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04-22-2010
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Rumblings in the Cloud
Louis Lovas
03-08-2010 04:09 PM
Rumblings in the Cloud
Cloudcomputing... it's on everyone's mind these days. Personally Ithink it's a term that has attained such aggrandized acclaim thatvendors, analysts, bloggers and anyone with marketing muscle has pulledand stretched its definition to such and extent that it could mean justabout anything hosted. Cloud Computing Journal polled twenty-one experts to define Cloud Computing. Just the fact they had to ask the question of twenty-one expertsis rather telling in itself. Well I read what the experts had tosay.
So armed with my newly minted (yet fully stretched, but not of my own making) Cloud definition I happened upon this commentary about CEP in the Cloud or the lack thereof. There's a great quote in the article: "I don’t care where a message is coming from and I don’t care where it’s going”.Correctly indicated, this in a sense defines a key aspect of CEP.Event-based applications should be transparent to messages (orevents to which messages transform) origin and destination(sans a logical or virtual name). However, unlike the author Colin Clark, I do believe the current crop of vendor products, most notably Progress Apama maintain this separation of the physical from the virtual.
The rationale behind the lack of CEP-based applications in the Cloud(ok, there's that word again) are found in other factors. Toexplain my reasoning I'll start by dividing CEP-basedapplicationsinto two categories. Of course there are many ways to categorizeCEP-based applications, but for the sake of this discussion, I'll usethese two:
CEP-based Application CategoriesNot sure I could make a simpler layman-like description, but needless to say itwarrants further explanation (or definition in sticking with our theme)
CEP-based applications that do things
This category is best explained by example. Typical of event processing applications that do thingsare those in Capital Markets like algorthmic trading, pricing andmarket making. Theseapplications perform some business function, often critcal in nature in their own right. Save connectivity to data sources and destinations, they are the key ingredient or the onlyingredient to a business process. In the algo world CEP systemstap intothe firehose of data, and the data rates in these markets (Equities,Futures &Options, etc.) is increasing at a dizzying pace. CEP-based tradingsystems are focused on achieiving the lowest latency possible.Investment banks, hedge funds, and others in the arms racedemand the very best in hardware and software platforms to shavemicroseconds off each trade. Anything that gets in the (latency) way isquickly shed.
In other verticals, an up and coming usage of CEP islocation-based services. This is one that leveraging smart mobiledevices (i.e "don't care where the message is going")to provide promotions and offers.
CEP-based applications that observe other applications doing things
Conversely, event-based applicationsthat observe other applications doing things are classified asproviding visibility or greater insight into some existing business function. These event-based applications overlay businessprocesses to take measures to improve their effectiveness. Asis often the case critical business applications provide littlevisibility or the information is silo’ed. There is a need toprovide a broader operational semantic across a heterogeneous mix ofbusiness applications and processes. Here are a few typicalexamples of event-based visibility applications observing otherbusiness systems.
Of course the demarcation linebetween these two classifications is not clear cut. Providing greatervisibility is just a starting point,monitoring for opportunities to take action is just as important suchas kicking-off a fraud watch if a suspected wash-trade occurred (so in a sense they are doing things).
Where for art thou oh CEP
When considering the Cloud, animportant point to consider is dependency. Specifically, there is adependency that the underlying applications and business processesexist in the Cloud for (observing) CEP to overlay them. Iwould offerthat Enterprise business has not yet migrated their key businessprocesses to the Cloud on a widespread scale just yet. Why not? Whatare the barriers? Security, regulatory compliance, DR, investmentcosts, limited skill sets are just a few of the challenges mentioned inthis ITProPortalarticle. I suspect these barriers are far reaching, keepingthe pace of Cloud deployment in check to the point where it's not asyet strategic to many.
One of key things that makes the Cloud a reality is virtualization, it has clearly revolutionized PaaSas the Cloud. Virtualization does come at a cost, there isa latency penality for the conveinence, no matter howsmall for some use-cases that cost is too great.
Make no mistake, I am certain the Cloud with all it's twenty-one definitions isthe future of computing. It's an imperative that will knock down thebarriers and change the face of the Enterprise and when it reachescritical mass CEP will be there.
Once again thanks for reading, you can follow me at twitter, here.
Louie
.
Source...
03-08-2010 04:09 PM
Rumblings in the Cloud
Cloudcomputing... it's on everyone's mind these days. Personally Ithink it's a term that has attained such aggrandized acclaim thatvendors, analysts, bloggers and anyone with marketing muscle has pulledand stretched its definition to such and extent that it could mean justabout anything hosted. Cloud Computing Journal polled twenty-one experts to define Cloud Computing. Just the fact they had to ask the question of twenty-one expertsis rather telling in itself. Well I read what the experts had tosay.So armed with my newly minted (yet fully stretched, but not of my own making) Cloud definition I happened upon this commentary about CEP in the Cloud or the lack thereof. There's a great quote in the article: "I don’t care where a message is coming from and I don’t care where it’s going”.Correctly indicated, this in a sense defines a key aspect of CEP.Event-based applications should be transparent to messages (orevents to which messages transform) origin and destination(sans a logical or virtual name). However, unlike the author Colin Clark, I do believe the current crop of vendor products, most notably Progress Apama maintain this separation of the physical from the virtual.
The rationale behind the lack of CEP-based applications in the Cloud(ok, there's that word again) are found in other factors. Toexplain my reasoning I'll start by dividing CEP-basedapplicationsinto two categories. Of course there are many ways to categorizeCEP-based applications, but for the sake of this discussion, I'll usethese two:
CEP-based Application Categories
- Those that do things
- Those that observe other applications doing things
CEP-based applications that do things
This category is best explained by example. Typical of event processing applications that do thingsare those in Capital Markets like algorthmic trading, pricing andmarket making. Theseapplications perform some business function, often critcal in nature in their own right. Save connectivity to data sources and destinations, they are the key ingredient or the onlyingredient to a business process. In the algo world CEP systemstap intothe firehose of data, and the data rates in these markets (Equities,Futures &Options, etc.) is increasing at a dizzying pace. CEP-based tradingsystems are focused on achieiving the lowest latency possible.Investment banks, hedge funds, and others in the arms racedemand the very best in hardware and software platforms to shavemicroseconds off each trade. Anything that gets in the (latency) way isquickly shed.
In other verticals, an up and coming usage of CEP islocation-based services. This is one that leveraging smart mobiledevices (i.e "don't care where the message is going")to provide promotions and offers.
-
- Algo Trading, Pricing, Market Aggregation
- Location Based Services (providing promotional offers and alerts)
Conversely, event-based applicationsthat observe other applications doing things are classified asproviding visibility or greater insight into some existing business function. These event-based applications overlay businessprocesses to take measures to improve their effectiveness. Asis often the case critical business applications provide littlevisibility or the information is silo’ed. There is a need toprovide a broader operational semantic across a heterogeneous mix ofbusiness applications and processes. Here are a few typicalexamples of event-based visibility applications observing otherbusiness systems.
-
- Telco Revenue Assurance
- Click Stream Analysis
- Fraud Detection
- Surveillance
Where for art thou oh CEP
When considering the Cloud, animportant point to consider is dependency. Specifically, there is adependency that the underlying applications and business processesexist in the Cloud for (observing) CEP to overlay them. Iwould offerthat Enterprise business has not yet migrated their key businessprocesses to the Cloud on a widespread scale just yet. Why not? Whatare the barriers? Security, regulatory compliance, DR, investmentcosts, limited skill sets are just a few of the challenges mentioned inthis ITProPortalarticle. I suspect these barriers are far reaching, keepingthe pace of Cloud deployment in check to the point where it's not asyet strategic to many.
One of key things that makes the Cloud a reality is virtualization, it has clearly revolutionized PaaSas the Cloud. Virtualization does come at a cost, there isa latency penality for the conveinence, no matter howsmall for some use-cases that cost is too great.
Make no mistake, I am certain the Cloud with all it's twenty-one definitions isthe future of computing. It's an imperative that will knock down thebarriers and change the face of the Enterprise and when it reachescritical mass CEP will be there.
Once again thanks for reading, you can follow me at twitter, here.
Louie
.
Source...