Acquisitions won't solve SOA problems
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Service Oriented Architecture isn't getting any easier despite the raft of acquisitions.
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Can it deliver on its promises? Comment Service oriented architectures, or SOAs, have been positioned as the great leap forwards in how IT will finally come to be the major facilitator to the business.â¦
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What may have been one of the least inspiring demonstrations at TechEd earlier this month may actually pertain to one of the most critical issues Microsoft faces among enterprise customers:  If it truly means to achieve interoperability, it needs to be able to recognize what it can be interoperable with.
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Although SOA efforts are still early-stage at most organizations, systems integrators who work for government agencies are concerned that SOA efforts might put them out of a job. So says the Input Executive Forum, a trade organization representing federal contractors and agencies. Instead of hiring systems integrators to add new capabilities into existing IT environments, "agencies with a SOA environment can just acquire the services they need," says Deniece Peterson, a senior analyst at Input whose study examined the impact of SOA on IT contractors.[ What is SOA? Watch the InfoClipz primer to learn more. ]Only a few federal agencies -- including the Defense Dept., NASA, Treasury Dept., SEC, and FBI -- have significant SOA efforts under way, Peterson notes. Elsewhere, SOA efforts are typically small test projects or still in the research and design phases, she says. That slow uptake means IT providers haven't yet seen much shift away from traditional integration efforts in federal project proposals. "But they can see it coming," Peterson says. "When that time comes, they'll need to offer SOA services."While IT contractors are beginning to worry about possible loss of systems integration work, federal agencies that have a SOA agenda have their own concerns, Peterson notes. Many of the SOA-enabling technologies being sold to them contain proprietary components that interfere with SOA's promise of standards-based modularity. "The agencies are looking for standards, so this is slowing them down," she says.The other concern is a lack of SOA-skilled IT talent within the federal agencies, many of whom are facing a brain drain across the board due to the high percentage of retirement-age employees. Ironically, this lack of inside talent may help IT contractors -- if they can fill the gap by providing SOA-savvy architects, developers, and project managers, Peterson says.Although Peterson's research focused on the implications of federal SOA efforts, she suspects a similar set of issues exists in corporate IT environments. There, too, is an ecosystem of systems integrators accustomed to a series of integration projects in large enterprises -- particularly in finance and telecom -- who are looking at SOA as a way to reduce the integration need.
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PC Magazine - IBM launches a new SOA effort to fill gaps in the company's portfolio of SOA tools so that IBM can serve as a one-stop shop for SOA customers.
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The software maker is moving along -- but not enough to get investors excited.
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The Open Solutions Alliance, a nonprofit group backed by a number of commercial open source vendors, released a survey on Wednesday that found interoperability is a foremost concern among open source software customers.The group, which includes CollabNet, EnterpriseDB, and others, contended in a statement that if its members overcome interoperability challenges, they stand to &quot;out-Microsoft Microsoft by offering a fully interoperable suite of business tools.&quot;&quot;We think interoperability has to be a core feature [of open source software] from the very beginning,&quot; OSA&#39;s president, Dominic Sartorio, said in an interview. &quot;Most commercial open source companies are finding a good amount of success. But how many opportunities are they leaving on the table because they&#39;re not interoperable?&quot;The OSA singled out Microsoft, as opposed to Oracle or SAP, because its member companies mostly target midmarket customers, according to Sartorio. &quot;We have one common competitor: Microsoft.&quot;OSA derived the study&#39;s findings from a series of forums it held this year in Europe and the United States. It said some 100 people attended the events.Participants cited a variety of interoperability scenarios and concerns, including single sign-on for identity management.Another involved user interface interoperability. &quot;A lot of people try to plug open source projects into an enterprise portal, and they want a unified look and feel,&quot; Sartorio said.Customers also cited cross-platform portability and data integration challenges.In addition, the study found that:-- Lower up-front cost was the most important driver for adoption of open source products, but this was tempered by concerns that spending on support and services would be greater. That feeling in turn was mitigated by a belief among respondents that open source products will become more mature over time and easier to support.-- Few customers cited the ability to customize source code as a selling point for open source applications, preferring instead that it handle their needs out of the box.Sartorio said OSA&#39;s work will continue in 2008. &quot;This is going to be an ongoing effort. We&#39;re scratching the surface here with issues customers brought up in these forums,&quot; he said.
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The leading vendors in the data warehousing market are running scared of new entrants to the market that are offering data warehouse appliances (i.e. pre-integrated hardware, software, storage combinations) that can offer greatly superior performance at a significantly lower price.  In this white paper we will dispel the 'fog of war' that currently pervades the data warehousing landscape, dismissing those question marks that are irrelevant and gratuitous, but highlighting any genuine issues that need to be addressed.
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With merger and acquisition fever said to be waning, which deals will be the ones to work out?
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A recent acquisition should help with its overall product offering, but more challenges lie ahead.
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An investor's guide to service-oriented architecture
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Worries about how well SP2 will work with existing software, combined with concerns about possible security vulnerabilities, have led many corporates to hold back from installing the security update.
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The company's strong operations don't excite the market.
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Last November's buyout by IBM of SOA software provider Cognos is already having a major impact on businesses that use vertical market software. That impact is being felt in the way these businesses warehouse and access their data.
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(Source: MessageLabs) Compliance issues have always plagued businesses, but the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOA) increased the level of concern companies face concerning accounting regulations. Read the MessageLabs SOA report to learn how to better manage business communications.
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Thinks modular for NetWeaver There'll be no more big updates for SAP's ERP software until 2010, as SAP entices customers and developers to adopt new products and initiatives for its NetWeaver SOA strategy.â¦
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PC maker says mergers and acquisitions aren't the way to succeed.