Evolution of the Rich Internet Application Market

As the Internet continues to penetrate every aspect of our lives, both business and personal, the distinction between “Internet application” and “application” increasingly fades from view. Rich Internet Applications (RIAs) operate in the sweet spot among richness of Internet capability, richness of user interactivity, and richness of client-side computing capability. RIAs act as Service consumers as part of Service-Oriented Architecture implementations and enable Enterprise Mashups.

Since ZapThink first covered the space in 2002, the RIA market has matured considerably, establishing two core submarkets: RIA environments and RIA components. Adobe Systems emerging as a leader in the RIA environments submarket with their Adobe Integrated Runtime (AIR) and Flex products. Microsoft is a strong contender with their newer Silverlight technology. Open source vendors have emerged as significant players, and form a large portion of the RIA components submarket.

While the RIA market should continue to grow for the next few years, it will most likely merge with other markets long term and be indifferentiable from a market sizing perspective as the RIA category increasingly overlaps with other existing desktop and Internet application categories.

After a Merger, Time to Digest

Jason Bloomberg, senior analyst at ZapThink, offered another perspective. “The key to successful integration is to stop thinking in terms of integration altogether. Instead, think in terms of architecture. Integration should be a byproduct of service composition in the context of SOA. It should be something the business does with the capabilities and information at its disposal–not something IT has to do before the business can get any value out of the technology.”

Read more at: SD Times

IT companies are hooking up like divorcees at a Vegas wedding chapel

The ZapThink guys have it right that this is only the second inning (given the weather, it can’t be too soon for baseball metaphors) of a nine-inning outing of SOA components and supplier consolidation.

Read more at: ZDnet

2005 a Record-Setting Year for LogicLibrary

ZapThink, LLC said Logidex improves efficiency and reuse of assets across an organization.

Read more at: Business Wire

Borland upgrades IDE as open source alternatives loom

“I do see Eclipse eating away at the non-Microsoft IDE environment, but I think that it doesn’t threaten Microsoft’s IDE at all,” added Ronald Schmelzer, senior analyst at ZapThink, also in an e-mail.

“Going forward, I think there’s little incentive for companies to create new IDEs, and even for many companies with proprietary IDEs to continue developing them in the face of what’s becoming increasingly and more widely accepted as a ‘universal’ IDE for non-Microsoft environments,” Schmelzer said.

Read more at: InfoWorld

Borland, Macromedia back Eclipse

“What makes [the Eclipse plug-in] compelling is that Macromedia is now targeting the mainstream developer audience for their rich user interface apps, whereas before they targeted a more specialized designer audience,” said Ronald Schmelzer, senior analyst at ZapThink.

Read more at: InfoWorld

LogicLibrary Introduces Smart Controls for SOA Governance

“Proper SOA governance requires organizations to be able to manage the process for planning, creating and deploying composite applications built from services as well as the traditionally developed components that underlie those services,” said Jason Bloomberg, senior analyst at ZapThink, LLC. “With the ability to control the production and deployment of software development assets, LogicLibrary’s Smart Controls enable customers to deliver services and composite applications that increase business agility.”

Read more at: LogicLibrary Press Release

LogicLibrary Develops SOA Governance Tools

“Proper SOA governance requires organizations to be able to manage the process for planning, creating and deploying composite applications built from services as well as the traditionally developed components that underlie those services,” said Jason Bloomberg, Senior Analyst at ZapThink, LLC. “With the ability to control the production and deployment of software development assets, LogicLibrary’s Smart Controls enable customers to deliver services and composite applications that increase business agility.”

Read more at: eBizQ

Defections Rattle Java Alliance

“The spec is itself an implementation spec, so it doesn’t conflict with any Web services spec, but the implementation is sure to hit competition from IBM and BEA’s own business process offerings, specifically the WebSphere Business Integration and WebLogic Integration products,” said Ronald Schmelzer, an analyst with ZapThink LLC, of Waltham, Mass. “So, this will prove to be a highly competitive area.”

Read more at: eWeek

Microsoft makes a play for Web services

However, Microsoft “tends to use all these green field examples,” says Jason Bloomberg, an analyst at ZapThink, a consultancy in Waltham, Mass. “It’s a bit misleading because most Web services are simply new interfaces on existing technology. But a lot of the examples Microsoft uses tend toward brand-new applications.”

Another thing to keep in mind is that “the presence of Web services doesn’t obsolete the need for code – it’s an interface, not a new coding model,” reminds Ron Schmelzer, another ZapThink analyst. “You still need Java, C#, php or Cobol.”

Read more at: Application Development Trends