Technology trends in 2005 (page 1 of 3)

Oracle sees some interesting technology developments that are set to bring benefits to both the public and private sectors. In 2005, some will become broadly adopted, while others will remain further out on the horizon.

Grid Computing
Predicting the future of technology change has been key to Oracle's success and Oracle is confident that a Grid-based enterprise IT infrastructure is the next logical evolution in IT. Grid computing, which helps companies save money via optimum utilisation of hardware resources, is gaining increased acceptance.

Whilst last year, customers asked - what is Grid? - this year, they enquire - how can I implement Grid? The concept of Grid is easy to grasp - it utilises the estimated 40 percent of wasted storage capacity that languishes in most organisations' servers. Year 2005 will see a much broader implementation of this cost-reducing technology.

The Year of Linux in the Enterprise
In 2002 Oracle bet heavily on Linux and has since transferred many of its operations to the open source based operating system.

In 2005 Oracle expects an increasing number of both public and private organisations to follow in their footsteps, moving Linux from an IT project to a mission-critical enterprise operating system. Within the public sector, Linux is increasing becoming the operating system of choice, as it is freely available, thereby reducing government costs.

On-Demand Computing
Software as a service - a model under which companies can outsource the deployment, management, maintenance and support of business software to third-party service providers - has been a slow burner since first touted a few years ago, but is becoming increasingly popular.

The interest has become so pronounced that technology industry analyst IDC Corporation has predicted that by 2005, this model - which heralds the convergence of two previously discrete functions, software delivery and customer service - will grow into a US$24-billion-a year market.

Would-be users are starting to overcome their initial resistance to having critical data managed off-site as hosting models become more sophisticated and secure. The compelling driver is the predictable costs and substantial savings. Early adopters are eulogising about the costs savings of anything between 25% to 50% of their total IT budgets.

Service-oriented architectures (SOA) will reflect how we use our systems
In the evolution of computing architectural systems, the mainframe model was followed by client/server, which itself was dramatically made obsolete by the advent of the Internet.

Today, Service-oriented architectures (SOA) are the next architectural change in how computing programmes are created. SOA is nascent today, but it signals the next big shift in the development of computing architectures. Computers have always been used for the automation of business processes.

What companies are now focusing on is the correct management of these processes (Business Process Management, or BPM), which requires the computer functions that map to these processes to be architected as services which can be independently invoked. SOA is the architectural approach that will enable this to happen.

SOA is set to have a major influence on the development of business IT systems over the coming years. This isn't something that will happen overnight as it will require organisations to devote considerable time and investment to get it right.