Infrastructures and Architectures post the 'com hype and crash

1
Infrastructures and Architectures post the .com
hype and crash

• Alexander Voss
• National Centre for e-Social Science
  alex.voss_at_ncess.ac.uk
• www.ncess.ac.uk

2
The .com Bubble

• Ca. 1997-2001
• Emergence of the Web
• Applications mainly around
• Simple, one-way content delivery models
• Company presentation and advertising
• Customer relationship management
• New, unconventional business models emerging
• Sector awash with money for
• Internet and network infrastructure (e.g.
  Worldcom)
• Internet tools (e.g. Netscape)
• Consumer websites and portals (e.g. Yahoo)
• Only few business models turned out to be
  successful, leading to the .com bubble burst
  ca. 2001
• A healthy shake-out for the industry?

3
Whats different today?

• Growth of the Web/Internet has continued
• Technologies have matured, interoperability
  increased
• But, crucially, the Web has started to become a
  platform for more sophisticated applications
• Much wider range of uses, partially replacing
  desktop functionality and emphasising
  collaborative aspects of computing
• Enabled by
• Advent of XML as extensible data interchange
  format in server-to-server communication
• Availability of components, application server
  containers and established programming models
• Higher level of abstraction as a starting point
  for systems development

4
Web 2.0 and Mashups .com coming of age?

• Web 2.0 cover term for technologies enabling
  rich user experiences and complex functionality
• Mashup trading and assembly of functionality
  through public APIs
• http//www.programmableweb.com/
• Web Application Hosting
• SalesForce.com online CRM system
• Google writely online text processor
• Del.ico.us online, collaborative bookmarking
• YouOS, Microsofts Live.com, Yahoo 360 desktop
  in a web browser
• MySpace.com

5
Web 2.0 and Mashup Examples

• http//www.connotea.org/
• http//www.scanbuy.com/
• http//tvmap.thomasscott.net/
• http//lovejoy.nerc-essc.ac.uk8080/Godiva2

6
Components and Services

• The programming models behind Web 2.0 and Mashups
  are the same used for building enterprise
  applications, i.e. The boundaries between the
  web and everything else are becoming difficult
  to define.
• Components services also used within, even what
  is sold as an application may consist of a
  configuration of individually developed
  components
• Inversion of control, programming to interfaces
  and aspect orientation make new degrees of
  independence between modules possible and allow a
  true pick-n-mix approach to application
  assembly, sourcing from a best of breed market.

7
Some emerging themes

• User-customer-provider relationships are becoming
  increasingly complex and dynamic, functionality
  arises from combinations of independent parts
• Security and privacy in dynamic assemblages
• Provenance of data, auditing its processing
• Demarcation of areas of responsibility and
  locating problems
• Maintaining technological and operational
  alignment
• Managing usage, avoiding abuse
• Increased importance of and changing modes of
  standardisation?

8
Relevance yet another bubble?

• Amazon claims to have made 28 of its turnover
  through its programmable interfaces in 2Q05
  490M (source iX Magazin)
• eBay processed 8 billion web service requests in
  4Q05 and counted 1900 applications using its
  services
• (source iX Magazin)

9
Wider Relevance of Grid/eScience

• Many future applications will require
  functionality being developed in the
  Grid/eScience community, may problems are the
  same
• security/privacy requirements (MySpace -
  CancerGrid)
• provenance and conditions of use (Flickr - UK
  data archive)
• eScience and other applications are starting to
  inform each other, Grid technologies and the Web
  Service world are beginning to merge