Six characteristics of SaaS
The world of IT doesn’t stand still and never has this been truer than it is today. SOA and related concepts are still riding strong on the wave but a new contender is starting to make its way through into the mainstream; this being the concept of Software as a Service (SaaS).
SaaS is a very nebulous term that really encapsulates a whole range of new and existing software delivery models often bundled together in different combinations in order to deliver a particular service or function to a particular consumer be that human or computer. It is a term that to me really describes a point in time, a transition in the way software is delivered and consumed, the ultimate enabler for which is down to the ubiquity of computer communication made possible as a result of the Internet, broadband and vast reduction in hardware costs.
For this reason, we shouldn’t get too stuck on crystallising a single definition for SaaS as it really represents a moving target and at some point we'll hopefully just revert back to using the good old word software once more. But for the moment, as we move through this transitional period there is definite value in highlighting the changes in software delivery that is crystallised in the acronym SaaS.
So with this in mind over the next few postings I plan to provide an overview of what in my opinion SaaS encapsulates today in terms of a set of six common characteristics that frequently re-occur when we see implementations of SaaS in the wild.
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SaaS: Application
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SaaS: Licensing
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SaaS: Location
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SaaS: Management
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SaaS: Community
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SaaS: Reach
As always feedback is welcomed and if there are additional characteristics then I would be interested in your opinions.
