The Role of Platform-As-A-Service

Whitepaper

The Role of Platform-as-a-Service

Moving from buzzword to mainstream

WOLF Frameworks The Role of Platform-as-a-Service

Contents

Abstract ...... 3 Traditional model ...... 3 The New Model ...... 3 What is SaaS, PaaS, and IaaS…..the cloud computing lingo? ...... 3 Welcome to PaaS ...... 4 Types of PaaS ...... 4 Key Characteristics of PaaS ...... 5 Advantages of PaaS ...... 5 What Makes PaaS Different? ...... 6 Monetization of PaaS ...... 6 PaaS Service Levels ...... 7 Why WOLF Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS)? ...... 7 References ...... 8

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The Role of Platform-as-a-Service

Abstract The New Model

Platform-as-a-Service is an increasingly popular paradigm Just as Amazon.com, eBay, Google, iTunes, and YouTube moving from just being a buzzword to the mainstream. A made it possible to access new capabilities and new number of Startups, ISVs and Enterprises are now going markets through a Web browser, PaaS offers a faster, more directly to the cloud, bypassing traditional web hosting cost-effective model for application development and solutions, avoiding the need to own a server in-house, and delivery. shifting from the traditional model of software development to the new model offered by PaaS. This PaaS provides the entire infrastructure needed to run whitepaper talks about the shift from the traditional applications over the Internet. It is delivered in the same software development model to the new model offered by way as a utility like electricity or water. Users simply “tap Platform-as-a-Service. It proceeds to discuss the various in” and take what they need without worrying about the types of PaaS, key characteristics, advantages, complexity behind the scenes. And like a utility, PaaS is monetization models to the service levels offered by PaaS based on a metering or subscription model so users only providers. pay for what they use.

Traditional model With PaaS, ISVs and corporate IT departments can focus on innovation instead of complex infrastructure. By leveraging The traditional model of building and running on-premise the PaaS, organizations can redirect a significant portion of applications has always been complex, expensive and risky. their budgets from “keeping the lights on” to creating To deploy or use software we first needed the hardware applications that provide real business value. which included servers from hardware vendors like Dell, This model is driving a new era of mass innovation. For the HP, IBM or Sun. If we are intending to build a web first time, developers around the world can access application, we also required data center equipments like unlimited computing power. Now, anyone with an Internet firewalls, switches, routers, VPNs etc for performance and connection can build powerful applications and easily security. Then it was bandwidth and hosting services. deploy them to users wherever they’re located. Once the hardware is in place; we required to purchase and What is SaaS, PaaS, and IaaS…..the cloud install operating system, and subsequently an application computing lingo? server stack, such as Tomcat for Java, LAMP for PHP or Perl. Next we needed some database like MySQL or Microsoft SQL Server.

Once the stack was assembled, a team of developers had to navigate complex programming models like J2EE and .NET. A team of network, database, and system management experts was needed to keep everything up and running. Inevitably, a business requirement would require a change to the application, which would then kick off a lengthy development, test, and redeployment cycle.

Large companies often needed specialized facilities to house their data centers. Enormous amounts of electricity also were needed to power the servers as well as the Figure 1: Cloud Computing Stack systems to keep them cool. Finally, a failover site was needed to mirror the data center so information could be SaaS, PaaS and IaaS are various segments of cloud replicated in case of a disaster. computing.

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The Role of Platform-as-a-Service

Software as a Service (SaaS) is the service based on the do is keep capital expenditures under control. By moving concept of renting software from a service provider rather your infrastructure to the cloud, you have the ability to than buying it yourself. The software is hosted on scale as if you owned your own hardware and data center. centralized network servers to make functionality available over the web or intranet. Also known as “software on Welcome to PaaS demand” it is currently the most popular type of cloud What makes PaaS unique? With so much buzz around computing because of its high flexibility, great services, Cloud Computing Services including Infrastructure-as-a- enhanced scalability and less maintenance. Yahoo mail, Service (IaaS), Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) and Software- Google docs, CRM applications are all instances of SaaS. as-a-Service (SaaS), why PaaS stands out of this mix? Is The service provider hosts both the application and the PaaS simply a way of getting code up and running without data so the end user is free to use the service from having to requisition a server or there is more to it? In the anywhere. With SaaS user need not worry about words of Wikipedia, ‘Platform as a service (PaaS) is the installation or upgrades. delivery of a computing platform and solution stack as a Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) provides an independent service’. PaaS makes all of the facilities required to support platform or middleware on which developers can build and the end-to-end life cycle of building and delivering web deploy customer application. Common solutions provided applications and services entirely available from the in this tier range from APIs and tools to database and Internet with no software downloads or installation for business process management system, to security developers or end-users. integration, allowing developers to build applications and run them on the infrastructure that cloud vendors own and Types of PaaS maintains.

The final segment in the cloud computing is the infrastructure. Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) is delivery of the computing infrastructure as a fully outsourced service operated in a pay-as-you-go model. Some of the companies that provide infrastructure services are Google, IBM, and Amazon etc. Managed hosting and development environments are the services included in IaaS. The user can buy the infrastructure according to the requirements at any particular point of time instead of buying the infrastructure that might not be used for months. Virtualization enables IaaS providers to offer almost unlimited instances of servers to customers and make cost- effective use of the hosting hardware. IaaS users enjoy access to enterprise grade IT Infrastructure and resources Figure 2: Types of PaaS that might be very costly if purchased completely. Thus dynamic scaling, usage based pricing, reduced costs and Social Application Platforms – Social Application Platforms access to superior IT resources are some of the benefits of are used to develop applications on social networks. IaaS. IaaS is also sometimes referred to as Hardware as a Platforms like Facebook, Orkut, Yahoo, and MySpace Service (HaaS). An Infrastructure as a Service offering also provide APIs for third parties to write new application provides maximum flexibility because just about anything functionality that is made available to all users. that can be virtualized can be run on these platforms. This is perhaps the biggest benefit of an IaaS environment. For a Computation Platforms – Computation Platforms are sort startup or small business, one of the most difficult things to of hardware architecture and software framework

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The Role of Platform-as-a-Service

(including application frameworks) that allows software to investing in expensive software licenses with its run. Amazon Web services and Microsoft Azure provide subscription model based on a pay-as-you-use basis. storage, processor, and bandwidth as a service. Developers 5. Eliminates the overhead of buying, configuring and can upload their traditional software stack and run their maintaining hardware such as database, middleware applications on these infrastructures. and server, which interact with each other as well as with the software, as these are all taken care of by Web Application Platforms – Web Application Platforms the PaaS provider. like Google provide APIs and functionality for developers to 6. Instant deployment of your web application. build Web applications that leverage its mapping, calendar, 7. Inherent security provided by the PaaS provider. In and spreadsheets plus YouTube and other services. addition to this, many PaaS providers give the option of enabling additional security features at a price. Business Application Platforms – Business Application 8. Multi tenant Architecture Platforms provide application infrastructure specifically for 9. Faster ROI transactional business applications such as database, 10. Scalability integration, workflow, and user interface services. For 11. Integration with a host of software systems companies unwilling to compromise on scalability, 12. Simultaneous upgrades or enchantments for SaaS reliability, and security, WOLF is a clear choice for a flexible applications or the PaaS system by the PaaS platform that manages critical business processes and is a provider. rapid online application development platform. Business

Application platforms can also be used to build situational applications. Situational Applications do not replace core Advantages of PaaS business applications. They address a different need — Following are the some advantages of PaaS as a Customer applications that are built for just a handful of users, point of view: applications that are used for only a few weeks or months, or applications that address a small piece of functionality. 1. Low cost and lower total cost of ownership (TCO): Situational applications are a potent combination of tools, Generally when customer wants to have a software mindset and methodology. They provide a formidable force business solution (IT enabled business solution), that helps your organization meet today’s business there are many factors for which cost have to be challenges quickly and cost-effectively. considered. The various types of costs involved are datacenter costs, setup costs, licensing costs, Key Characteristics of PaaS training costs, maintenance costs and support costs. 1. Simplified and reduced infrastructure - Build web When a customer uses PaaS as a business solution, applications using a browser and an internet then they don’t have to worry about this entire connection. infrastructure and ultimately there is reduction in 2. Work across boundaries - Collaboration of cost. geographically distributed teams in development 2. Zero Infrastructure - Reduced Overheads: Customer and maintenance of a software. not has to consider setup and maintenance so there 3. PaaS keeps the focus on the design - PaaS takes care is less overhead associated with PaaS model. of configuring and maintaining the interoperability 3. On demand service: Customer can use a platform of of individual components of the web application, their choice and requirement on a subscription basis enabling the focus to be on the design of the and when there is no need for it they can software. discontinue the same. 4. Removes the overhead of buying/installing 4. Lower risk - faster implementations and outsourced additional software - PaaS works on an On-Demand expertise dramatically lower risk Model. It further eliminates the overhead of 5. A more powerful and secure IT infrastructure

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The Role of Platform-as-a-Service

6. Cost-effective Infinite Scalability: Customer can Scale PaaS platforms also have functional differences from the no of user licenses as per their requirements. traditional development platforms. These include: 7. Easy to implement: As there is no infrastructure setup associated with PaaS, it is easy to implement 1. Multi-tenant development tool: traditional 8. Freedom of Choice: As there are many PaaS development tools are single user – PaaS supports providers, customer can select according to their multiple users, each with multiple roles. choice and requirement. 2. Multi-tenant deployment architecture: scalability is 9. Centralized feature updating, which obviates the often not a concern of the initial development effort need for downloadable patches and upgrades and is left instead for the system administrators to 10. Per license cost has to give deal with when the project deploys. In PaaS, scalability of the application and data tiers must be built-in (e.g., load balancing, failover need to be Platform as a Service (PaaS) help business users to basic elements of the dev platform itself). minimize operational costs and increase their productivity. 3. Integrated management: traditional development Some of the advantages to business users are: solution usually does not concern them with runtime monitoring, but in PaaS, the monitoring ability needs 1. Time to Market to be baked into the development platform. 2. Requires no up-front investments 4. Integrated billing: PaaS offerings require 3. Minimize operational costs mechanisms for billing based on usage that are 4. Centralized information management unique to the SaaS world. 5. Enhanced productivity 6. Access to information anywhere, anytime 7. Easy collaboration Monetization of PaaS 8. Secured and customized access The traditional licensing model of the on-premise platform or software is not the best idea for On-demand Platform. A Platform as a Service (PaaS) enables developers to focus subscription pricing model is the most suitable solution to only on innovation that provide real business value instead PaaS monetization. Many PaaS providers face the problem of infrastructure set-up. Some of the advantages are: of fixing the right price for its platform/services. There are many alternatives and factors that should be considered 1. Zero Infrastructure when dealing with this. 2. Lower Risk 3. Lower cost and improved profitability 4. Easy and quick development Pay Pay per 5. Monetize quickly Periodically User 6. Reusable code and business logics 7. Integration with other web services

Pay for Pay per What Makes PaaS Different? Resources Features

The alternative to PaaS is to develop web applications using desktop development tools like Eclipse or Microsoft Access, Figure 3: Payment models of PaaS and then manually deploy those applications to a cloud Some of the pricing alternatives for Platform-as-a-Service hosting provider such as Amazon EC2. are:

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The Role of Platform-as-a-Service

1. Pay Periodically: This means charging the customer 2. Customized SaaS solutions for every customer on regular basis as a monthly subscription fees. o WOLF’s unique technical architecture allows 2. Pay for each user: Charge the customer on the basis customers to develop and enhance custom of the number of users for the platform. features and processes within days with minimal 3. Pay for the resources: This means charging the investments. customer for computing resources such as data o You have freedom to white label your solutions storage. – custom branding, personalized URL and 4. Pay for the features: The customer pays just for the custom UI. Easily embed WOLF functional features in the platform they really need. This can be widgets in your website, portal or blog. based on the number of applications a customer can 3. Intuitive Business Rules Engine build on the platform. o Ready-to-use Business Rule Actions to fire & map complex business processes. Draw complex PaaS Service Levels analysis from data and represent it in the form of reports, graphical charts and dashboard items within minutes. 4. Interoperable & Mashable SaaS Applications o Ready actions to interact with on-premise or other Cloud based software systems. No need to deal with APIs– use configurable business rules. 5. Secure o Built-in User/Role Management module, supports highly secured 128-bit encryption enabled URL, SSO authentication & AD integration. Figure 4: Cloud Service Levels 6. The End of IT Maintenance The above diagram shows the service levels associated with o Focus on your business application the various segments of cloud computing. In a Platform-as- functionality/core competency while WOLF a-Service model it is the just the application that you need maintains and upgrades the underlying to manage, the rest is taken care of by the PaaS vendor. technology & infrastructure and manages your The PaaS manages the runtimes, security & integration, business solution. database, servers, virtualization, server HW, storage and networking making it much simpler for you and allows 7. Flexible Deployment Options focusing on your business and the application you use. o Hybrid & flexible deployment models. Host the application in your preferred server: Private Cloud or just run it from the WOLF On Demand Why WOLF Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS)? Public Cloud or a third party hosting provider 8. Reduced Vendor Lock-in 1. Reduced time-to-market and faster ROI o Own the Business IP via paper license, extract & o Reduce the time & cost for developing custom save data in your private database & also extract web-based software by more than 70% as application design in a portable XML format compared to any standard software with a single click. development cycle. 9. Cost Effective, Scalable and pay as you earn o Clicks instead of code – design all the way! o Monthly subscription fee on per user / per o Business Rules engine to define custom month basis ranging from USD $ 7 to $ 10. workflow o Scale your application cost-effectively with your o Ready chart and report templates business.

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The Role of Platform-as-a-Service

10. Leverage the WOLF Partner Ecosystem as-a-Services within days. WOLF also has o The Partner Model is targeted to drive idea specialized channel partners delivering these partners, SI’s, ISV’s, and Consulting firms to SaaS applications to customers across regions. rapidly commoditize and commercialize their business processes and offer them as Software-

References

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Platform_as_a_service [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloud_computing [3] http://www.wolfframeworks.com/ [4] http://www.keeneview.com/2009/03/what-is-platform-as-service-paas.html [5] http://crmhelpdesksoftware.com/what-is-saas-paas-iaas-understanding-cloud-computing-lingo/ [6] http://cloud-computing.learningtree.com/2010/08/25/comparing-paas-and-iaas/ [7] http://www.slideshare.net/AspireSystems/going-ondemand-iaas-paas-or-solution-accelerators [8] http://www.slideshare.net/jcleblanc/foundations-of-a-social-platform [9] http://www.zdnet.com/blog/saas/a-plethora-of-paas-options/472 [10] http://eprints.ecs.soton.ac.uk/21078/1/2010_-_21078.pdf [11] http://vlele.wordpress.com/2010/12/07/platform-as-a-service-when-it-comes-to-the-cloud-paas-is-the-point-2/ [12] http://devcentral.f5.com/weblogs/macvittie/archive/2010/02/11/return-of-the-web-application-platform- wars.aspx [13] http://www.asp-toolkit.com/tag/pricing-models [14] http://cioresearchcenter.com/2010/12/107/ [15] http://itknowledgeexchange.techtarget.com/bookworm/building-information-systems-at-the-edge-of-chaos/ [16] Jonathan Sapir, “Power in the Cloud”, Using Cloud Computing to Build Information Systems at the Edge of Chaos, 2009 [17] http://www.cloudcomputinglive.com/mea/paas.html [18] http://cloudpulseblog.com/2010/02/the-essential-characteristics-of-paas

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