Mega-Trends

• SOA- While Service Oriented Architectures are hardly new, adoption of simple protocols and standards have led to wide-spread conversion from yesterdays vertically integrated mega-applications to SOA enablement. Additionally, software infrastructure designed to support the development, deployment, and administration fo huge vertical applications is being replaced with light weight horizontally integrated application services.
  
  We will be exploring important trends in SOA, including standards, practices, impact of application development, and the effects on todays major application vendors.
  
  
  
• OpenSource- OpenSource has become a viable approach to development and distribution, although most emerging OpenSource vendors continute to struggle to find an appropriate business model. Additionally, OpenSource communities struggle with the impact of various licenses and the dichotomy between the religion of OpenSource and "Commercial OpenSource".
  
  We will be exploring emerging trends in OpenSource, including the impact of community development, the realities of "free and open", the commercial OpenSource world, and the impact on traditional software development processes.
  
  
  
• Software As A Service- There is lots of confusion regarding SAAS, including multiple business and deployment models. There are a few major successes and lots of companies struggling with these concepts. Perhaps most important is the emergence of interest on the part of the major vendors...Microsoft, Oracle, and SAP.
  
  We'll be looking at some of the major trends, together with examples of the success (and failure) of these approaches.
  
  
  
• Evolution of Infrastructure Software- Partially as a result of these trends, software infrastructure products and technologies are being impacted at an ever increasing pace, with many of the traditional products seriously struggling to keep pace. This is creating substantial stress for Enterprise Consumers as they evolve their architectures and technologies, but without support from their long term commercial vendor partners.
  
  We'll be looking at impact of these changes on both customers and vendors.