This paper introduces Distributed Responsive Infrastructure-Virtualization Environment (DRIVE), a tool that provides both an integrated development environment (IDE) and an execution environment and thus supports the entire life cycle of sensor/actuator applications. Developers are only responsible for implementing the core event-handling logic, whereas DRIVE generates the necessary code for message passing and invocation, thus reducing the development skills required. The development methodology, which is component based and model driven, separates the solution model, which captures the business logic, from the deployment model, which reflects the physical computing infrastructure. This allows the administrators to configure and deploy applications on various infrastructure topologies. To illustrate the benefits of DRIVE, we present an example application, dock-door receiving, and show the ways in which DRIVE supports the modeling and development of the application logic and the multiphase deployment of the resulting application in a production environment.
This paper presents a framework for the modeling and analysis of business model designs involving a network of interconnected business entities. The framework includes an ecosystem-modeling component, a simulation component, and a service-analysis component, and integrates methods from value network modeling, game theory analysis, and multiagent systems. A role-based paradigm is introduced for characterizing ecosystem entities in order to easily allow for the evolution of the ecosystem and duplicated functionality for entities. We show how the framework can be used to provide insight into value distribution among the entities and evaluation of business model performance under different scenarios. The methods are illustrated using a case study of a retail business-to-business service ecosystem.
In this paper we examine managed service in the information and communication technology (ICT) sector, characterized by the polarization between an infrastructure service that is growing in scale and increasingly becoming a commodity and customized or even one-of-a-kind projects. We refer to the approaches taken by three highly innovative advanced service companies, IBM, Ericsson, and Cable & Wireless, to package and deliver ICT service on a more industrialized basis. We identify the six-stage process that describes their journeys to date. We also describe some of the challenges they faced on that journey as well those currently facing them as they move to a higher degree of industrialization. To address these challenges, we propose a model with three axes: offering development, service delivery, and go to market. The model demonstrates how the increasing industrialization of managed service requires an approach integrating all three of these dimensions. We also show that strong governance is required to address the impacts of technological evolution, marketplace dynamics, and corporate culture.
In this paper, we describe continuously available services and application hosting on the Events/IBM.com® Infrastructure (EI)-a continuously available virtualized environment based on three active data centers that has demonstrated 100-percent availability for many premier Web sites, including www.ibm.com. The environment consists of simultaneously active paths spanning three geographically diverse data centers. We describe techniques for automated rapid scaling and continuous availability using IBM WebSphere® clustering, IBM DB2™ replication, load balancing, virtualized network infrastructure components, and IBM System p® virtualization capabilities. We explore best practices for deploying application releases and updates, applying fix packs, and updating hardware and operating systems, all without interrupting service. In addition, we discuss how to troubleshoot and synchronize the vast flows of a multipath redundant solution. Finally, we describe the requirements that dictate continuously available hosting solutions and modifications to our multisite approach for use in fewer data centers. Application of the topics in this paper has resulted in continuous service with no planned or unplanned interruptions over many years of application hosting within the EI.
Since the onset of the computer age, customers have been searching for ways to increase systems availability, maximizing the return on their investment and keeping their systems running continuously as much as possible. Traditionally, customers have used a combination of hardware and software architecture and processes in an attempt to address their continuous availability needs. In this paper, we introduce a new approach to provide high availability which leverages technology for both proactive and reactive support, while engaging a trusted support partner to automate services. We show how automated problem reporting reduces problem resolution time, often by sending the problem to a specialist rather than sending a generalist to the problem. We describe how inventory reporting enables proactive support by applying intellectual capital and knowledge to a specific customer configuration. We also describe how the IBM Electronic Service Agent™ can be used as a foundation for providing service automation and enabling a digital relationship that expands the capabilities of the trusted support partner.
IBM Parallel Sysplex® is a clustering technology that was designed to address specific client business objectives for IBM mainframe System z® servers. The nondisruptive addition of scalable processing capacity and improved application availability with respect to unplanned and planned outages were two key design objectives. This paper focuses on the evolving technology options that support the business objective of continuous availability. Key technology options are discussed relative to their importance to achieving continuous availability. Best practices for effectively using these technology options to improve availability, based on extensive client experiences, are recommended.
The primary objective of service-oriented architecture (SOA) is to use information technology to address the key goals of business today: innovation, agility, and market value. Agility in SOA is achieved by use of the principles of encapsulation, modularity, and loose coupling, which facilitates a cleaner separation of concerns. While loose coupling enables customers to rapidly reuse services in new applications, strong coherency must be maintained to achieve the primary business objectives of the application. When applications are composed of loosely coupled services that are independent (owned by different parts of the organization, based on disparate technology assumptions, and evolving on independent schedules and with diverse priorities) the coherency of the composite application can be undermined. in this paper, we examine how coherency can be created and maintained in loosely coupled applications. We examine, in this context, various techniques and design approaches, such as service management, the use of service buses, the role of industry models and semantic ontologies, and governance, to achieve and maintain coherency of composite applications using SOA.
Designing and implementing a business resilience (or disaster recovery) plan is a complex procedure for customers, and the impact of implementing an incorrect or incomplete plan can be significant. For some customers, being able to recover their data center functionality in a short period of time may be of the utmost importance; for others, recovering in a short period of time may be worthless if the data with which their database is restored is hours or days old. Also of importance is the impact to business-critical applications when copies of data are being made. This paper presents the IBM TotalStorage™ Productivity Center for Replication (TPC-R), a tool designed to help customers implement cost-effective data replication solutions for continuous availability and disaster recovery. We give an overview of TPC-R, describe recent enhancements to TPC-R that are available on all supported platforms (as well as those that are unique to the z/OS™ platform) and discuss the ways in which customers can exploit TPC-R to implement business resilience solutions, with a focus on the various trade-offs customers must consider when choosing between different storage replication technologies.
Conventional messaging technologies have been designed for large transactional systems, making the prediction and calibration of their delay impractical. In this paper, we present a minimal messaging system, implemented in Java™, that is designed to enable the analysis, modeling, and calibration of the expected performance of these technologies. We describe the algorithms and protocols that underlie this messaging system, show how an analysis can be performed, and give the actual measured performance figures. We show that the system achieves a throughput of more than 100,000 messages per second with less than 120-millisecond maximum latency, in the test environment. At 10,000 messages per second, a maximum latency of 5 milliseconds is measured. The algorithms make use of lock-free data structures, which allow the throughput to scale on multi-core systems.
We propose to exploit the technology for complex event processing (CEP) embodied in the rule-based engine known as IBM Active Middleware Technology™ and extend it to the development of real-time CEP applications. Specifically, we propose to develop a framework that includes an integrated development environment (IDE) for defining rules, and, given a set of rules, generates code for a CEP application and enables us to determine time bounds on the response of this application to a set of supported events. In particular, the IDE helps determine a time bound for the execution time of the code corresponding to each rule. The calculation of time bounds is based on a set of benchmark measurements to be performed on the target hardware and involves code segments corresponding to basic operations. Although we assume the code generation phase produces Java™ code, the same approach can be applied to any other suitable programming language. In support of a feasibility argument for the proposed approach, we present some preliminary experimental results obtained on a partially implemented tool.
For a service delivery system to produce optimal solutions to service-related business problems, it must be based on an approach that involves many of the traditional functional areas in an organization. Unfortunately, most business school curricula mirror the older traditional organizational structure that dominated businesses throughout most of the twentieth century. This structure typically consisted of vertically organized functions (or silos), such as production, marketing, and finance, with each silo operating largely independently of the others. Similarly, business schools today are usually organized by functional departments—such as marketing, finance, accounting, and operations management—with little interaction among them. Within this traditional silo-structured environment, it is very difficult to properly develop a curriculum, or even a course, in service management. Consequently, a significant gap exists between the education received by business school graduates and the skills that they need to succeed in today's service-intense environment. This paper explores the underlying causes of this gap and suggests ways in which the emerging field of service science can facilitate the changes in business school curricula that will make them more relevant in meeting the needs of today's businesses and organizations.
There are several essential legal topics that must be included in the research agenda of service science. In this paper, we discuss these topics, beginning with an analysis of the definition of a service and a categorization of some of the actors in service systems, with their diverse interests. A set of case studies and scenarios is presented to illustrate the kinds of legal challenges that are involved in providing user-centric and customer-oriented services. We conclude by suggesting the most important legal topics that should be studied further in relation to service science.
We first provide an overview of the state-of-the-art architectures for continuous availability, briefly covering such traditional concepts as high-availability (HA) clustering on distributed platforms and on the mainframe. We explain how HA can be achieved in environments based on Sun Microsystems J2EE™, which differ from classical clustering approaches, and we discuss how disaster recovery (DR) has become an extension of HA. The paper then presents aspects of service management, including the use and orchestration of process-based (ITIL®) systems management tasks within DR scenarios, where the key challenge is to ensure the right level of redundancy in the integration and service-oriented management of heterogeneous information technology landscapes.
Advancing service science requires a service-centered conceptual foundation. Toward this goal, we suggest that an emerging logic of value creation and exchange called service-dominant logic is a more robust framework for service science than the traditional goods-dominant logic. The primary tenets of service-dominant logic are: (1) the conceptualization of service as a process, rather than a unit of output; (2) a focus on dynamic resources, such as knowledge and skills, rather than static resources, such as natural resources; and (3) an understanding of value as a collaborative process between providers and customers, rather than what producers create and subsequently deliver to customers. These tenets are explored and a foundational lexicon for service science is suggested.
We apply pattern language methodology to describe design and integration patterns for real-world-aware and real-time solutions, i.e., software solutions that integrate business information processing with sensor and actuator manipulations of the external world. Efficient engineering of such solutions depends on the definition and reuse of components whose real-time characteristics can be specified. Other nonfunctional characteristics, such as throughput and reliability, may also be constrained and critical for correct behavior of a design element. We present a pattern language comprising a basic catalog of design patterns for component-based real-time solutions.
All too often, software designers ignore the fact that a running computer system is a combination of software and hardware. In this combination, hardware may play a crucial role, particularly in time-sensitive systems. In this paper, we first explore the nature and impact that platforms may have on application software and its design. Based on this analysis, a canonical model of software platforms is proposed to assist in more accurately factoring in the effects of platforms on the design of real-time and embedded software applications. Finally, we show how this model can be realized using modern model-driven design standards and methods.
