The next BriefingsDirect case study interview explores how improved visibility analytics and predictive responses are improving supply-chain management. We’ll now learn how SAP’s Supplier InfoNet, coupled with the Ariba Network, allows for new levels of transparency in predictive analytics that reduce risk in supplier relationships.
ServiceNow this week launched its Eureka version of its online service management suite with new features aimed at letting non-technical folks build custom applications and process flows. IT service management (ITSM) has long been a huge benefit to complex and exception-rich IT operations by helping to standardize, automate and apply a common system-of-record approach to tasks, incidents, assets, and workflows. ServiceNow has been growing rapidly as a software-as-a-service (SaaS) provider of ITSM, but clearly sees a larger opportunity - making service creation, use, and management a benefit to nearly all workers for any number of business processes. It's one of those rare instances where IT has been more mature and methodological in solving complexity than many other traditional business functions. Indeed, siloed and disjointed "productivity applications" that require lots of manual effort have been a driver to bring service orientation to the average business process.
Fundamentally, SDN is still mostly about network plumbing. While plumbing may be useful to tinker with, what you can do with your plumbing is far more intriguing. A rigid interpretation of SDN confines it to Layers 2 and 3, and that’s reasonable. But SDN opens opportunities for novel constructions in Layers 4 to 7 that solve real operational problems in data centers. “Data center,” in fact, might become anachronistic – data is everywhere, constantly on the move, seemingly always overflowing. Networks move data, but not all networks are suitable for all data. In his session at 15th Cloud Expo, Steve Riley, Technical Leader in the Office of the CTO at Riverbed Technology, will discuss how finding (or building) the right network, with the right applications, is still a labor-intensive task. Must it always be this way? No: for networks will soon be expressed as code. Finally, the data, the applications that process it, the networks that move it and the objects that store it can all be described by software constructs – let’s call this collection a super-blob – in the hands of skilled developers. Freed from their dependence on any given location, super-blobs can move around as necessary, resting on any physical fabric that can satisfy their requirements. As requirements change, locations may change – while preserving all application states. Location-independent computing is within our grasp.
Enterprise Resource Planning has traditionally been a software for large corporates with million dollar technology budgets. But that has been changing over the past decade with the advent of cloud based ERP systems. According to a survey conducted by Sage, nearly 30% of finance managers at UK based SMEs believe that cloud could make ERP more affordable or viable to them. In another study published by Gartner, the top five fastest growing ERP vendors today are all SaaS companies. Even the larger, mature SaaS players like NetSuite have registered exponential growth rates of nearly 40% while the traditional on-premise vendors like Oracle and SAP are showing signs of stagnation.
Big Data is big - but just how big may surprise you. According to a new QuinStreet survey, 77 percent of respondents consider Big Data analytics a priority. Another 72 percent cite enhancing the speed and accuracy of business decisions as a top benefit of big-data analytics. And 71 percent of mid-sized and large firms are planning for, if they are not already active, in big-data initiatives. And based on what I'm hearing this week at the HP Discover conference, much of the zeitgeist has shifted from an emphasis on cloud benefits to the more meaningful and long-term implications of Big Data improvements.
OpenXava is an Java Framework for Rapid Development of Enterprise Web Applications. In OpenXava you only have to write the domain classes in plain Java to get a web application ready for production. This 5.0 release has a new look & feel, includes module navigation, user login/logout (so you do not need Liferay anymore), inline editable collections (just like a spreadsheet), a new editor to attach files to your entity, and many many more things.
As technology evolves, business models evolve. The corner grocery store gave way to the emporium, which became the supermarket. Now we order groceries online with a credit card, and a truck turns up with the goods. Hansom cabriolets became taxis and limos, and now we have Uber. At one time, people would communicate at a distance through pigeons and human messengers. Then we created postal services, then email, and now a plethora of social networks. We still eat food, move around and communicate, but we do it all in different contexts. None of this contextual change would be economically or technically possible without the information systems to manage the business relationships, track transactions and settle accounts. Now, think about your phone and Internet access arrangements. For most people, this means a subscription with one big company, a contractual commitment, a monthly payment and perhaps some usage charges. Big companies build and own the infrastructure; they may subcontract work to other companies, but the carrier “owns” the customer relationships. It was pretty much like that 50 years ago.
While on-premise deployments are still the default for many enterprise applications today, most everyone agrees that SaaS and Cloud are the future. The question from the CXO is no longer, “Should we consider putting this application in the cloud?” It is, “Why wouldn’t we deploy this in the cloud?” As this new thinking takes full effect, I see three big changes for IT professionals: Instead of acquiring and operating on-site infrastructure and applications for the enterprise, IT professionals will be expected to coordinate business services for employees and end-users. Their role will be to ensure their “customers” are getting the performance levels they need to speed communication, increase collaboration and accelerate individual and organizational productivity.
Google leads the way in terms of autonomous driverless cars. Their vehicles have altogether logged over 700,000 autonomous miles, and there is still a lot more to do in terms of development. The latest developments are of a model without a brake, gas pedal, or steering wheel making it a 100% autonomous vehicle. Tesla has achieved a great deal to overcome the barriers of running electric cars over long distances (the current Tesla Model S can do over 250 miles on a single charge). They are also leading the way in making cars that are more software driven. With all these rapid developments in the automobile industry, it is quickly becoming apparent there will be a significant social impact on all of our lives.
Hear from Red Hat leaders and industry experts on Tuesday, June 10, 2014, at 11am and see how Red Hat Enterprise Linux continues to deliver unmatched customer value, increased efficiency, and true strategic advantage for global customers across every industry. Attendees will learn more about how Red Hat Enterprise Linux has: Transformed the IT industry. Redefined the server operating system. Enabled unparalleled choice for customers. Created the foundation for cloud computing. The event is open and complimentary for all Red Hat customers, partners, contributors, and any open source enthusiasts.
While there are many ways to define DevOps, the goal of the concept is to be able to deliver IT solutions faster, leveraging several technology tools to add value for business. Cloud companies have demonstrated how they can manage massive pools of IT infrastructure, giving the developer a very flexible resource pool that they can leverage and IT is eager to do the same. In this Power Panel at 2nd DevOps Summit moderated by Cloud Expo Tech Chair Larry Carvalho, Bernard Golden, VP, Strategy at ActiveState; Andi Mann, VP of Strategic Solutions at CA Technologies; John Willis, VP of Customer Enablement at Stateless Networks; Randy Bias, Co-Founder and CTO of Cloudscaling; and Vasu Sankhavaram, Chief Strategist of DevOps and Cross Portfolio Architecture Alignment within HP Software, will discuss this movement that is delivering frictionless IT to the enterprise.
Users are becoming increasingly impatient with new apps that don’t work. Often, you get one shot to get it right. But, new applications are being rolled out all the time and being accessed from all sorts of devices. Operations need to provide developers with real-world production data to help them identify performance issues before applications go into production. This Application Lifecycle Optimization (or DevOps) is key for businesses to reduce the risk of faulty application rollouts. In their session at 2nd DevOps Summit, Aruna Ravichandran, VP at CA Technologies, and Peter Tsatsaronis, Delivery Manager, NextGen Online Channels at NAB, will discuss how National Australia Bank (NAB) uses Application Performance Management (APM) from CA Technologies to create an exact replica of load and performance data from production to help developers improve new and enhanced application quality. Business transaction context from the real world allows quick testing of critical processes and provides key performance indicators to line of business owners. See how NAB has lowered their transaction response time by 75%, improved developer code efficiency, and even found issues they didn’t know they had, which were all discovered in performance testing, by implementing CA APM.
Electronic signatures are an important component of any web application. They make it possible to keep business processes online even when a signature is required on a contract, form or application. If you are interested in learning how to quickly integrate e-signatures into your cloud applications, this webinar is for you. Mauro Franco, Business Analyst, will demonstrate how to use e-SignLive’s REST API and SDKs to enable end-to-end electronic business processes.
As businesses look to unlock greater value out of their existing IT investments, they are increasingly re-evaluating their overall desktop strategy. A greater mobile workforce shifting usage models like BYOD and legacy infrastructure refresh cycles are all acting as catalysts in fueling a shift to a hosted, cloud-based model across the entire IT infrastructure, including the end-user computing side. Increasingly, IT leaders everywhere are seeking high performing, secure, and cost-effective alternatives to traditional desktops – one that minimizes large capital investments and allows them to shift scarce resources into supporting the needs of the business. The groundswell of Windows 7 migration plans, expanding virtual workforce, growing popularity of mobile devices, and tighter IT budgets all point to the need to reevaluate desktop strategies. By moving virtual desktops to the cloud, instead of an internally deployed and managed data center, companies can realize all the promised benefits of virtual desktops – centralized management, improved data security and simplified deployment – without the exorbitant cost, limitations or hassles of VDI.
Has Washington finally caught on to the cloud? As a "borderless technology," cloud computing is subject to the laws and regulations of many different countries – some more than others. The American legal and regulatory system has recently been paying more attention to cloud computing, so as a result new laws and regulatory regimes may be on the horizon. In order to make good business decisions, it is important to understand where the legal and regulatory environment is headed and how possible changes might affect cloud computing deployment, adoption, and usage. What is the Supreme Court case The American Broadcasting Companies v. Aereo really about and how is it related to cloud computing? What exactly is the FCC doing about Net Neutrality and should the cloud computing industry and enterprises that use cloud be concerned? What new measures are law makers taking to address privacy and security concerns in the cloud? What other cloud-related issues are the executive and legislative branch concerned about?
As we know, the subject of Big Data and the ‘space race’ to produce software application development functions that will enable us to extract insight and (therefore) value from the Big Data mountain remains one of the most discussed issues in information technology today. Increasingly prevalent and popular, if not quite as ‘predominant’ as some would have us believe, in this arena is Apache Hadoop. This software library is a framework that allows for the distributed processing of large data sets across clusters of computers using simple programming models.
SYS-CON Events announced today that VASCO Data Security International, Inc., a global leader in authentication, digital signatures, and identity management, has been named “Bronze Sponsor” of SYS-CON's 14th International Cloud Expo®, which will take place on June 10–12, 2014, at the Javits Center in New York City, New York. VASCO is a leading supplier of strong authentication and e-signature solutions and services specializing in Internet security applications and transactions. VASCO has positioned itself as a global software company for Internet security serving a customer base of approximately 10,000 companies in more than 100 countries, including approximately 1,700 global financial institutions. VASCO's primary markets are the financial sector, enterprise security, e-commerce and e-government.
The private cloud momentum among enterprises is undeniable. Private cloud is able to deliver the agility and ease-of-use that users have come to expect – without sacrificing any of the security or control that is critical to so many industries. But implemented incorrectly, there's no question that private clouds can be a costly and frustrating undertaking. In his session at 14th Cloud Expo, Stuart Robbins, CIO Evangelist at Metacloud, will spell out the most common mistakes that he and his colleagues have seen in their experience working with companies that have attempted to implement private clouds. He'll talk about what has gone wrong for these firms, as well as what steps your company can take to avoid falling into similar traps as you pursue your own private cloud.
SYS-CON Events announced today that Tau Institute, the leader in global ICT/IoT research, will exhibit at SYS-CON's @ThingsExpo, which will take place on June 10-12, 2014, at the Javits Center in New York City, New York, and the 2nd International @ThingsExpo,which will take place on November 4-6, 2014, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, CA. Tau Institute is devoted to providing unique insights into the ICT environments and dynamics of the nations of the world, with the goal of helping to improve these infrastructures and the societies in which they function.
Application Performance Management (APM) has been bred with all the right elements to give us the insights we need to see the health of our applications. Similar to your most trusted watch dog, it alerts us to anomalies when events occur, providing awareness to the environment that only they can observe. As enterprises embrace the DevOps philosophy, and the coalescence of the Development and Operations continues, I foresee the conditions ripening to foster innovative methods of making application performance better and code deployments smoother. To me, the argument that system monitoring is just a “nice to have” and not really a core requirement for operational readiness dissipates quickly when a critical application goes down with no warning.
SYS-CON Events announced today that Parasoft will exhibit at SYS-CON's 2nd DevOps Summit, which will take place on June 10–12, 2014, at the Javits Center in New York City, New York. For 25 years, Parasoft has researched and developed software solutions that help organizations define and deliver defect-free software efficiently. By integrating Development Testing, API testing, and service virtualization, Parasoft reduces the time, effort, and cost of delivering secure, reliable, and compliant software. Parasoft's enterprise and embedded development solutions are the industry's most comprehensive – including static analysis, unit testing with requirements traceability, functional and load testing, dev/test environment management, and more. The majority of Fortune 500 companies rely on Parasoft in order to produce top-quality software consistently and efficiently.
In his session at 2nd DevOps Summit, Vasu Sankhavaram, Chief Strategist of DevOps and Cross Portfolio Architecture Alignment at HP Software, will discuss strategic and tactical challenges for DevOps adoption – how to get buy-in for and implement DevOps. Vasu Sankhavaram is Chief Strategist of DevOps and Cross Portfolio Architecture Alignment within HP Software. He has been working in the area of DevOps and Continuous Delivery since 2009.
The private cloud is misunderstood. At this stage, vendors can be forgiven for not having a firm idea of what the private cloud is and how it can uniquely improve their processes. Too many service providers have branded legacy technologies as "cloud-based," warping buyers' expectations about what a private cloud actually is and should do. In some cases, what developers and testers get with these cloud-washed solutions are nothing more than heavily virtualized environments that offer little or none of the scalability, automation, self-service, and on-demand provisioning associated with cloud computing at-large. As a result, organizations may think of the private cloud as simply a slight update to their internal IT systems, a fresh coat of paint on the same aging infrastructure that they have been looking to leave behind as new dynamic applications become more central to their businesses. They want a cloud platform that can enable more agile software lifecycles, with streamlined testing and abundant resources for developers, but these misconceptions may lead them to conclude that the public cloud is the only way to achieve these goals and facilitate quicker time-to-market, as well as higher programmer productivity.
SYS-CON Events announced today that MangoApps, the unified collaboration company, will exhibit at SYS-CON's 14th International Cloud Expo®, which will take place on June 10–12, 2014, at the Javits Center in New York City, New York. MangoApps provides private all-in-one social collaboration networks allowing workers to securely collaborate from anywhere in the world and from any device. Social, mobile, and easy to use. MangoApps has been named a "Market Leader" by Ovum Research and a "Cool Vendor" by Gartner. 10,000+ business customers worldwide.
Electronic signatures are an important component of any web application. They make it possible to keep business processes online even when a signature is required on a contract, form or application. If you are interested in learning how to quickly integrate e-signatures into your cloud applications, this session is for you. In his session at 14th Cloud Expo, Mauro Franco, Senior Sales Engineer at Silanis Technology, will demonstrate how to use e-SignLive’s REST API and SDKs to enable end-to-end electronic business processes.