Has Gartner been pulling my leg for the last decade on Portal technology?

By Nick Hortovanyi

I keep reading how IBM's WebSphere Portal technology has been the leader in Gartner's Magic Quandrant for Portal technology for years. In fact, its the been the case ever since I can remember going back to WebSphere Portal 4.1.

Really can't see how that can be the case. Its just not reflected in any of the markets I've engaged in.

In the early naughties I worked on telstra.com applications to build and provision online communities. All the development work, I was involved with was Java based using the early J2EE 1/1.1/1.2 speced application servers like ATG Dynamo, iPlanet, BEA WebLogic and IBM WebSphere. One of them, which I won't name, would only start up with out crashing during its internal boot process every now and then. These were crazy times but enjoyable.

After these endeavours, I realised that there were clear patterns for frameworks to provide the plumbing and reduce delivery risk. In fact, as the Internet bubble had burst, most customers, 1) weren't interested in funding framework building and 2) didn't understand/weren't willing to learn what was required in a framework (most of the effort was behind the scenes). Thus products should emerge to provide these frameworks. In essence, when a developer was going to be working on an application I wanted them to focus on the Use Cases (that add value to the paying customer) and not the plumbing.

So I went hunting for a product, that was Java enterprise based and found WebSphere Portal. I'd seen how Oracle had wrestled market share from its competitors and gained the number one spot and thought IBM would do the same in this genre. Gartner confirmed it that they were number one. iPlanet the Sun Netscape alliance didn't last and BEA & Sun Microsystems have now been acquired by Oracle. Not sure about ATG Dynamo, but I never really heard of it again. So my decision back then based on the Gartner magic quadrants was correct, wasn't it?

From my perspective, its been a resounding NO.

Outside of the larger organisations, both public and private, there are small pockets of WebSphere Portal. Everywhere you look there is Microsoft Sharepoint and if they use SAP, nearly without fail a SAP Portal.

In the larger organisations where integration between many disparate systems is an issue or they have had a large investment in other IBM middleware/technology there are significant deployments. The organisation demographics between the US and Australia is also interesting. I understand per capital we have more SMEs and less larger organisations here.

So from a Worldwide perspective the Gartner Magic Quandrant data may well be correct, if and only if its used in context of large multinational organisations. So have Gartner been pulling my leg or was I just naive to trust their magic quadrants?

Tags portal enterprise gartner technology websphere websphere+portal   |  Comments 0

The C in ICT

By Nick Hortovanyi

This C of course stands for Communications, so in context of ICT it is Communications Technology. What exactly is it? and why is it being grouped with Information Technology?

From wikipedia Communication's entry, we have a definition "Communication is a process of transferring information from one entity to another. Communication processes are sign-mediated interactions between at least two agents which share a repertoire of signs and semiotic rules. Communication is commonly defined as "the imparting or interchange of thoughts, opinions, or information by speech, writing, or signs"."

Many of us in the IT industry, I think forget and to a very large extent de-emphasize the communication component when it comes to things that are not related directly to two or more computers talking together or for IP based communications such as VOIP (Voice Over IP) or IM (Instant Messaging). However, the communications through web sites and in particular social media is becoming important, that is the expression of a persons or an organisations collective thoughts, opinions and information.

As I eluded in my post on Cup cakes and bunnies, the composite skill sets required to deliver these services has changed as the technology has changed. These composite skills now include a lot of those from marketing, communications and graphic design to name a few. Its getting the correct mix right for any given project that is critical for its success.

Tags ict team communications technology   |  Comments 0

Is SOA really dead?

By Nick Hortovanyi

A blog post titled "SOA is Dead; Long Live Services" was directed to me by a couple of persons. It highlights, what I first started to describe a couple of years ago as "Journalist led technology"; sometimes I do believe that it is Analyst led as well. That is, that the potential promise of the technology genres and acronyms, in this case SOA, take over. Without necesarrily having the real world experiences to back it up, to cut through the hype.

We most not forget that SOA means Service Oriented Architecture. It is an architectural style, that is a different style, then what has been used in the past in the client/server world of old. "to SOA or not to SOA" which I wrote about a couple of years ago, is always an interesting question.

"What are the alternates to a SOA style architecture?" still holds true in my opinion, that if you are not using a monolithic 80s/90s style client/server model, then there will be a business tier that exposes services at some granularity to be consumed by a presentation tier or another business tier service. Its the pace layering that becomes the issue (my thoughts here on timeless software).

To me Anne has highlighted the true issue that has been missed which is the important stuff: architecture and services.

Tags soa saas middleware technology analyst cloud journalist business   |  Comments 0

Are IT Leaders Missing the Boat?

By Nick Hortovanyi

This is a great post from the Enterprise Initiatives (madgreek65) .

The following extract is great that was picked up: "Here’s the deal. The world has changed – forever. First, hierarchical management structures will weaken as we continue to globally decentralize our business units. We have to change the way we think about control, standardization and the overall governance we bring to technology acquisition, deployment and support."

Tags decentralise technology hiererchical governance   |  Comments 0

Cloud Computing thinking within The Board

By Nick Hortovanyi

I'm presently doing the Australian Institute of Company Directors, Company Directors Course for management education. I elected to do this, as when I went to the information sessions, I found out, to my surprise, that they are suggesting that company boards look to appoint more IT focused Directors. In Australia at least, the majority of directors have had an accounting/finance or legal background. If this is different in other countries, please let me know.

My understanding is that, in general, the boards have relied on the advice from or they have deferred to the accounting/finance based directors when difficult governance issues have arisen, that have related to IT. I've often wondered why this is the case, in particular now, with the commoditisation of hardware and software in this area being ERPs. The net effect is, in most cases, they just allow the companies to operate more efficiently. To keep the cost base at a point to compete against their existing competitors.

I myself, have not worked on an Accounts Payable, Accounts Receivable and/or General Ledger system for a number of years now. Whilst understanding the importance of them to the operations of the business, I find that they are not the areas that occupy the forefront of innovation within an organisation.

One of the modules, last Friday was Strategic thinking. The lecturer, actually mentioned Cloud Computing, which was something that I was not expecting at all, as an example of thinking laterally. Others, that I talked to at the course, had not heard of the term Cloud Computing before.

But this is the issue, Human Capital and Information Capital, are now beginning to be at the forefront of new organisational strategies. Where I live in Adelaide, South Australia, the local state based government, is expecting 50% of the workforce to retire within the next ten years. I've also heard figures as high as 60% of the workforce in some utilities over the same period. These Human Capital issues compound the Information Capital issues, because better means are required to capture that Information Capital of an organisation before it retires out the door.

At the same time, new strategies are required to either compete more effectively in existing Red Oceans or to find new Blue Ocean strategies.

How is the strategy going to be underpinned? Potenially by using technology! SaaS (Software as a Service) based applications that utilise Cloud Computing infrastructure services are being steadily used as new strategy option. They may not be the answer, to every strategy, but increasingly, as it becomes more difficult to find resources willing to work within companies, they will become a core part of an organisation's strategy.

Are current boards or your existing board up to the challenge around this? Am interested to hear your opinions about this.

Tags cloud+computing strategy technology thinking company+directors   |  Comments 0