Second-generation cloud architecture: breaking the application silo

Table of Contents

  1. Summary
  2. Application evolution: from the mainframe to the cloud
  3. Application integration: from silos to interoperability
  4. Going forward: from cloud-enabled to cloud-native
  5. Key takeaways
  6. About George Anadiotis

1. Summary

The cloud as we have come to know it is starting to crack. Like any new technology, it has become a buzzword at the peak of its phase of inflated expectations. Just as early television programs were little more than filmed stage plays, first-generation cloud applications are often just yesterday’s apps in a different data center. But the cloud has grown up, and there are no more excuses for building siloed, brittle applications that can’t exploit all the benefits of distributed, on-demand computing. The manner in which traditional applications have been architected is no longer sufficient to address applications that have become strategic business assets. We must change the way application architects and information managers approach application development and integration going forward.

Key findings include:

  • Traditional application architecture is a patchwork that is unable to cope with the challenges of today’s business needs.
  • An agile and holistic approach is needed, and applications cannot possibly support this by operating in silos; integration is the key.
  • If we move applications to the cloud without a change of architectural paradigm, we will at best get modest benefits and at worst broken applications. We need a new set of guidelines to build applications suitable for today’s business.

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