Users struggle with recipe when moving enterprise apps to the cloud For the world's two dominant ERP vendors, the cloud is their future infrastructure. For customers of Oracle and SAP, getting there can mean technology and business process upheaval, but the commercial relationship with the vendor is also transformed. Speaking to The Register ahead of Gartner's IT SYM/Xpo in Barcelona this week …
"I call it a siloed meatballs and spaghetti model versus a horizontal lasagna model."
Yet you wonder why the vast majority of people think cloud tech is a load of mis-sold bullshit.
"Dawson warns that users should treat infrastructure migration, cloud transition, and application modernization differently"
They _are_ different. Application modernization usually involves rewriting an app to the point where it's no longer the original app, with a view to being able to deploy it on some cloud infrastructure. There is no such thing as cloud transition without it. Same goes for infrastructure migration - it's _different_ infrastructure! Which leads us nicely to the next point...
"That is not an easy transition, especially when you have to look at things like implementation costs and upfront costs as well"
The usual crap that's spouted by people who suggest the cloud is the holy grail of saving money never consider the upfront costs. Assuming you have applications X, Y and Z all working and running perfectly then yes maybe - just maybe - you could get away with saying it's advantageous to be able to use them for 3 years on a consumption basis and then move on. But it never works like that because of all the cost in getting to that point in the first place.
I spent 42 years in IT before I retired (prompted in some degree to my dislike for cloud).
The last 25 years of my 42 years was dedicated to moving (as a consultant) large scale customers between differing Unix platform and laterly from Unix to Linux, in the applications and database space.
Now we are talking large customer's "crown jewel" apps/databases and here you hit a huge quandary. Simple example: two "crown jewel" Oracle databases (running on prem) that do two phase commits over dblinks between each other. In the old "on prem" days, you would migrate one database, let it bed in then move the other safe in the knowledge that the two phase commits were across a local LAN.
What do you do for a cloud mig: only move one and now your two phase commits are across a WAN or take the risk and move BOTH mission critical apps/db's to the cloud at the same time?
Extend the analogy and look at a system (say a telco) where you have systems taking raw data acquisitions from switches and then doing some ETL into say the billing systems, the CRM systems and other related databases.
Aint gonna work (a onperm/cloud split) so what do you do in the rush to "save" money by moving to the cloud. Hence my retirement..intractable topologies that some CIO (looking for the next bonus) will force into the cloud... not something I wanted to be involved with.
Bluck
Quote: "...a smooth and successful transition to the cloud...."
On-prem: the business has control over the hardware, the software and some of the support.
Cloud: the business has NO CONTROL over the hardware, the software or any of the support.
Cui bono? Well.....SAP, Oracle, Amazon, Microsoft.........
Who has control? Well.....SAP, Oracle, Amazon, Microsoft.........
How much is control worth? Well...ask SAP, Oracle, Amazon, Microsoft.........!!!!
Bad journalism........
" people think, 'Oh, I'm moving from capex to opex.'"
When people think that do they also think 'What happens if, for any reason, I can't make a payment?' and look at the T&Cs to find out? If they're not careful they might find that that's an outgoing which has to take precedence over everything else, including payroll.
I foresee a long period of retrenchment where sales will drop dramatically meaning less profit and a tightening of belts all around apart from the C-level execs who will manage the company from their tripical island boltholes.
The world economy will take a great hit as all those millions of key workers in the US are [cough][cough] sent home (aka deported). The snowball effect will hit everyone.
The SAAS,PAAS, IAAS (add your **AAS to suit), well know it's a gravy train that will catch and awful lot of businesses out on costs,time, effort etc., etc., but by then, you're stuck between a rock and a hard place whilst you work out who or what needs to change to actually get the "savings" you were promised by the sales team.
For some organisations, Cloud will work, for others, they are pissing in the wind trying to keep up with the Jones'.
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