Platform Evolution
Assessment run-2026-07-27-1 · 213 of 213 repos assessed
Repos / travelcounsellors-net

travelcounsellors-net

Legacy ASP.NET Web Forms public website (travelcounsellors.net) hosting TC Score (NPS) collection, testimonials, e-cards/e-shots, recruitment, KPI and other customer-facing microsites.

56 · amberhighloosely attachedOn-premZDD: a long roadweb-ui

Health score

56

0 to 100 across seven weighted factors; nothing is hidden. Green is 75 and above, amber 50 to 74, red below 50. How scoring works.


Runtime currency / 25
0
.NET Framework, out of mainstream support
Legacy transport / 15
15
No legacy WCF or SOAP surface
Test posture / 15
0
No tests
Security hygiene / 15
15
No credentials found in source
Dangerous coupling / 15
11
depends on pinning component(s): application-framework
Activity / 10
10
Actively maintained
Deployment hygiene / 5
5
CI in place
Health over time
2026-07-24 (run-2026-07-24-1): 562026-07-27 (run-2026-07-27-1): 56
No change since 2026-07-24 (56 to 56).

Facts

Languagescsharp, vbnet
FrameworksASP.NET Web Forms
Runtimes.NET Framework 4.6.2
Tests / CInone / CI in place
Last commit2026-07-07
OwnerOwner unknown (mapping to be curated)
DomainPublic web (system generated; curate in repo-owners.json to override)
Product areaShared platform
HostedOn-prem Deployed to our own machines
  • Release "travelcounsellors-net": Development: deployment-group phase (agents on our own machines)
  • Release "travelcounsellors-net": UKMANWWW6: deployment-group phase (agents on our own machines)
  • Release "travelcounsellors-net": UKMANWWW7: deployment-group phase (agents on our own machines)
Releases1 release pipeline(s): travelcounsellors-net
Integrationrest, graphql, soap, smtp, sqlserver
SourceOpen in Azure DevOps

Risk flags

Each flag links to its glossary definition.

Dependencies in context

Laying out the graph…
greenamberreddata store (square, dashed link)Node size follows fan-in. Click any node to open it.

Entanglement

loosely attached Bound into the core by 1 mechanism(s).

Detaches when its pinning dependencies are cut or multi-targeted (application-framework).

Migration playbooks

Generated from this repo's assessment data: what is feasible, what blocks it, and the steps in order. Ratings: green means actionable now, amber means sequence other work first, red means blocked, grey means not applicable.

ZDD adoption

A long road

Technically eligible one day, but the blockers are structural: hosted WCF or SOAP contracts that cannot run two versions at once, or heavy legacy coupling. Sequence the modernisation work first. Legacy web front end: session state and framework age make mixed-version fleets risky until state is externalised.

Steps
  1. Adopt the four-stage discipline from the ZDD engineering standard: pre-deployment compatibility, deployment, feature activation behind a flag, post-release cleanup.
  2. Raise automated test coverage first: ZDD trades the end-of-sprint manual gate for continuous automated confidence, so the tests are the entry ticket.
  3. Make every change dual-version safe: backwards-compatible APIs (new major version for breaking wire changes), expand and contract for any schema change, and consumers tolerant of unknown fields.
  4. Audit serialized data: anything in Redis, queues or shared caches must deserialize cleanly across adjacent versions.
  5. Externalise any remaining session state so users can move between nodes mid-session without disruption.
  6. Wrap behaviour changes in feature flags so code deploys dark and release becomes a business decision, not a deployment event.
  7. Route deployments through the Workflow Engine's automated drain, deploy, health-check, return cycle (the path proven by the first automated production run in mid-2026).
  8. Verify with area-scoped regression rather than the whole-platform cycle, and watch error rates after rollout with automated rollback on alert.

SQL Server exit

Blocked by a shared database

sqlserver:TCDB, sqlserver:TravelCounsellors are shared, so this system cannot change engine on its own: every sharer moves in convoy. Either agree the move with all sharers as one programme, or first split this system's data out behind an owned API, then follow the steps below.

Blockers
Steps
  1. Inventory the schema and query surface of sqlserver:TCDB, sqlserver:TravelCounsellors: tables, stored procedures, triggers, cross-database joins and anything else engine-specific.
  2. Confirm the target: PostgreSQL (relational model; keep transactions and joins, swap the engine).
  3. Replatform to modern .NET first (see the recommended actions): current PostgreSQL and MongoDB drivers and EF Core providers target modern .NET, and doing one risky change at a time is cheaper than doing two.
  4. Data access is not through an ORM, so port the SQL by hand: translate T-SQL constructs, replace stored procedures with application code or target-native equivalents, and add integration tests around the queries that matter first.
  5. Stand up the target alongside SQL Server, backfill with an ETL pass (pgloader or an export/import job), then dual-write or replicate until parity is proven.
  6. Move reads to the target, watch correctness and latency, then cut writes over and keep SQL Server read-only until confidence is earned.
  7. Decommission the SQL Server database and remove the connection strings and firewall paths that pointed at it.

Containerisation

Feasible after replatforming

Appropriate, but the .NET Framework runtime has to go first; container work rides along with the replatform rather than preceding it.

Blockers
  • .NET Framework only runs on Windows; practical (Linux) containers need modern .NET
Steps
  1. Replatform to modern .NET first (see the recommended actions). Containerising then becomes routine.
  2. Add a Dockerfile and make the app read all configuration from environment variables and the secrets manager, never from machine-local files.
  3. Log to stdout and expose a health check endpoint so ECS can supervise it.
  4. Adopt the shared ci.yml pipeline template with the container parameters (awsRegion, containerAfterBuild, ecsTerraformRepo), which is exactly how the estate's existing AWS services deploy.
  5. Define the service in the Terraform repo, deploy to a non-production environment, then shift traffic and disarm the deployment-group release pipeline.

Recommended actions

Replatform travelcounsellors-net to modern .NET

Runs on .NET Framework 4.6.2, out of mainstream support. Blocked until stage 2 cuts: application-framework.

Impact: Reduces the end-of-life runtime count

proposed

Assessment notes

travelcounsellors-net

Purpose

Grab-bag public website for the travelcounsellors.net domain. The README says it is "used for collecting TC Scores" (post-booking NPS with checksum-validated links), but the project also carries testimonials submission/reminders, contact-centre enquiry and unsubscribe pages, recruitment applications, e-cards/Xmas cards, e-shots, email signatures, KPI reporting pages, phone-call lookups, financial-protection content and a legacy VB.NET "Goss" enquiry area — roughly 156 .aspx pages including 19 VB.NET code-behinds.

Tech stack

ASP.NET Web Forms on .NET Framework 4.6.2 (single csproj, packages.config), mixing C# and VB.NET. Modern packages retrofitted in: GraphQL.Client 6 (backoffice Accounts GraphQL), TC.ConnectionBroker 1.20 (Sql/Api/Wcf), TC.Cognito.Auth.Client, TC.Phenix.CompanyInfo, TC.ContactCentre.ServiceClient, TC.Phenix.Services.Client, raw System.Data.SqlClient with inline SQL in code-behind files.

Deployment

prod_application, release_count 1. YAML Azure.pipelines.yml (shared templates, classic Visual Studio build of the Web Forms project) feeding build and release pipelines both named travelcounsellors-net. IIS-hosted website.

Dependencies

Internal: tc-connectionbroker, tc-exceptions, backoffice (Accounts GraphQL client and TC.Phenix.Services.Client), company-info-api, phenix-contact-centre-wcf (TC.ContactCentre.ServiceClient), application-framework. External: AWS Cognito for authorising HTTP clients; SMTP relay (smtp.travelcounsellors.com) for testimonial/recruitment/error mail; legacy Testimonialservice.asmx endpoint.

Data stores

Direct SQL Server access via ConnectionBroker connections TCDB and TravelCounsellors (webuser credential set) — shared estate databases queried with inline SQL from page code-behinds.

Integration points

Server-rendered Web Forms UI; outbound GraphQL to backoffice Accounts, REST to Phenix APIs, SOAP/ASMX for testimonials, SMTP for notifications, direct SQL for most page data.

Code health

No test projects. README is boilerplate beyond one sentence. Hard-coded staff email addresses in Web.config and inline SQL throughout; VB.NET pages coexist with C#. Still actively changed (last commit 2026-07-07).

Modernisation risks

High: Web Forms has no migration path to modern .NET, the app mixes many unrelated public-facing capabilities that would need decomposing, it writes directly to shared databases (TCDB, TravelCounsellors) with inline SQL, and it has no tests. Individual functions (TC Score, testimonials, unsubscribe) are natural candidates to extract into existing modern APIs before retiring the site.