrics rather than predictions. Most deployments can begin with modest resources and grow as needed.

Cloud Provider Quick Reference

Service Mapping

AskGov Component	AWS	Azure	GCP	On-Premise
App Servers	ECS Fargate / EC2	App Service / AKS	Cloud Run / GKE	Docker / VMs
Load Balancer	ALB	Application Gateway	Cloud Load Balancing	Nginx / HAProxy
Database	RDS PostgreSQL	Database for PostgreSQL	Cloud SQL	PostgreSQL / CockroachDB
Weaviate	EC2	VMs	Compute Engine	Docker / VMs
Redis	ElastiCache	Azure Cache	Memorystore	Redis
Storage	S3	Blob Storage	Cloud Storage	MinIO / NFS
Secrets	Secrets Manager	Key Vault	Secret Manager	Vault / Encrypted files

Key Considerations by Provider

AWS

• Use RDS for simpler setup, EC2 for CockroachDB

• Weaviate can be self-managed and host on AWS yourself, or can go for managed option

• Consider Fargate for serverless container management

Azure

• App Service provides easy PaaS deployment

• Weaviate needs VMs or AKS

• Consider Azure Database for PostgreSQL Flexible Server

GCP

• Cloud Run works well for containerized AskGov

• Weaviate requires Compute Engine

• Cloud SQL supports PostgreSQL with automatic backups

On-Premise

• Docker Compose for simple deployments

• Minimum 3 servers for high availability

• Consider OpenShift or Rancher for container orchestration

TODO: format with cards

Docker Deployment

Simple Docker Compose Setup

version: '3.8'

services:
  askgov:
    image: askgov:latest
    ports:
      - "8080:8080"
    environment:
      - NODE_ENV=production
      - DATABASE_URL=postgresql://root@cockroachdb:26257/askgov
      - REDIS_URL=redis://redis:6379
      - WEAVIATE_INSTANCE=http://weaviate:8080
    depends_on:
      - cockroachdb
      - redis
      - weaviate
    deploy:
      replicas: 3
      
  cockroachdb:
    image: cockroachdb/cockroach:latest
    command: start --insecure --store=node1
    volumes:
      - cockroach-data:/cockroach/cockroach-data
    ports:
      - "26257:26257"
      
  redis:
    image: redis:7-alpine
    volumes:
      - redis-data:/data
      
  weaviate:
    image: semitechnologies/weaviate:latest
    environment:
      - AUTHENTICATION_ANONYMOUS_ACCESS_ENABLED=true
      - PERSISTENCE_DATA_PATH=/var/lib/weaviate
    volumes:
      - weaviate-data:/var/lib/weaviate

volumes:
  cockroach-data:
  redis-data:
  weaviate-data:

Network Architecture

Security Zones

Essential Firewall Rules

TODO: maybe not needed, can remove

Source	Destination	Port	Purpose
Internet	Load Balancer	443	HTTPS access
Load Balancer	App Servers	8080	Application
App Servers	Database	5432/26257	PostgreSQL/CockroachDB
App Servers	Redis	6379	Cache
App Servers	Weaviate	8080	Search

High Availability Essentials

Minimum HA Setup

• Application: At least 2 instances across availability zones

• Database: 3-node cluster (odd number for quorum)

• Redis: Primary with at least one replica

• Weaviate: Can start with single instance, scale as needed

Database HA Options

PostgreSQL with Streaming Replication

• Primary + 2 standby servers

• Automatic failover with Patroni or similar

• Point-in-time recovery capability

CockroachDB (Recommended for HA)

• Built-in distributed architecture

• Automatic failover and rebalancing

• No SPOF

Monitoring Essentials

Key Metrics for AskGov

Metric	Why It Matters	Alert Threshold Examples
Question Creation Rate	User engagement	Sudden drops
Search Response Time	User experience	> 1 second
Answer Feedback Ratio	Content quality	< 60% positive
Database Connection Pool	Performance bottleneck	> 80% utilized
Weaviate Query Time	Search performance	> 500ms p95
Redis Hit Rate	Cache effectiveness	< 80%

Recommended Monitoring Stack

• Metrics: Prometheus + Grafana (or cloud provider equivalents)

• Logs: ELK Stack or cloud logging services

• APM: Datadog, New Relic, or open-source alternatives

• Uptime: External monitoring service

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Next Steps

• For AWS deployment: See AWS Production Guide

• For customization: Check Component Customization

• For security: Review Security Guide