software in flux
What users get is an
"executable version"of the software with the original source code remaining (closed) with the principal organization
software as a service (SaaS)
A form of cloud computing where a firm subscribes to a third-party software and receives a service that is delivered online. (myCourses, Binghamton email from Google)
software as a service (SaaS):
A form of cloud computing where a firm subscribes to a third-party software and receives a service that is delivered online. (myCourses, Binghamton email from Google)
server farm
A massive network of computer servers running software to coordinate their collective use. Provide the infrastructure backbone to SaaS, hardware cloud efforts, and many large-scale Internet services. • Require plenty of cheap land, low-cost power, ultrafast fiber-optic connections, and benefit from mild climates. • Google, Sun, Microsoft, IBM, and HP have all developed rapid- deployment server farm modules. • Microsoft surprised Wall Street when it announced it would need to pour at least $2 billion more than analysts expected into its annual server farm.
virtualization
A type of software that allows a single computer o cluster of connected computers to function as if it were several different computers. (BingView to server) • Each computer runs its own operating system and software, can be used to DIFFERENT COMPUTERS reduce an organization's hardware needs, can create a firm's own private cloud of scalable assets, and cut energy consumption and lower carbon footprint
• total cost of ownership (TCO)
All of the costs associated with the design, development, testing, implementation, documentation, training, and maintenance of a software system.
Source code for OSS products is openly shared.
Can be changed and redistributed by anyone.• In stark contrast to the practice of conventional software firms who: Treat their intellectual property as closely guarded secrets. Almost never provide the source code for their commercial products.• Seen by some firms as a threat that undermines their economic model.
platform as a service (PaaS)
Cloud providers offer services for customers to build their own applications on the provider's infrastructure. Services include hardware, operating system, tools, and hosting. Amazon WebServices development platform
infrastructure as a service (IaaS):
Cloud providers offer services that include running the remote hardware, storage, and networking. Client firms can choose the software used.
Why Open Source
Cost—free alternatives to costly commercial code can be a tremendous motivator. • Reliability—the more people who look at a program's code, the greater the likelihood that an error will be caught and corrected. • Security—by allowing "many eyes" to examine the code, the security vulnerabilities come to light more quickly and can be addressed with greater speed and reliability. • Security-focused: Technology products that contain particularly strong security features • Scalability—ability to either handle increasing workloads or to be easily expanded to manage workload increases. • Agility and Time to Market—vendors able to skip whole segments of ©FlatWorld 2020 the software development process, allowing new products to reach the market faster.
SaaS: Not Without Risks
Dependence on a single vendor. Concern about the long-term viability of partner firms. Users may be forced to migrate to new versions.• Possibly incurring unforeseen training costs and shifts in operating procedures. Reliance on a network connection, which may be slower, less stable, and less secure. Data assets stored off-site may lead to security and legal concerns. • Limited configuration, customization, and system integration options compared to packaged software or alternatives developed in-house. • User interface of Web-based software is less sophisticated and lacks the richness of most desktop alternatives. • Ease of adoption may lead to pockets of unauthorized IT being used throughout a firm.
infrastructure as a service (IaaS)
Dropbox (storage space)
black swans:
Events that cannot be predicted but can cause an impact. Scalable computing resources can help a firm deal with spiking impact from Black swan events.
Evolution of cloud computing has huge implications across the industry:
Financial future of hardware and software firms.• Cost structure and innovativeness of adopting organizations. • Skill sets likely to be most valued by employers.
utility computing:
Firm develops its own software and then runs it over the Internet on a service provider's computers.
Internet backbone:
High-speed data lines provided by many firms all across the world that interconnect and collectively form the core of the Internet.
Increasingly, it is getting difficult to define the software industry
It powers everything from media consumption (Netflix, Spotify), games (League of Legends, DOTA, Call of Duty) to appliances (Nest, Apple Homekit). Drives modern farming, and even the most mundane task such as driving (self-parking features have become commonplace)
LAN
Local Area Network - a collection of hardware devices connected together in one physical location, such as a building, office, or home. A LAN can be small or large, ranging from a home network with one user to an enterprise network with thousands of users and devices in an office or school. Regardless of size, a LAN's single defining characteristic is that it connects devices that are in a single, limited area
Benefits of SaaS
Lower costs and financial risk mitigation.• Faster deployment times and variable operating expense. • Scalable systems.• Higher quality and service levels. • Remote access and availability.• Limits development to a single platform.• Tighter feedback loop.• Ability to instantly deploy bug fixes and product enhancements. • Lower distribution costs.• Greater accessibility. • Reducing software piracy.
Why Give It Away? The Business of Open Source
Lowers the cost of computing and makes computing options accessible to smaller firms. • Reliable, secure, and lowers computing costs for all users. • Diverts funds that can be used for other competitive initiatives and encouraging innovation.
• Other SaaS firms:
Offer free services that are supported by advertising. (Gmail) • Promote the sale of upgraded or premium versions for additional fees. (Turbox tax software) • Compete directly with the biggest names in software.
Why?
Once a successful software product has been written, the economics for a category-leading offering are among the best you'll find in any industry. Unlike physical products assembled from raw materials, the marginal costs to produce an additional copy of a software product is effectively zero
Linux
Open source software (OSS) operating system. -- GitHub
cloud computing
Replacing computing with services provided over the Internet.
virtual desktops:
Running an instance of a PC's software on anothermachine and delivering the image of what is executing to the remote device. (BingView to AA lab desktop) • Allow firms to scale and upgrade systems far more easily than if they had to maintain each individual PC.
There are two separate categories of cloud computing:
SaaS or Utility comutuing
Cloud offerings
SaaS provides the software and hardware to replace an internal information system.• Afirmreplacessoftwareandhardwarewitha service provided by a third party online. Hardware and software exists "in the cloud," meaning somewhere on the Internet. You only pay for the amount of processing, storage, and telecommunications used. Cloud vendors typically host your software on their systems. Cloud computing efforts focus on providing a virtual replacement for a subset of operational hardware like storage and backup solutions.
open source software (OSS)
Software that is free and where anyone can look at and potentially modify the code.
Security-focused:
Technology products that contain particularly strong security features
virtualization:
Technology that can make a single computer behave like many separate computers. Helps consolidate computing resources and creates additional savings and efficiencies.(bingview)
marginal costs:
The costs associated with each additional unitproduced.
cloudbursting:
Use of cloud computing to provide excess capacity during periods of spiking demand. It is a scalability solution that is provided as an overflow service, kicking in as needed.
VPN
Virtual Private Network - A VPN connection establishes a secure connection between you and the internet. Via the VPN, all your data traffic is routed through an encrypted virtual tunnel. This disguises your IP address when you use the internet, making its location invisible to everyone. A VPN connection is also secure against external attacks..
WAN
Wide-area network - a collection of local-area networks (LANs) or other networks that communicate with one another. A WAN is essentially a network of networks, with the Internet the world's largest WAN.
Cloud computing is
affecting the competitive dynamics of the hardware, software, and consulting industries • IBM saw server sales fall from 20 to 30 percent in recent years, finally selling its low-end server business off to Lenovo (the same firm that bought Big Blue's PC and laptop business years earlier). Shifting to cloud computing modifies the margin structure for many in the computing industry. Cloud computing can accelerate innovation. • Changes the desired skills mix and job outlook for IS workers. • Enables organizations to spend less on hardware infrastructure and reinvest in strategic efforts and innovation. Firms need to think about the strategic advantages that can be created.
Installing a complex set of systems on someone else's hardware can
be a brutal challenge, and in many cases is just about impossible. • Firms considering cloud computing need to do a thorough financial analysis. • Firms should enter the cloud cautiously, particularly where mission- critical systems are concerned.
Red Hat
brings in $3 billion a year from paying customers subscribing for access to software updates and support services
Vendors make money on OSS
by selling support and consulting services. • Industry's evolution (standards competition): • Pre-Linux days: Almost every major hardware manufacturer made its own incompatible version of the Unix operating system. • As such, they had difficulty attracting third- party vendors to write application software. • Now all major hardware firms run Linux, resulting in a large, unified market attracting software developers.
LAMP
cronym for Linux, Apache Web server software, MySQL database, and any of the several programming languages that start with P (e.g., Perl/Python/PHP). ---Powers many of the sites visited each day, from Facebook to YouTube.
For many worldwide, the smartphone is the primary screen for engaging in a series of tasks or entire new categories of software and services. And while smartphones use the web, most smartphone functionality is
delivered via custom apps Compared with packaged software, apps lower the cost of software distribution and maintenance. Apps offer a richer user interface and integrate more tightly with a device's operating system. Huge firms have leveraged smartphone apps as their only, or primary interface with consumers. • Uber, Instagram, and WhatsApp are among the billion-dollar firms that exist because of smartphones and the rapid proliferation of apps Critics say apps force consumers into smartphone walled gardens and raise ©FlatWorld 2020 consumer switching costs.
Planning to account for usage spikes explains why
he servers at many conventional corporate IS shops run at only 10 to 20 percent capacity
Linus Benedict Torvalds
is a Finnish-American software engineer who is the creator and, historically, the principal developer of the Linux kernel, which is the kernel for GNU/Linux operating systems (distributions) and other operating systems such as Android and Chrome OS. During a marathon six-month coding session in 1991, Torvalds (21 yrs. old then) created the first version of Linux marshaling open source revolutionaries like no one before him. Instead of selling his operating system, Torvalds gave it away
A main principle of open-source software development
is peer production, with products such as source code, blueprints, and documentation freely available to the public.
• Open source software
isn't without its risks. • Another major concern is legal exposure. • Firms adopting OSS may be at risk if they distribute code and aren't aware of the licensing implications. • Some commercial software firms have pressed legal action against the users of open source products when there is a perceived violation of software patents or other unauthorized use of their proprietary code. • Also complicating issues are the varying open source license agreements (these go by various names, such as GPL and the Apache License), each with slightly different legal provisions—many of which have evolved over time
software has been a
magnificent business
Linux is common on
mobiles, consumer electronics, and on enterprise solutions, but not on desktop computers: • It is not easy to install. • Its complexity can raise the total cost of ownership.
Software as a service (SaaS)
myCourses, SalesForce - application
Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE)
offers the Helion Cloud Suite software, Helion CloudSystem hardware, Helion Managed Private Cloud and Managed Virtual Private Cloud services.
Include variants:
platform as a service (PaaS) - Amazon WebServices development platform
Some are developing their own private clouds
pools of computing resources that reside inside an organization and that can be served up for specific tasks as need arrives.
In spring 2014
some open source products which had been woefully neglected were exposed to the Heartbleed bug. Heartbleed was an error in the OpenSSL security toolkit, a product used by some two-thirds of Internet websites, and underpinning security related when sending secure information over the Internet. A routine coding error opened a hole that could potentially have been used to allow hackers to gather passwords, encryption keys, & other sensitive information, triggering "the largest security breach in the history of the human race." Heartbleed provides a cautionary tale to managers: Just because a tool is used by many doesn't mean one shouldn't audit its software products to understand the strength of support and potential risks associated with use.
All software companies work on a "closed source model"
the software program (code) is the principal organizations (Microsoft, SAP, Riot Games) intellectual property. They do not share the sourcecode. What users get is an "executable version" of the software with the original source code remaining (closed) with the principal organization. Every time you need additional functionality you have to go back and pay them (they have caught you !!!)
Most SaaS firms earn money via
usage-based pricing model similar to a monthly subscription.
Many open source projects are very well maintained with tightly coordinated contribution armies overseen by w
well-funded, paid professionals
• Examples of hardware cloud services:
• Salesforce.com offers Force.com. • Includes several cloud-supporting tools to write applications specifically tailored for Web-based delivery. • Google's App Engine offers developers several tools. • Including a database product called Big Table. • Microsoft offers Windows Azure.
