The success of SOA, which grew out of the popular Object Oriented development paradigm, was greatly hampered by the inability of architects to enforce its central premise of reuse. But it wasn’t just the lack of reusing services that caused it to fail to achieve the greatness predicted, it was the lack of adopting the idea of an authoritative source for business critical objects, i.e. data.
A customer, an order, a lead, a prospect, a service call. These “business objects” within SOA were intended to represented by a single, authoritative source as a means to ultimately provide a more holistic view of a customer that could be then be used by various business applications to ensure more quality service.
It didn’t turn out that way, mores the pity, and while organizations adopted the protocols and programmatic methods associated with SOA, they never really got down to the business of implementing authoritative sources for business critical “objects”. As organizations increasingly turn to SaaS solutions, particularly for CRM and SFA solutions (Gartner’s Market Trends: SaaS’s Varied Levels of Cannibalization to On-Premises Applications published: 29 October 2012) the ability to enforce a single, authoritative source becomes even more unpossible. What’s perhaps even more disturbing is the potential inability to generate that holistic view of a customer that’s so important to managing customer relationships and business processes.
Monthly Archives: January 2013
Is "Little data" Big Data’s new battleground?
Mark Little, Principal Analyst, Consumer, Ovum
“You have zero privacy anyway, get over it,” Sun Microsystems chief executive Scott McNealy is quoted as saying at a product launch back in 1999. McNealy will surely have grown almost as tired of hearing his famous quote as consumers appear to be of being tracked on the Internet, and Ovum’s latest Consumer Insights survey suggests that two-thirds of the Internet population is very tired indeed.
Internet players and data collectors of every type are at risk of taking the consumer’s personal data, their “little data,” for granted, turning the Big Data value system into a battleground.
Regulation and hardening attitudes are squeezing the supply of personal data
Since Scott McNealy made his famous quote there have been many privacy infringements and policy errors. These have mostly involved major players, and notable examples include Google Street View’s covert collection of consumers …
Cloud Migration Is Not Enough
Cloud migration has become known as a critical solution for public cloud deployment. Yet cloud migration is not sufficient for hybrid cloud and enterprise cloud requirements. Enterprises will require cloud integration.
Mobile Development & Testing Integrated
Appcelerator, who’s got a mobile development platform called Titanium
3.0, and SOASTA, who does cloud and mobile testing and has a mobile test
automation solution called TouchTest, have integrated their widgetry to
make things easier for developers.
It’s said to be the first integrated test automation solution.
Are cloud contracts driving away business?
Cloud computing providers are increasingly falling for bad habits – they are offering customers “standard form” contracts whereby they set the provider lays out the terms, very much like insurance companies do with their policies.
These contracts are somewhat problematic, as they levy all responsibility and liability onto the client making use of the cloud service. Whilst many small businesses may accept these contracts due to not having sufficient legal resources, large businesses have means and are extremely unlikely to take up a one-sided contract.
This contractual quandary could well hinder the process of cloud adoption, unless the providers address the matter, and soon. Large businesses have already taken the lead in rejecting cloud providers with such contracts.
Many of the standard form contracts are extremely basic and presented very much like software contracts whereby you must simply accept the terms in order to proceed, or else don’t accept – “take …
Interoute claims CloudStore is “game changer” for cloud computing
Cloud service provider Interoute has announced the launch of CloudStore, an enterprise app store which doubles up as a compute and storage facility, hosting OS and databases, as well as business apps.
Interoute, known for its virtual data centre and owning Europe’s largest cloud platform, is further focusing its efforts on the enterprise – understandable, given that’s where most of its client base lies – but featuring a much more rounded product than just hosting apps.
Counting Microsoft, RedHat and Ubuntu among its cast list, the Interoute CloudStore integrates several assets, with its integrated network, compute storage platform underneath a layer of appliances, from which secure platforms can be built.
The store also comes with an online knowledge centre, designed to help enterprises choose a bespoke model to suit their business needs.
In a press release, Interoute calls the solution a “game changer” and “the next generation of cloud computing …
Governance Must Drive All Security Initiatives… Even Cloud
Risk is not unique to the cloud. The “how” (aka the technology) changes, but not the mission. True professionals know the argument is not about technology or how security is delivered, but rather one of governance and policy enforcement.
Do a Google search on “cloud security” and the first entry is “How secure is the cloud?” True professionals know the argument is not about technology or how security is delivered, but rather one of governance. You need to know exactly who HAS access to what resources and if these levels of access are appropriate. You need to know who IS accessing resources, and if they don’t have the proper credentials, you need to be notified immediately to take further preventive action. You need know that protocols for compliance are in place and routinely and successfully generate the reporting for periodic audits. You need to know your rights, liabilities (SLA) for any application or service acquired and that they conform to your risk management practices.
Supermicro to Exhibit at Cloud Expo New York
SYS-CON Events announced today that Supermicro, a global leader in high-performance, high-efficiency server technology and innovation, will exhibit at SYS-CON’s 12th International Cloud Expo, which will take place on June 10–13, 2013, at the Javits Center in New York City, New York.
Super Micro Computer, Inc. or Supermicro®, a global leader in high-performance, high-efficiency server technology and innovation, is a premier provider of end-to-end green computing solutions for Enterprise IT, Datacenter, Cloud Computing, HPC and Embedded Systems worldwide. Supermicro’s advanced server Building Block Solutions® offers a vast array of modular, interoperable components for building energy-efficient, application-optimized, computing solutions. This broad line of products includes servers, blades, GPU systems, workstations, motherboards, chassis, power supplies, storage technologies, networking solutions and SuperRack® cabinets/accessories. Architecture innovations include Twin Architecture, SuperServer®, SuperBlade®, MicroCloud, Super Storage Bridge Bay (SBB), Double-Sided Storage™, Universal I/O (UIO) and WIO expansion technology all of which deliver unrivaled performance and value.
Open Source Release of the OpenNebula Apps Suite
Continuing its strong commitment to open-source and to the OpenNebula community, C12G Labs has just announced the open-source release of OpenNebulaApps, a suite of tools for users and administrators of OpenNebula clouds to simplify and optimize multi-tiered application management. The new software has been released under Apache license and will be incorporated into the main distribution of OpenNebula. After the announcement made two weeks ago about the public distribution of OpenNebula Maintenance Updates and Service Packs, the incorporation of this innovative functionality consolidates OpenNebula’s position as the most advanced, enterprise-ready open-source cloud management platform.
AppZero to Exhibit at Cloud Expo New York
SYS-CON Events announced today that AppZero will exhibit at SYS-CON’s 12th International Cloud Expo, which will take place on June 10–13, 2013, at the Javits Center in New York City, New York.
AppZero is the fastest and most flexible way to move server applications to the cloud, without re-engineering, re-installation, or lock-in. With one-click simplicity, AppZero migrates Windows server applications from datacenters to private, public, and hybrid clouds. Patent-pending Zapp migration technology automates the extraction and movement of server-side applications to any cloud or machine in a fraction of the time required by other approaches.