MICROSOFT

Microsoft.NET will make computing and communicating simpler and easier than ever. It will spawn a new generation of Internet services, and enable tens of thousands of software developers to create revolutionary new kinds of online services and businesses. It will put you back in control, and enable greater control of your privacy, digital identity and data.



Microsoft Dynamics business solutions bring together information from every corner of your company and let you analyze it to make more profitable decisions. As part of the Microsoft family of offerings, these solutions are ready to work with widely-used productivity applications, like Microsoft Office, and top technologies like Microsoft Servers and Microsoft .NET. Data entered by an employee in one place is shared by others across your company—speeding operations, reducing errors, and putting accurate information at the fingertips of those who need it. But "connected" doesn't stop there. Processes can be securely extended to your entire business community, helping you maximize efficiency.

WAVEMAKER

WaveMaker is a rapid application development environment for building, maintaining and modernizing business-critical Web 2.0 applications.

Web Fast
• WaveMaker eliminates Java coding for building Web 2.0 applications, allowing developers to focus on solving business problems.
• WaveMaker's visual, WYSIWYG development studio was built using WaveMaker!

CIO Safe
• WaveMaker Studio generates standard Java apps - extensible by expert developers using any Java IDE.
• WaveMaker Enterprise Server uses standard Java components to provide security, data access & scalability.

Cloud Ready
• One-click deployment eliminates the complexity of deploying web apps to enterprise or cloud-based hosting.
• WaveMaker Enterprise Server automatically provides same multi-tenancy architecture as SalesForce.com.
• WaveMaker is the only open source cloud development platform! Deploy to your choice of cloud hosts directly from the Studio: Amazon EC2, Rackspace, OpSource or Eucalyptus.

Eliminating Complexity
• WaveMaker Studio will look and feel especially familiar to client/server developers who are used to working with visual tools like Microsoft Access.
• WaveMaker slashes the painful Java learning curve for developers who are familiar with tools like Microsoft .Net, Lotus Notes, Oracle Forms, PowerBuilder or ColdFusion.

Studio and Server Products
• WaveMaker Studio is a visual, WYSIWYG development tool that runs in a standard browser.
• WaveMaker Enterprise Server is a standards-based Java server that runs WaveMaker applications.

Enterprise, Community and Cloud Editions
• WaveMaker Enterprise Edition provides enterprise security, scalability and deployment features, along with commercial support.
• WaveMaker Community Edition is licensed under the open source Apache license.

MAGIC SOFTWARE ENTERPRISE

uniPaaS - the most productive and cost-effective application platform for Full Client, RIA & SaaS

uniPaaS is Magic Software’s comprehensive application platform and the next generation of the company’s award-winning eDeveloper series. It is also the company’s first Rich Internet Application (RIA) and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) Enabled Application Platform (SEAP) that uses a single development paradigm to automatically handle all Client and Server partitioning. Unique to the market, uniPaaS gives you the power to choose how you deploy your applications, whether Full Client or web; on-premise or on-demand; software or Software-as-a-Service; or global or local.

By offering technology transparency, uniPaaS enables customers to focus on their business requirements rather than technological means. uniPaaS’ single development paradigm significantly reduces the time and costs associated with the development and deployment of RIA. With uniPaaS you can deploy the most profitable applications quicker than ever before, and at an unprecedented low cost of ownership.

In addition, application owners can move from Full Client mode to RIA and SaaS and back again.


uniPaaS business benefits
• Eliminates multiple paradigms and skill-set requirements
• Significantly faster time-to-market & ROI
• Higher revenues & profitability
• Better performance & responsiveness
• Considerably lower cost of operation & ownership
• Business-oriented application development
• Much lower development risks
• Future growth opportunities
• Superior application productivity
• Investment and skills preservation
• Easy conversion of existing applications to RIA

EMERGING TECHNOLOGY

Is your company one that tries the hot, new technology just after it is released (early adopter)? Or is your organization one that waits for months, sometimes years, before implementing the technology (late adopter)? Regardless of which end of the spectrum you fall (most small to medium-sized businesses are somewhere in the middle), hot or emerging technologies capture your attention because they are constantly discussed in publications, in web seminars, in conferences and many other venues.

Here are some technologies that are piquing the interest of small and medium businesses and being adopted as they mature in their feature set and lifecycle.

Server Virtualization and its associated technology is based on the premise that an average server is typically being utilized 5-15%.  A best practice by network administrators is to distribute applications onto separate servers so the server won’t experience utilization spikes, possibly disrupt services or become a single point of failure.  This practice led to “server sprawl” because network administrators started buying one server for every application. Virtualization allows administrators to store several under-utilized servers on a single piece of hardware and also store an entire server as a set of files. These files contain the operating system, application and data.  The files can then be moved from one physical server to the next as the hardware utilization rate changes.
Generally organizations consider virtualization for two main reasons – consolidation and high availability.  Consolidating reduces the server sprawl and its associated costs and resources: the electricity bill, hardware maintenance, warranties, technical support, air conditioning/cooling systems, real estate or physical space. 

Organizations that want to achieve high availability because they have a very low tolerance for downtime use virtualization to achieve this goal.  Virtualization can allow servers to be safely moved from one physical server to another with no impact to end users.  Virtualizing a production environment better prepares companies for a disaster as the virtual servers can be safely moved from one physical server to the next under certain circumstances. 

SaaS or Software as a Service is more of a model or methodology where software applications are used or accessed via the web versus installing the application on each user's machine and running the software "locally". These products are built specifically for one-to-many usage over the Internet. The advantages include no maintenance or updates by the IT department, no management of hardware, instant updates delivered by the software company, and pay-as- you go licensing model. Some of the most popular or well known SaaS products include Salesforce.com, Google Apps, QuickBooks or TuboTax Online, and WebEx.

The disadvantages to these services are that it may cost more in the long run, you have less control over the application or little customization capabilities and the vendor's longevity or viability is more of a concern. SaaS products are generally considered part of Cloud Computing, where anything can be made into a service (storage, backup, infrastructure, voice) that leverages the Internet or “cloud” as it is sometimes called or depicted.

For assistance with implementation of any emerging technology, contact MIG to help you evaluate the advantages and disadvantages and to determine if your business will benefit from these new technologies.