Disruptive Tech 2007
		•  RFID •  Web Services •  Server Virtualization •  Graphics Processing •  Mobile Security

Web Services

The Web has become a force of nature and a solid applications delivery platform. Whatever you call this latest buzz, Web applications have changed the way we will deploy enterprise software.

In 2006, we saw more buzzwords describing the "Webification" of the enterprise. Software-as-a-service (SaaS), mashups, Web 2.0, RSS feeds, Wikis, blogs, the rewritable Web, social networking spaces, group chat rooms -- no matter which aspect you're talking about, clearly something new is happening here. The trick is paying attention, because the Web services movement is producing better and more capable enterprise class applications, which can be deployed in a fraction of the time that more traditional apps took.

IT managers are using the combinations of various Web-based applications to piece together what they need done. For example, you can now take a mapping service such as Yahoo or Google Maps and tie in the location of your current sales leads to determine where to deploy your sales force. Many of these begin with one or more hosted applications and build from there. For some leading-edge examples, look at Zimbra for hosting enterprise-class e-mail, Amazon's S3 for offsite disk storage, basecamphq.com for project management, Concur for expense reporting, and Jive Software's Clearspace for document and workflow management. All mix multiple applications using well-known, and, in most cases, open-source code.

"Hosted applications definitely provide a new and more flexible opportunity for providing application solutions to my clients," said Dan Parnas, a director at online broker Charles Schwab. "They have significantly lower up-front cost and the ability to bring the application online relatively quickly."

"With SaaS, we've seen this movie before with the invention of the PC. Resistance was futile then and it is futile now. The good news is that we finally we have a software architecture and business model that can meet our growing need for agility," said Doug Neal, a research fellow with Computer Sciences Corp.'s Leading Edge Forum -- Executive Program.

As we recommended in the recent article on Web makeovers, go slowly on deploying these technologies, start with some basic skills on CSS or RSS before moving any deeper, understand what expertise you have in-house versus what you need to purchase, and examine whether your existing portfolio of Web applications needs to be updated with more modern and dynamic content tools.