So you’re ready to make the move into the cloud. That’s great, but you’re going to need some help to do it. Well, it just so happens that – wouldn’t you know it – we’re in the business of helping organizations like yours roll out successful cloud deployments. Our team of data storage professionals will answer all of your questions and help you find the cloud plan that works best for your business needs.

Our state-of-the-art cloud storage facilities are ideal for safely housing your cloud instance. High-tech HVAC controls and attentive data operators will help ensure that you always stay online. In fact, in the unfortunate event that your server does experience downtime, you’re even guaranteed to be back up and running in almost no time whatsoever thanks to our automatic failover system. The system works by automatically reestablishing your instance someplace else in our massive, reliable cloud network if there is a server issue affecting it.

Cloud Integration

But that’s getting a little bit ahead of things. Once you’re deployed, we’ll take things from there. Let’s get back to our original point about cloud integration, though. It’s something we talked about already in our last blog post, and today we’re back to dig a little bit deeper into cloud integration tools.

It’s fair to say that the long-term competitive advantage that your business enjoys as a result of moving into the cloud is partially dependent on how effectively you’re able to interconnect all of your assets, regardless of where they are physically located. As we explored in our last post, many of your business’ cloud integration needs will differ from others’, but there are certain core needs that everyone shares.

Tech Target explains that everyone’s applications must be integrated or connected to internal systems on a functional level. There are also, of course, concerns about data sharing and applications causing extra actions in connected applications, which can somewhat complicate things. So what are your integration options for un-complicating them?

Asynchronous or Synchronous Messaging

Clear and effective communications are important to all organizations, and so it should come as no surprise that messaging is a central consideration during the planning stages of application cloud integration.

The first option is known as synchronous, and it involves procedure calls made across the web. These calls typically suffer from a decent amount of latency and can be challenging to keep up to scale. It’s possible to use message queues (software-engineering components used for interprocess communication or inter-thread communication within the same process) in order to bump up the efficacy of synchronous messaging. This works by notifying the application when a message arrives in the queue and the app then going to that location and only that location to obtain it.

Another option available to you is asynchronous messaging, which is a more scalable alternative. Asynchronous lets apps shoot off messages and then return to normal processing. This is sometimes referred to as the “fire-and-forget technique.”

Cloud-Based Connectors

Connecting software-as-a-service (SaaS) cloud implementations to on-site or existing legacy apps is made easier through the usage of cloud-based connectors. Additionally, they help out with the integration of myriad varieties of APIs that are needed for keeping business applications working the way that they are supposed to work.

The number of software APIs that are constantly in flux is staggering, and this makes for a practical issue when it comes to ensuring that applications stay up and running while they’re in the cloud. It also presents a big challenge in terms of all the legalities and intricacies of all the different ways in which an organization employs SaaS. Luckily, a good SaaS Law Firm has lawyers who specialize in this emerging field, and they can take care of all the fine print. Other than that, staying up-to-date on all of the changes can be expensive, time-consuming, and mind-rattling for the coders doing the dirty work down in the trenches.

Middleware is available from some vendors (Dell Boomi, IBM CastIron, MuleSoft Inc., etc.) in the form of enterprise services buses. An enterprise service bus is capable of managing application, service and condense interface access. The process of connecting a legacy application(s) to an SaaS platform is made simpler through the use of an ESB. A good ESB will come with network failover abilities and error handling. It will also be capable of informing engineering personnel when a function fails and at what point the failure occurred and include in its communications suggestions for repair along with a comprehensive and easily understandable error log.

iPaaS

Wouldn’t it be great if you could get some pre-built tools for enabling the connection to SaaS and other cloud services? Well, good news – you can! An iPaaS (integration platform as a service) does just that. Cloud silo problems can be solved by an iPaaS that lets those using it integrate cloud services together and link them up to their already-in-place legacy apps. Integration platforms as a service include with them security behind a firewall so that the using organization’s back-end processing is secure.

It’s important to pick out a platform that is flexible and configurable so that you are able to easily adapt when your business needs change. Choosing one that comes with tools that the dev team has preexisting knowledge of will minimize training needs. On the other hand, when choosing popular hosting platforms such as AWS, there are a number of different aws training and certifications programs available. So training won’t be that much of a problem. Either way, planning for any new training or additional training must be accounted for going in so that the whole thing runs smoothly.

Many businesses already need cloud integration, and most will likely need it in the near future. It’s important, though, to first assemble a full plan for managing the entire scope of the changes and to have backup plans in place just in case a problem rears its ugly head. With the right technical knowledge and tools, a plan to ensure cloud integration success can be put together, and high cloud efficacy can be established.

Discover what the cloud can do for your business.

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