As many people correctly predicted, Web services and their corresponding
service-oriented architecture (SOA) have proven their promise. Companies and
businesses are starting to not only integrate new components and
technologies, but are also opening up back-end systems and legacy processes.
The former is helping to end compatibility and integration issues of the past
while the latter is working to foster growth and more forward-thinking ideas,
thus exempting the need to waste time on costly rewrites of existing
technology.
Web services do not solely add benefits to individual enterprises; they also
help to speed partnerships through quicker integration across businesses.
This is a direct result of the abstract way a Web service describes itself,
as it is almost completely agnostic of both medium and platform. So it is no
longer a requirement for companies that wish... (more)
With better technologies, new architectures, and innovative ways of thinking
about old problems, there are new applications for business intelligence and
data analysis. I am talking about the power of the intelligent portal.
But what do portals have to do with data analysis? Everything. A portal, by
bringing together such a wide range of applications, services, and even
entire businesses, not only provides a solid integration platform, but by
doing so, enables business intelligence. Data that was once separate,
awkwardly related, and difficult to format can now be brought together... (more)
IBM is known in the industry for releasing software products that are
tremendously powerful yet tremendously complex; unfortunately, because of the
latter their software installations are sometimes quite difficult. Actually,
in their defense, "are" is quickly becoming "were." IBM has been putting
forth quite an effort to revamp and fix the installation challenges that
developers and consultants have seen in the past. This Pro-Spective will
attempt to touch upon the major recurring issues with IBM installations, both
in the WebSphere suite of products and others, and look at how I... (more)