Chris Harding

This week, I've been at The Open Group Conference in San Francisco. The theme was Enterprise Transformation which, in simple terms, means changing how your business works to take advantage of the latest developments in IT. Evidence of these developments is all around. For example, when I took a break and went for coffee and a sandwich to a little cafe on Pine and Leavenworth, it seemed to be run by and for the Millennial Generation. True to type, my server pulled out a cellphone with a device attached through which I swiped my credit card. An app read my screen-scrawled signature and the transaction was complete. Then to make dinner reservations, the hotel concierge tapped a few keys on her terminal and, presto, we had a window table at a restaurant on Fisherman's Wharf. No lengthy phone negotiations with the maitre d'. We were just connected with the resource that we... (more)

The Evolution of SOA Hinges on an Open Marketplace for Services

We can't foresee the full potential of Service Oriented Architecture any more than Henry Ford could have foreseen the scale of today's automotive industry when the first Model T rolled off the production line nearly a hundred years ago. But there are signs that it will be equally far-reaching. If so, this will because of the same force that made Ford rich: the open market. Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) is an architectural style in which the software applications are organized as loosely coupled services. It's being adopted by many enterprises today because it results in agil... (more)

The Golden Thread of Interoperability

SAN DIEGO -- There are so many things going on at every Conference by The Open Group that it is impossible to keep track of all of them, and this week’s conference here is no exception. The main themes are cybersecurity, enterprise architecture, SOA and cloud computing. Additional topics range from real-time and embedded systems to quantum lifecycle management. But there are a number of common threads running through all of those themes, relating to value delivered to IT customers through open systems. One of those threads is interoperability. Interoperability panel session The int... (more)

Testing SOA Solutions

Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) has been discussed as an important architectural style for the last few years. Organizations have started to develop service-oriented solutions and many are now leveraging services in their production environments. SOA introduces new technical complexities and challenges and makes testing a critical component of the development lifecycle. Teams need to think about: How do you know if the solution is ready? How do you know that it will scale to accommodate future needs? How do you know that you can actually get the business flexibility that SOA ... (more)

A Peaceful Leap to Cloud Computing

History has many examples of invaders wielding steel swords, repeating rifles, or whatever the latest weapon may be, driving out people who are less well-equipped. Corporate IT departments are starting to go the same way, at the hands of people equipped with cloud computing. Recently I was at The Open Group conference in Boston. The Open Group is neutral territory with a good view of the IT landscape: An ideal place to watch the conflict develop. The Open Group Cloud Computing Work Group has been focused on the business reasons why companies should use cloud computing. The Work Gro... (more)