Dave Linthicum is up now. He says his purpose is to be a curmudgeon. So, we'll see how that goes. He's talking about the relationships between enterprise architecture, service-oriented architecture and cloud computing.
He warns us that this presentation is relevant for this instance in time. In six months, this will change because cloud computing is rapidly evolving.
SOA & Cloud Computing
"The trick is to determine which services, information, and processes are good candidates to reside in the clouds, as well as which cloud services should be abstracted within the existing or emerging SOA."
Basic idea is that SOA resides in the enterprise and leverages cloud resources (amazon, xignite, salesforce etc). Leverage solutions you don't own or host. Morphing the lines between on-premise and off-premise solutions. Dave sees the future as a hybrid model, not all in the enterprise, not all out.
Dave walks through his cloud computing framework, originally posted here.
Enterprise IT is understandably skittish about cloud computing. However, many of the cloud computing resources out there will actually provide better service than on-premise. Security & performance are still issues.
Always have to understand your business requirements and cloud offerings and match for best value for your organization.
When cloud computing may be a fit:
- when processes, applications and data are largely independent
- when the points of integration are well defined
- when a lower level of security will work just fine
- when the core internal enterprise architecture is healthy (cloud doesn't give healthy architecture to existing problem applications)
- when cost is an issue
- when the applications are new (porting costs of legacy applications is an issue
Dave's advice:
1. start with architecture - understand: business drivers, information under management, existing services under management and core business processes
2. get ready: (a) accept the notion that it's ok to leverage cloud hosted services in your soa (b) create a strategy for the consumption and management of cloud services (c) create a proof of concept now
In other words, play with cloud computing before jumping in.
Dave offers a 17 point stepping into the clouds plan, starting with accessing the business all the way through implementing operations.
Other thoughts:
External cloud services should function like any other enterprise application or infrastructure resource. In fact, should be more reliable than internal.
Cloud resources should appear native.
Consider private clouds if your requirements call for that (security, control, privacy)
Watch the hype!
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