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PureApplication on SoftLayer
With IBM’s acquisition of SoftLayer last year, IBM has bought into an excellent infrastructure provider and it’s clear that they’re determined to capitalise on their investment. Their recent announcement of “PureApplication Services” (note: “Services” and not “Systems” which is the on-premise equivalent) is a great example of this.
“PureApplication Services” means that Patterns of Expertise will now be run off-premise in the SoftLayer data centers. As a result, patterns can run both off and on premise and that means you have more flexibility – e.g. you can consider a model where perhaps you develop those patterns off-premise and then bring them in-house when you are confident that they meet your needs but want to reduce your cloud rental costs.
Another really exciting result of this announcement is that you will also have the ability to cloudburst out from your on-premise infrastructure at times of peak demand. This is something which is often promised but is rarely enabled. Although the recent announcement doesn’t quite enable it for free, I can see how it can be done reasonably easily with the use of some of the scaling policies we’ve created for clients today.
With more flexibility to come
PureApplicatiom V.next (codename Troy) comes with a new way to create those Patterns of Expertise too. Up until now there was a large disconnect between what IBM termed System patterns (IaaS view on a topology) and Application patterns (more of a PaaS view).
In Troy, IBM has connected those two models in a really nice way. You can now start by building a system model using the same old methods that you always have done – assured in the knowledge that you know what you are building and how you are building it. Now, the beautiful bit that IBM has added is that you can wrapper those same infrastructure patterns into a more PaaS like look and feel so that you can expose those low-level components to your more development focused folks.
This model is brilliant; it takes the best skills from your infrastructure teams and gives it to your more business focused people in a really clean, re-usable manner.
And a little bit of a makeover
In terms of the hardware, the PureApplication System box itself is also getting a makeover. To ease you in gently, you can now buy the box and then upgrade in 32 core increments – so you can get used to the power of the patterns without making the full initial commitment. Of course, you can always try out the Patterns of Expertise off-premise now too! It’s also getting SSD as standard – which will greatly improve IO.
Introducing the Cloud marketplace
IBM also recently launched the Cloud marketplace – a one-stop-shop to get your cloud applications. It brings together all of IBM’s capabilities-as-a-service and those of partners and third party vendors. Here you’ll be able to browse a catalogue of SaaS offerings, IaaS offerings or Patterns of Expertise and download what you need. Of course, you’ll be able to find our PureApplication patterns there too – our Sterling OMS solution will be there from launch with more to follow soon!
Good news for all
All these offerings mean good news for the customers. There’s much more flexibility now when it comes to the Patterns of Expertise – you can have more choice in terms of the platform to host them on, more flexibility in how you create them and more accessibility to the patterns already produced. It’s a real sign that IBM has been listening to feedback, maturing the product and improving its accessibility very quickly and, in my opinion, in the right direction.