Application Development: Software Appliances Are Changing the Way Developers Create Applications

Software Appliances Are Changing the Way Developers Create Applications

by Darryl K. Taft

30 Minutes or Less

An ISV can build an appliance online in less than 30 minutes.

Sticks and Disks

A user can install a software appliance from a USB stick, a CD or a simple download link in a few minutes from a Website or the cloud.

Apps as Appliances

Popular applications are shipping as software appliances today. IBM, Adobe, Ingres and other companies are shipping applications as software appliances. For instance, Adobe LiveCycle Enterprise Suite is available in an appliance version.

Like Having an iPod

Having software preconfigured in an appliance is like having your iPod preloaded with music.

More than 1 Billion Served

Software appliances are one of the industry's fastest growing technologies, expecting to reach 1.2 billion in sales by 2012, according to IDC.

The Bandwagon

More and more ISVs are looking at software appliances. Indeed, Novell and IDC say not just big vendors such as IBM, Adobe and VMware, but thousands of ISVs are using appliances to deploy their software, including companies such as BitRock, Black Diamond, GroundWork Open Source, Lymeware and Zmanda.

Moving at the Speed of the Cloud

Software appliances are the fastest way to deploy applications and workloads on the cloud.

Minimizes Complexity, Cuts Cost

Since software appliances provide only the amount of technology required for a specific task, companies can increase productivity and save costs by eliminating unnecessary technology from their IT infrastructure.

Speeds Up Development

Building and deploying your application as an appliance slashes your development time and costs by 70 percent.

An (Almost) Turnkey Solution

A software appliance has everything you need in one image