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InComparison OutSystems Platform and Force.com different PaaS for different players An InComparison Paper by Bloor Research Author : David Norfolk Publish date : October 2013 Using cloud doesn’t necessarily (and shouldn’t) mean giving up control of your data and processing David Norfolk OutSystems Platform and Force.com different PaaS for different players Executive summary This paper is about two different PaaS— ethos for end user computing. This is what Platform as a Service—solutions. In the PaaS could make Force.com popular—it’s busi- model, the cloud service customer creates the ness-oriented and Force developers should software it needs using tools and/or libraries not need to bother about performance, avail- from the PaaS provider. The customer also ability, security etc., all of which are supplied controls software deployment and configura- by the platform (although the effectiveness of tion settings; whereas the PaaS provider looks this probably shouldn’t be taken for granted). after the provision of the networks, servers, Adopting a single platform (basically, Sales- storage, and other services that support force.com) with a lot of pre-written and the software. Analysts such as Gartner are market-tested apps, and the choice of predicting a sharp rise in PaaS adoption, now writing your own apps with Force.com only if that people are more used to using cloud you really have to, is very attractive to large services and PaaS isn’t only available from organisations with a lot of sometimes over- risky start-ups. lapping, usually very expensive, point solu- tions to manage. One platform with the data OutSystems is a well-established supplier shared between apps should be a lot more of high-productivity in-house programming cost-effective. tools, maintaining a “small company” ethos and culture, even as it grows. According to its Salesforce.com is also big and stable enough ‘small book’ of employee guidance, “Every so for the risk—or the risk as perceived by a often you might see Paulo (Rosado, the CEO) company’s customers and partners, which roaming around the offices and asking people may be what is important—from adopting what they are doing. If he stops and asks you Force.com to be negligible. what you are doing he’ll probably follow up by asking you why you are doing it”. Saleforce.com thus offers an attractive story, particularly to intelligent business OutSystems sees an opportunity for the supply people without too much experience of, or of its tools as a PaaS development plat- liking for, the IT status quo. However, there form, an alternative to the Force.com PaaS is a reason for PaaS and public cloud solu- used to customise and extend the Sales- tions not yet being ubiquitous. At Bloor, we force.com platform. It believes that there is think that they may well be ubiquitous in a choice worth considering for Salesforce. the future, but that there are many barriers com customers in this space—and, of course, to overcome in the minds of many of those its tools can be used to develop standalone involved with the technical detail of business custom apps from the ground up, too. automation today: Salesforce.com, vendors of Force.com, started • lock in to a particular supplier, even (or as a SaaS (Software as a Service) supplier of perhaps especially) one that is all-powerful cloud-based CRM (Customer Relationship in its space; Management) solutions; but it now sees itself as a platform supplier—on which CRM is • possible difficulties with integrating a PaaS just one app. It is now becoming a “customer solution with on-premises legacy appli- company”, as it sees it: Alex Dayon, (President cations, which may still be critical to the of applications and platform, Salesforce.com) business; says that, “the next generation of enterprise apps are social with business data embedded • possible inflexibility, if the PaaS as supplied at the core and accessible from any device. doesn’t support precisely what you need With Salesforce Communities, customer to deliver the scalability, performance or companies can connect with customers, part- security you need for a specific applica- ners and employees in entirely new ways and tion (and always remembering that regula- from anywhere”. tions may dictate an on-premises solution on occasion); Force.com is its PaaS development platform for enterprise apps—it is becoming a capa- • the possibility, even, of not getting enough bility for developing rich socially enabled access, easily enough, to sufficiently gran- enterprise apps; but it developed out of ular PaaS services to enable rigorous Salesforce.com’s original “no-computing” testing. A Bloor InComparison Paper 1 © 2013 Bloor Research OutSystems Platform and Force.com different PaaS for different players Executive summary These issues can be overcome, but this prob- Scope ably affects the choice of tool used for devel- oping for the Saleforce.com platform or This InComparison is directed towards organ- extending Salesforce.com solutions. It is isations (typically, enterprises with existing important to remember that Force.com isn’t IT systems and some concerns around regu- the same thing as Salesforce.com and, for latory compliance) looking for a professional example, OutSystems Platform now delivers developer platform on which to modernise a new PaaS solution with broadly equivalent their business automation, with especial (but capabilities to Force.com on the cloud; but a not exclusive) reference to the Salesforce. solution that has grown out of a less cloud- com platform. It is intended to help decision- focused, on-premises, high-productivity makers decide which PaaS best fits their development platform, developed back when particular needs and culture. It is probably enterprises simply weren’t ready to embrace not much of a spoiler to suggest that Force. off-premises public cloud-based solutions com might be the right choice for an existing for critical business applications. Even today, Salesforce.com customer who is entirely most businesses are most comfortable with happy with it and has been using Salesforce. ‘hybrid cloud’—where parts of a cloud solution com since setting up in business. However, can be kept on-premise if necessary. Using it might well not be such an obvious choice cloud doesn’t necessarily (and shouldn’t) for a company that has little experience with mean giving up control of your data and Salesforce.com and which has a major invest- processing. ment in legacy in-house applications. In between, there’s a judgement call; which this There is no question in our minds that this paper should help its readers to make. OutSystems innovation is a timely one. The era of the silo’d IT shop is past and business It is important to remember that, at this success now increasingly comes from mini- level, an InComparison isn’t contrasting a mising time-to-market, using agile, app- ‘good’ and a ‘bad’ product. It is looking at based, user-centric computing. The cloud two products that are fit for some purpose; and PaaS fits the emerging business auto- to identify exactly what this purpose is, and mation model well—but businesses adopting to give prospective purchasers of the prod- these new paradigms still need and expect ucts enough information to help them decide choice. whether it matches their particular purposes or requirements. © 2013 Bloor Research 2 A Bloor InComparison Paper OutSystems Platform and Force.com different PaaS for different players Market for the high productivity PaaS Both OutSystems Platform and (possibly to a PaaS is a category of cloud computing services lesser extent) Force.com are typical exam- that provides a computing platform and a ples of ‘high productivity’ development tools; solution stack as a service. Along with soft- they abstract away the complexity of conven- ware as a service (SaaS) and infrastructure as tional (third generation or 3GL) computer a service (IaaS), it is one of the service models code, generating much of the routine parts for cloud computing. In the PaaS model, of an application from high-level declara- the customer creates the software using tive statements, leaving the developer free to tools and/or libraries from the provider. The concentrate on the high-value business logic. customer also controls software deployment The caveat with Force.com is due to its fairly and configuration settings; and possibly even conventional Apex programming language, the configuration of the application hosting which is used when things get more compli- environment. The provider provides the cated than usual. networks, servers, storage and other services. People-centric business computing is coming This definition of PaaS is broadly in line with to the fore. People expect to be supported the NIST —see www.nist.gov —definition (PaaS by apps (often running on smart phones and is one of its three Cloud Service Models; tablets) that have the look-and-feel common along with SaaS; and IaaS). If readers wish to the social and entertainment apps that they to learn more about cloud service models, use in their daily life. These business apps we’d recommend Cloud Computing for Busi- aggregate the flood of information that over- ness, Chris Harding and members of the Open whelms most of us at work. They should help Group Cloud Work Group, Van Haren, ISBN people to make better business decisions, 978-90-8753-657-2. leading to increased business profitability and consequent rewards for the business (and its There are various types of PaaS offered by decision-makers). The apps differ from the the service suppliers; however, all offer appli- conventional multifunctional business appli- cation hosting and a deployment environ- cations that people are accustomed to using ment, along with various integrated services.

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