Granted, there is a lot of growth in the SaaS (Software as a Service) market around providing "Platforms as a Service" (PaaS), targeting developers to build applications and host them on a platform. These models apparently seem to be centered around exciting technologies of development and at the same time trying to alleviate the headaches of traditional Web application scalability.

Impressive, But... 

I must admit that I am impressed by the direction of these solutions. It's encouraging to see development tools as Web-based applications, tied to drag and drop interfaces and utilities that make it possible to build a basic App quickly.

Some will argue that the advancements in these technologies are leading to some very sophisticated application development. I'll grant you that when you look at the features of these applications, they can be impressive to use. But what is the bigger trend and how will this all shake out?

I see lots of proprietary solutions emerging around underlying infrastructure that does not enable portability for the applications themselves, or allow developers to use the tools they want. In each model, the maker of the App and the platform both are being tied to the models of their solutions that are closed at some level. This creates vendor lockin for users AND developers.

Restricted for Your Own Benefit 

To build a cloud computing model where development is exposed through a Web-based IDE, providers restrict access to areas that developers are used to having control over in conventional development. Direct access to the database, file structures and ability to choose programming languages (and the list goes on) are all potential threats to stability for developers on these PaaS models. Platform as a Service providers have to standardize and limit control to prevent abuse, ensure scalability and resiliency. If they give developers the ability to touch core functionality, they are letting their decision making potentially weaken the strength of their architecture.

With so much restriction, the challenge for these providers is to expose as many features as they can through the interface to satisfy the developer, who is trying to satisfy the end-users of the developers' applications; and somehow keep them for a long time. The good news for the provider is that in a proprietary solution; the developer can't just get up and walk. They are stuck on their platform. I know from personal experience how this works. 

For the first several years, we focused on the development of a server architecture that was very innovative for a development framework. It provided many essential tools and you could build Apps really fast. But if you wanted to leave, you couldn't. We learned that this wasn't the way to go. It was not in support of the developer's or the business user's best interests. So we went for adoption of open standards. Etelos is incredibly open as a result.

An Open Standards Platform as a Service

Etelos has a very different approach today than in our early years. We learned that it was better to partner with the developer in giving them more control over the quality of code in the application they were building. We learned it was best to support PHP, JSP, etc. and give them direct access to the DB. We also have focused on providing more and more choice in the development environments. We went from a closed system to very open and we are passionate about continuing the trend.

How Open?

At Etelos, we built a solution that takes care of app provisioning, deployments, scalability and code updates all to help manage distributing an application for the developer. Consequently, we have liberated developers so they can just copy their application in most cases and run it on our stack. An example of all the tools available can be seen in this illustration:

Hard Work 

I must admit that it's hard work to focus on scalability for the development partner. But I believe that's what we are supposed to do. The culmination of products and services in our platform to assist the developer in the way they want to develop is our core, unique value. The open approach also is in the best interest of both the developer and the end-user business person. They are not stuck. They have freedom of choice.

Etelos does it all by having an application installed on each machine in the fleet, that helps manage distribution, security, data sharing, and integration with billing and support services. The Etelos platform talks with the Etelos Marketplace™ to help the business person and the developer succeed. It's something we are very proud of. It's innovative.  It's different than what others are doing.

The extra value added services of Etelos App Sync™, Etelos AOP™ and other Web applications on the Etelos Marketplace create an environment for collaborative success. Very different than traditional services, and very different that platform as a service providers today.

What About Virtualization?

Some vendors are pursuing the cloud computing model through enabling virtualization. Virtualization has great promise for the provider and gives more control to the developer. My opinion is that this is not enough. It's not enough benefit to give the developer really cheap hosting. As a service provider, we must provide more value through services to help monetize, sell, distribute, support and probably most important -- solve critical business process problems like data sharing.

App Sync is one of those things that solves a critical business problem for both the developer and the business user alike. Create an app, copy the files to an Etelos™ server, set up App Sync rules and your application syncs within a framework. Every account in the Etelos ecosystem has their own framework for data sharing, user management and app management. As a developer, set up the sync rules once and any other app installed will automatically sync data at the DB level. No code changes.

We believe that is a killer value to the developer. They don't have to worry about managing APIs. They don't have to worry about security in the use of the API. They don't have to deal with the decisions of partners and which APIs to support. One time and the work is done.

You Have an App, Now What? 

The other problem with building a solution in a proprietary PaaS model is that you are mostly on your own when it comes to monetization.

You have a great app? How do you sell it? How do you monetize it? Where do you distribute? That's why we created the Etelos Marketplace years ago. We knew then that having an online mall for Web-based applications made sense. Additionally, focusing on the value added services to support the transaction, service and support all made sense. As a provider of these services, we are proud to help the developer focus on the quality on the app by taking care of the other business necessities in distributing their solution.

More to be Done

Still more to be done, true. But enabling an open standards approach vs. restricting developers is in the best interest of business users who clearly want to adopt Web-based applications to grow and support their businesses.