SOA – Live Free or Die
So what about the old stuff? That’s a question we often hear from companies when we talk about service-oriented applications.
The “old stuff” is the big block of ERP code that companies already have installed. It may be functionally rich but it’s hard to change. So, how do you connect the old stuff to the sleek new service-oriented applications?
As it happens, it’s not too terribly difficult to put an SOA “wrapper” on existing chunks of code. The wrapper can open a new world to old code. That’s effectively what we’ve done with the latest releases of our major systems – Lawson M3 release 7.1 and S3 release 9.0.
We expect to write virtually all of our future applications with Landmark Application Designer which – by its very nature – generates service-oriented applications. Thus, it should be relatively easy for Lawson customers on M3 7.1 or S3 9.0 to access the new Landmark applications. They’ll typically use standard SOA technologies to communicate between the old stuff and the new stuff.
But why stop there? Let’s say your business runs on a chunk of BigCo ERP code. And let’s say that Lawson delivers a killer application called Assortment & Replenishment Planner (which, in fact, we have). You’d like to use the Lawson application but you can’t because it doesn’t communicate effectively with BigCo. Without SOA, you’re SOL.
But wait. What if your BigCo system has an SOA wrapper on it? Then you could incorporate Lawson SOA applications relatively easily – or any other SOA application for that matter. After all, SOA is SOA is SOA.
Of course, the BigCo ERP companies don’t want you to do this. They lose control. What would happen if any company could buy any application from any software vendor? Prices would decline and competition would intensify. Imagine if you could buy from anyone or even build your own applications and snap them in to BigCo. But BigCo vendors want to keep you locked in. That’s one reason they push their proprietary technology so hard.
Didn’t our industry go through this once before? Didn’t open systems win out the last time around? Maybe the new battle cry should be: SOA – Live Free or Die.
If you’re trapped in a BigCo system, your first step toward freedom is an SOA wrapper. Don’t get trapped. Get wrapped.
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