New ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning):

Fino a oggi le imprese sono state abituate a considerare i loro sistemi informativi (ERP) comunque come entità 'proprietarie', anche quando sono basati su package e applicazioni di mercato. Le imprese comprano o noleggiano hardware, acquisiscono software in licenza o lo sviluppano internamente e danno lavoro a un gran numero di persone per consentire al sistema informativo di funzionare a dovere. Questo approccio ha funzionato, ma non sempre in modo soddisfacente. Dopo anni di questa politica, oggi le aziende si ritrovano con un miscuglio di sistemi diversi, non interoperabili tra loro se non al prezzo di costose integrazioni. Nel tentativo di risolvere anche questo problema, negli anni recenti molte aziende hanno investito enormi risorse nell'implementazione di suite ERP basate su database centralizzati. Sebbene queste applicazioni risolvano il problema dell'integrazione, lo fanno al prezzo di imbrigliare i processi di business all'interno di regole modificabili con difficoltà. Ciò mal si concilia con l'esigenza di flessibilità che è propria, per esempio, in scenari di acquisizione o fusione di aziende e con la necessità sempre maggiore di interagire con partner secondo modalità di volta in volta diverse.

L'architettura dei Web services è completamente diversa. Basata su Internet, essa è un'architettura aperta e non proprietaria. Grazie all'adozione di standard ormai condivisi da tutti - XML, SOAP, WSDL... - essa non è legata a una specifica piattaforma hardware o software o a un singolo linguaggio di programmazione. Anzichè acquistare o costruirsi i propri sistemi, le aziende possono prendere in affitto solo i servizi che a loro interessano, quando vogliono e per il tempo che a loro serve.I benefici di questo approccio sono diversi. Il primo è dato dalla possibilità di realizzare integrazioni in modo 'lasco' (si parla di 'loose coupling' in contrapposizione a 'tight coupling'), cioè dinamico e non predefinito. Il secondo beneficio è dato dalla facilità di realizzare una migrazione da un'architettura tradizionale a una basata sui servizi - SOA, Service Oriented Architecture - in modo incrementale e a basso costo. SOA è un sistema per collegare risorse a richiesta. (Guarda presentazione) In una SOA, le risorse sono rese disponibili agli altri partecipanti all'interno della rete come servizi indipendenti accessibili in modo standardizzato. Ciò fornisce un accoppiameno lasco delle risorse più flessibile rispetto a un'architettura tradizionale dei sistemi.
Dopo il paradigma di programmazione orientato agli oggetti gli informatici parleranno di architettura di applicazioni basate sui servizi Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA) .
Uno studio Gartner riferisce che "By 2008, SOA will be a prevailing software engineering practice, ending the 40-year domination of monolithic software architecture" e "Through 2008, SOA and Web services will be implemented together in more than 75 percent of new SOA or Web services projects."
 

Insomma, secondo Gartner, fra tre anni il SOA sarà una architettura largamente diffusa.
Quali sono le piattaforme che concretamente consentiranno di costruire software con questa filosofia?
I grandi attori della scena IT sono sempre gli stessi tre : Open Source, Sun e Microsoft.

Il movimento Open Source è sorretto non solo dalla comunità degli sviluppatori indipendenti ma in larga misura della grande multinazionali. Per ora l'Open Source sembra essere ancora indietro, o meglio è presente in minima parte grazie al sostegno di Bea Systems, che ha lanciato lo slogan:"Deploy Soa. Now", ovvero: "fare Soa, adesso".
 

Sun sta invece semplificando l'implementazione dei Web Services: il Java Community Process (Jcp) ha sviluppato e approvato all'unanimità i metadati Web service per le Java Specification Requests, nome in codice Jsr 181.
Gli strumenti di sviluppo compatibili con la J2EE potranno usare un set di annotazioni standard per generare prototipi di servizi Web, saltando così diversi passaggi di scrittura del codice.
 

Sul versante Microsoft dobbiamo parlare del nuovo sistema Operativo Windows Longhorn che sarà basato su tre pilastri, uno dei quali è appunto Indigo il nome in codice di una tecnologia basato proprio sui Web Services organizzati in SOA.
Indigo, che è un colore, più esattamente il grigio blu nella tavolozza dei colori di Windows, molto probabilmente sarà la più grande ed efficiente rampa di lancio per questa tecnologia proprio perché inserita all'interno del sistema operativo più diffuso del mondo.

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1) ERP Web services based

The Third Wave

Kapil Apshankar

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Every major technology goes through a series of revolutions or "waves" with each wave building upon the generation before it, and ERP is no exception. The first wave of ERP was the onset of computers in manufacturing. This was followed by a wave where specialized ERP applications began to emerge. Web Services based ERP solutions constitute what can be appropriately termed as the Third Wave in Enterprise Resource Planning. This article looks at who the major players in the foray are.

Enterprise Resource Planning is a generic term for the broad set of activities facilitated by multi-module application software that helps businesses manage their important facets. ERP also includes application modules for the finance and human resources aspects of a business. Typically, an ERP system uses or is integrated with a relational database system at the back end.

The Business Drivers behind ERP

No solution would be embraced by the industry unless it is economically promising. Businesses accept ERP because it carries in its wake the promise to alleviate hitherto unsolved chronic problems. The following points are the key business drivers:

1. Integrate financial information:
   ERP creates a single version of internal information that cannot be questioned or doubted because everyone uses the same system.
2. Integrate customer order information:
   ERP facilitates a single point of view of customer information in the enterprise.
3. Standardize and speed up manufacturing processes:
   Often multiple business units across a company make the same widget using different processes and methodologies. Standardizing these processes and using a single, integrated computer system can save time, increase productivity, and reduce payroll expenditure.
4. Reduce inventory:
   ERP helps the manufacturing process flow more smoothly, and it improves the visibility of the order fulfillment process inside the company.
5. Standardize HR information:
   Especially in companies with multiple business units, HR may not have a unified, simple, and all pervasive method for tracking employee information, benefits, and services. ERP can fix that. This results in improved employee satisfaction and helps clear communication lines.

In the 1990s, the need to develop a system with tightly integrated programs that would use a unified database and would be used across the enterprise gained prominence. This common-database, company-wide integrated system was named Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP).

ERP Implementation Methodology

Traditionally ERP is implemented as a product based solution. The businesses assess their requirements, come up with the product they want to employ to address the requirements and then go about customizing it.

There are three commonly used ways of installing ERP:

• The Big Bang: This is the most ambitious and difficult of approaches to ERP implementation. In this methodology, companies cast off all their legacy systems at once and install a single ERP system across the organization.
• Franchising: This approach suits large or diverse companies that do not share many common processes across business units. Independent ERP systems are installed in each unit, while linking common processes, such as finance management, across the enterprise.
• Try and Buy: ERP dictates the process design in this method, where the focus is on just a few key processes, such as those contained in an ERP system's financial module. The try and buy approach is generally for smaller companies expecting to grow into ERP. The goal here is to get ERP up and running quickly and to avoid the reengineering and tailoring issues in favor of the ERP system's out-of-the-box processes.

Why ERP and Web Services?

In the context of ERP, Web Services offer a two-fold advantage: ease of integration and reduction in costs through the hosted application model.

Ease of Integration

Integration is a major source of expenditure across enterprises. According to figures from the Meta Group, Global 2000 companies rely on an average of 49 enterprise applications, and they spend up to 33% of the IT budget just to get them to talk to one another.

ERP is complex and not intended for public consumption. Now, however, clients and outsourcing vendors are demanding access to the same information employees get through the ERP system - things like order status, inventory levels, and invoice reconciliation - except they want to get all this information simply, without all the ERP software. This is where Web Services come to the rescue, wherein seamless URL calls make it possible to expose just the appropriate amount of material to the authenticated users at the right time.

With the availability of Web Services we can achieve integration with a superior quality of service for reliability, security, manageability, routing, discovery, testing, and effectiveness. Web Services basically use object-oriented technology to "wrap" data and programming elements in Web Service methods to be accessed by different applications.

Reduction in Costs through the Hosted Application Model

The deployment of a traditional ERP system can involve considerable business process analysis, employee retraining, and new work procedures. A franchising strategy to adopt Web Services for ERP implementation or enhancement takes advantage of the investment made in the legacy ERP applications and provides them a new lease of life.

Web Services enable proprietary applications to communicate over the Web. The goal of chief vendors is to create "wraps" to access a high-level tool that turns Java, MS .Net or any other proprietary program into a Web Service. Proprietary ERP applications and Web Services can talk to each other by using such high-level tools all of which assist data flow and communications between vastly diverse applications.

ERP provides for integrated, multicomponent application software performing multiple business functions. It involves the use of packaged software instead of client-written custom software.

How does Web Services Make ERP Easier?

The enterprise may still require an ERP application for its internal systems to function efficiently together. Web Services allow the enterprise to acquire the information needed to respond effectively, even in situations where tightly coupled application design isn't necessary.

By developing an integrated Internet information solution, ERP systems companies make public information that was never before accessible from the enterprise. Markets created in this way are by definition more efficient, because they permit companies to concentrate their efforts on customer service and profits. As this new technology gains business-wide support, more vendors will venture into product support for these Web Services. Traditional ERP vendors had a hard time building the links between the Web and their software. Most of them are now presenting solutions helpful for bridging the gaps.

The number and functionality of available Web Services is starting to increase and ERP and accounting systems vendors are beginning to tackle the integration problem by introducing what are called Web Service broker hubs. A broker hub offers a portal to provide a user interface for consumers so that they can find, evaluate, subscribe to, cancel, manage, or monitor Web Services.

An increasing number of accounting and ERP vendors are delivering Web Service broker hubs.

This is a comparison between the current day ERP solutions and the Web Service based ERP solutions:

Economics of ERP Web Services

The TCO for a Web Services solution would be substantially lower than the staggering $53,320 reported by the Meta Group for a "heads-down" user over the first two years after installation of a similar ERP solution. This is due to the fact that the following costs normally incurred in a traditional ERP solution are alleviated or reduced in this approach:

• Deployment costs.
• Consultancy costs.
• Future expenses due to migration and scalability issues.
• Training costs.
• Integration and testing costs. We benefit from the "componentware" paradigm Web Services offer.
• Data Conversion costs.
• Data Analysis costs.

The rapid turn around time of a Web Service solution promises higher yield and ROI, lesser investment, and faster break-even point.

The Road Ahead

A growing number of small and midsize companies are deploying enterprise resource planning applications. In the past, many of these companies, typically with annual revenue of less than $500 million, didn't have the budget or time to consider implementing large, complex, and expensive ERP packages. But with an array of software vendors to choose from and who are creating less expensive, modular, Web-architected, and hosted versions of their ERP software, a lot of smaller companies are rethinking their options.

Within the next two years, ERP will be redefined as a platform enabled by Web Services globally. Originally focused on automating the internal processes of an enterprise, ERP systems will begin to include customer and supplier-centric processes as well. ERP Web Services will become universal business applications that will encompass front office, business intelligence, e-commerce, and supply chain management.

Summary

ERP is a great concept, but like so many of these great ideas, conditions apply. It seems very likely that future ERP applications will not be either products or services, but rather combinations of products, services, and "loosely coupled" applications. These applications are another form of hybrid because they combine locally installed product functions with distributed service functions delivered electronically over the Internet.

Hybrid models offer a best-of-both-worlds solution. They provide fast, locally installed product functions combined with on-demand remote services that take advantage of the Internet. They help maintain private data ownership, while making select data public in a controlled manner. They deliver simple customization of applications through the addition of Web Services channeled via service broker hubs, which focus on the needs of a specific ERP suite.

Leggi : Perchè un ERP deve essere sviluppato in tecnologia Web Services?

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2) SOA (Service-Oriented Architecture)

Dal sito : Web Services and Service-Oriented Architectures  

A service-oriented architecture is essentially a collection of services. These services communicate with each other. The communication can involve either simple data passing or it could involve two or more services coordinating some activity. Some means of connecting services to each other is needed.

Service-oriented architectures are not a new thing. The first service-oriented architecture for many people in the past was with the use DCOM or Object Request Brokers (ORBs) based on the CORBA specification. For more on DCOM and CORBA, see Prior service-oriented architectures (new window).

Services

If a service-oriented architecture is to be effective, we need a clear understanding of the term service. A service is a function that is well-defined, self-contained, and does not depend on the context or state of other services. See Service (new window).

Connections

The technology of Web services (new window) is the most likely connection technology of service-oriented architectures. Web services essentially use XML (new window) to create a robust connection.

The following figure illustrates a basic service-oriented architecture. It shows a service consumer at the right sending a service request message to a service provider at the left. The service provider returns a response message to the service consumer. The request and subsequent response connections are defined in some way that is understandable to both the service consumer and service provider. How those connections are defined is explained in Web Services explained (new window). A service provider can also be a service consumer. 

 

 

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