There’s a new aaS in town — data! If you can use application as a service (Gmail, Office 365, etc.) and infrastructure as a service (CeraNet – colo service or dedicated server hosting), then why can’t you use the data as a service?
We’ve offered this service for many years through our database server hosting service where clients run a ‘hosted’ SQL or MYSQL database and access a single data source with external applications. Here are two examples:
- ERP applications like SAP and Oracle. The applications access data through a combination of client installed apps (on their local computers), web sites, and direct database interfaces (API calls). Data is stored in one place, on a server in our data center, and accessed by many people in many ways.
- EMAIL using mobile devices and Outlook or Thunderbird. Email is probably the most common use of data as a service. Millions of people use email that feeds several different devices. Each phone, tablet, and client computer access the same data feed service enabling mobility and data portability. This is slightly different from ‘application as a service’ in that there are multiple applications access the same data stream. The data stream is application independent.
The US government has recently released standards for cloud computing as well as, plans for migrating to a data independent platform. This would allow for more transparency across gov agencies and eliminate costly duplications of data. Of course, all of this is in theory since most GOV data is in paper format. It might be good to put millions of people to work electrifying not only our data infrastructure, but also the pocketbooks of out work Americans.