Article
11/22/2021

The Arc Magazine

In issue 2 of The Arc, we aim to show you the implications for S+S and the effects it has around security, interoperability and services by talking to key figures and gaining an insight of how things might play out. We also feature an interview with Mark Taylor, Director of Developer and Platform Evangelism at Microsoft UK, the man charged with leading the S+S push within the UK.

Issue 2: Software & Services – The Architecture

Welcome to Issue 2

This magazine has been put together to showcase the Microsoft Software + Services (S+S) strategy from an architectural perspective and will help explain the fundamental architectural considerations and impact that software plus services will have.

Microsoft’s investments in S+S are framed by three core principles. Firstly, experiences should span beyond a single device. Secondly, infrastructure and solutions should extend from the server to the cloud. And lastly, tightly coupled systems should give way to federations of cooperating systems and loosely coupled compositions.

Software + Services: The Architecture

Today, we are witnessing a great transition in computing, driven through the broad availability of the internet, the increased bandwidth to share data, and the proliferation of cheaper connected devices from the desktop to the mobile phone.

Indeed, it is easy to get lost in this new wave given the deafening buzz that is out there. However, several concepts are starting to emerge from the rest: software as a service and service delivery; Web 2.0 and user experience; service composition; as well as the cloud and service platforms.

S+S draws together these concepts and in so doing provides a definition for Microsoft’s technical strategy for this new dawn.

To understand S+S it is best to look at an example. As we know Exchange is available as an installed server application within an enterprise, but is it also available as a hosted platform either through a hosting partner or direct from Microsoft data centres. This is what we describe as a ‘finished’ service. The second characteristic of S+S is the client or user experience tier. A third S+S characteristic is that of attached services which can be viewed as extensions to the core finished service.

The first tier is our experience tier; the second is the enterprise tier, the backend systems hosting our business infrastructure and our business solutions. The third is the Web tier – externally facing systems serving customers and your prospects. The final element of S+S yet to be discussed is that of platform or ‘building block’ services.

Leader of the Pack – A Man For Four Seasons

As director of Developer and Platform Evangelism at Microsoft UK, Mark Taylor has a job on his hands. Accountable for securing the future of the Microsoft Platform by demonstrating and articulating its value proposition, he and his team must successfully deliver this vision on a number of fronts.

Today, Taylor recognises four key areas. These are S+S, security, standards and interoperability, and environmental sustainability. Right now, Taylor says he is seeing a variety of trends emerging. Data centres are becoming more agile, broadband penetration and speeds are up, and social networking technologies are becoming pervasive.

Within all this, factors that remain key to all approaches are security, interoperable standards and environment sustainability. The key message here is one of collaboration as far as Taylor is concerned. Indeed, this should be at the heart of forward thinking providers and enterprises alike as they look to rein in costs by crossing divides that have held firm for so many years.

“The IT Industry needs to work together to tackle the problems that arise as we move to a world where we need interoperability between different service providers,” he adds, citing identity management as a key cross-industry problem that companies are already working together on.

“Over time though, driven by economies of scale and agility, I believe that many clients will look to a combination of software on –premise working in combination with services consumed from a service provider. It will not be either software on-premise or services consumed,” he adds.

A Question of Trust

The spate of data losses and insider abuse of privileged access to information has highlighted the problems associated with the acquisition and storage of personal information. Thankfully, those days have passed. People are realising that data can be a toxic liability and consequently a serious business risk. However, one of the largest remaining obstacles is the poor identity infrastructure across the Internet and some of the services it hosts, including email and websites.

“It still remains almost impossible for us to prove who we are when we are online and, worse, it remains impossible for us to prove that the other party or parties we are dealing with are who they say they are,” explains Jerry Fishenden, national technology officer, Microsoft UK.

Other key concerns raised tend to be about where data s being held, portability, and the type of identity, security and privacy regime that is in place to ensure a higher standard of protection around personal information than in the past. Businesses and governments who take best advantage of the software plus services (S+S) computing models will be able to both improve operational efficiencies and improve the quality of their services, but this will require a common framework around issues such as identity to ensure that different service providers and users can use them in a trusted and secure way.

Yet to succeed in enabling change to happen, cloud computing providers need to collectively be aware of key issues like charging models, data portability, openly documented interfaces and protocols, and common standards of security, privacy and identity. One of the main issues here which is certainly true is that IT will never be static, creating problems for vendors and users alike. Innovation and developments in a constantly evolving space mean that businesses and governments need to keep a close eye on things to ensure continued optimisation of technology that supports their services.

Together as ONE

Having recently launched an interoperability Initiative on a worldwide scale, Microsoft has been keen to demonstrate how its interoperability capabilities can support customer needs, especially in light of the current economic storm. As Giampiero Nanni, director of interoperability, Microsoft UK, stresses, it’s time for the company to provide evidence of a collaborative, pragmatic, customer and partner-oriented approach to all parties.

In February 2008 Microsoft announced its interoperability principles. These represent a commitment to a proactive interoperable approach to product design for its six high-volume products in terms of open engagement with the community, data portability, open connections, and standards support.

In a move further designed to show solidarity, Microsoft is also providing access to its technology through the licensing of patents, copyright, trademarks, and other IP rights, giving other vendors the opportunity to develop their solutions on its platform.

“Technical interoperability however, is only one level of this paradigm, which in turn enables the so called ‘semantic interoperability’, referring to the seamless flow of information between diverse systems, and ‘people interoperability’, the ability for different divisions, organisations or government agencies, to cooperate from a business and functional point of view, regardless of technology, standards or location constraints,” he explains.

One important example of collaboration cited by Nanni, in this case with a competitor and in a very sensitive area, is the Microsoft-Novell agreement. Over twenty organisations in the UK, both within private and public sectors, have embraced this approach and now run hybrid Microsoft and Linux environments, leveraging virtualisation and interoperability capabilities, and ultimately enjoying peace of mind in conducting their business or providing citizen services.

With Microsoft’s S+S vision already widely recognised as a leading strategy in the market place, Nanni believes the company will enjoy the benefits of this being a natural extension of its interoperability policy. Its recently announced Azure standard-based platform has been conceived with this in mind as it supports multiple protocols and enables developers to conceive and build applications on an agile and cost-effective fashion with other development environments such as Java, PHP or Ruby.

Going Green

Like many organisations around the world Microsoft has committed itself to software and technology innovations to help people and organisations improve the environment. The goal quite simply, is to reduce the impact of its operations and products and lead in environmental responsibility. To do this, it is aiming to revolutionise the way we look at things by using technology to help solve the challenges of sustainability whilst encouraging environmental responsibility and action globally.

“We believe that software is foundational to solving today’s environmental challenges and enabling long-term sustainability,” adds Francois Ajenstat, director, Environmental Sustainability, Trustworthy Computing, Microsoft Corp. He says the company is driving new ways to reduce energy consumed by technology, rethink business practices, and research new solutions. This means looking to drive energy efficiency at all levels across the enterprise from desktop to the server and to the datacentre in order to ensure that each node only uses the amount of energy that it needs.

When looking at the cloud, Ajenstat believes we must consider two elements. “For the first it’s about efficiency and improving on our power usage effectiveness. But it’s also about driving innovative approaches to building datacentres that reduce the impact on the environment”. The second part is all about customers rethinking their infrastructure and reducing their impact by using the cloud to host their services and applications.

Going down this route and opting for a software plus service approach (S+S) can also help deliver the environmental benefits many are yearning for, not only through reduced infrastructure but also from a reduction in energy costs associated with equipment and its use. It’s also a great way of keeping the power usage effectiveness (PUE) low and under control for both Microsoft and its customers.