Wed 13 Jan 2010
How Cloud and On-Premise Platforms Work Together
Posted by Rony Ross under On-Premise BI , Software as a Service BI , The Future of BI[8] Comments
Today’s software industry buzzword is “Cloud.” We all know what it is, and some of us are already leveraging Cloud platforms to reduce resource consumption on-premise. Right now, many ISVs are making a black-and-white distinction between Cloud and on-premise platforms. When you’re evaluating software platforms, there doesn’t seem to be a middle ground because many providers are exclusively leveraging either one or the other.
The problem facing most of us as technology managers is whether Cloud or on-premise makes the most sense for our businesses. Because there are strategic benefits to both, the decision can be a struggle. But what CIOs should know is that you truly don’t need to make a clear-cut decision for your business. Implementing platforms both in the Cloud and on-premise is a great way to play to multiple aspects of your business while enjoying the benefits that each strategy has to offer.
Read full article from the CIO Update: How Cloud and On-Premise Platforms Work Together
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January 14th, 2010 at 10:11 am
Cloud computing has not advanced far enough to be attractive to many enterprise level applications. Volume storage, processing power, processing speed, data transfer rates, security (logical) and environmental variety are all not up to our needs at this time. One of these days someone will take the plunge and commit the dollars to build the solution.
January 14th, 2010 at 11:56 am
My point is that as applications become really large, petabyte, the need to have geographically dispersed data centers becomes expensive. Data transfer rates become a huge issue. Processing power for these complex applications becomes a barrier to growth in the cloud environment. I/O issues arise. There are specific areas which need to be addressed from a technical perspective that no seems to be investing in at this time. It is a big commitment, but the pay off would be huge.
January 14th, 2010 at 12:03 pm
I don’t think you are taking the concept of hybrid BI far enough. We’re already seeing organizations that employ multiple deployment methods at once. These include Software as a Service, Data as a Service, Analytics as a Service, Analytics as part of BPO, and On-premises deployments. Some organizations make effective use of these methods on a project by project basis i.e. in some cases moving back and forth between on-premises and off-premises as project requirements dictate.
January 14th, 2010 at 2:37 pm
…the article was a quick read…I am not sure I fully understand the mechanics of a cloud which affects my thoughts below. I’ll take a stab at commenting anyway.
To me the blog point wasnt clear in pointing out valuable recommendations or either strategic or financial benefits of a hybrid cloud/onsite solution as it was pretty genericly directed – for instance, why is there lower maintenance in a hybrid solution? I would think it would be more maintenance – none for the cloud, but the same on my internal system, plus interface adjustments.
It’s all about how you define security too – I as a CIO, am concerned about access to valuable data query result sets more so than the raw data – I think once there is ‘cloud’ access, thats another point in my infrastructure where someone can potentially see sensitive business information…or query the larger, raw set of data….
I am guessing that security in either case comes down to personal access – like most situations. That and most organizations have trouble figuring out their own data, let alone randomly querying another group for intelligence.
As for hybrid performance, I believe it is still dependent on the volume of data processed to generate query results.
Another concept I have heard corporations struggle with is data lineage – how can one verify the integrity of a result by knowing the veracity of the source of data used in a query…a topic thats difficult even on in-house systems? I suspect that when one ‘clouds’ data, the individual data elements could potential not align in key figures…attributes like the time a business day closes…definitions of quantity or units of measurement…sources like 9 widgets need those attributes to have meaning, and may not have the same meaning from one source to the other.
This hybrid strategy exposes a number of the above issues – complicating development I think, and involves investment in two pieces of software, two development skillsets, adds a layer and another round of data handling meaning extra downstream time and potential for masking or changing the original data set, which i see contributing more to the questions of how can i trust this result, and what does the result really mean – is this real time, the state of business as of last sunday COB?
These are questions that vendors, delivery personnel and executives deal with on single systems, and I’d make an argument that when one adds a cloud to the mix, the very nature of the cloud further obscures the truth – not because of the data, but the way it is integrated.
Executives have had issues with SaaS for similar reasons, and I think now SaaS is an accepted practice, allaying concerns.
Perhaps some additional points to address these topics may encourage me to be more willing to adopt or consider a hybrid concept for my or a customer’s business.
-Dave
January 14th, 2010 at 2:54 pm
A hybrid approach is very popular cloud strategy with our customers. Specifically, we’re seeing many enterprises running Lotus Notes and Domino that want to move their email to the cloud like to Microsoft’s Exchange Online (BPOS) yet want to continue to use their on premise Lotus Notes applications. These applications continue to interface with the cloud based messaging solution seamlessly. With the help of Binary Tree software (shameless plug). I believe that after a certain comfort level is achieved with the messaging move that applications will follow.
-Steven
January 15th, 2010 at 11:08 am
I would like to know more on cloud computing for EDI messages?
Who are the leading cloud technology export in the market today?
Would love to hear everybody’s thoughts!
- Mosha
January 18th, 2010 at 11:34 am
Hybrid or non-Hybrid is defined by cost, speed and security. Either way, users get off-the-shelf data presentations solutions, customizable upon demand to a certain level. They must be accompanied by custom reporting done outside of that solution and tailored to the unique company needs.
January 19th, 2010 at 10:46 am
Very interesting comments. I see the SaaS opportunity as a ‘shared ride’, and the on-prem as a ‘limo ride’, each with it’s own benefits and disadvantages. From speaking with our customers about ‘hybrid’ I conclude that the model which will serve the hybrid best, will be some kind of a Hub & Spoke (excuse me for borrowing the term from the logistic world or distributed computing), where the hub enjoy a more ‘on-prem’ solution and the spoke enjoy ‘SaaS’. Similar to comment Steven Pivnik made earlier about Lutos note ‘on prem’ and BPOS in the cloud. I will take on myself to blog more about it in the future.