Defining SaaS

Phil Wainwright has written a definitive article on what SaaS is and why it's a very broad set of services, not all equivalent in architecture, concept or value.

It was particularly timely for me because I've been spending the last week working on judging SaaS players for the Codie contest.  There's no better way to see how many different kinds of approaches fit inside the SaaS tent then looking at a dozen on-line services and asking questions.

This afternoon, one vendor felt that he owed me an explanation as to why his very definitely SaaS application did not use a browser interface, but rather a rich client.  (They have a browser version.)  Rich clients typically offer a better user experience and may offer better performance because the interface and some of the data is kept on the desktop, so there's less need to go to the server for every keystroke.  They may also offer a solution to the desire to being able to work off-line. 

There's nothing that keeps an SaaS application from using a rich client -- nothing but the fact that some "purists" require that these applications be Web 2.0 compliant which apparently means (I'm not sure I agree) that everything happens within a browser, with or without the uplift AJAX can offer the interface.

Read Phil's article and see just how stretchy this market is, and how silly it is, especially in emerging markets where we're still making up the rules, to insist that everyone must be just alike.  I especially enjoyed his comments on how SaaS vendors who know what they're doing and where this is going are using SOA.  This is a pet theory of mine, so I'm delighted to see I'm not the only one who sees this intersection between SaaS and SOA as being a key element to how software will be constructed and delivered in the future.

Comments

[Abraham Sultan]

Amy,

I don't think you are the only one that sees an intersection between SaaS and SOA. I'd go as far to say that if your thinking on building a SaaS offering and not thinking SOA you are WAYYY OF TARGET and should seriously reconsider your architecture.

Sinclair has some very interesting ideas about SaaS and the future of it at www.saasblogs.com

Abe

[Madhava Venkatesh]

I agree with you that Web 2.0 defn of everything should run in a browser might not be the best approach. For an example look at on-line spreadsheet and word processors where the authoring environment is rendered through the browser, i dont understand the need, what is required is collaborative services, publishing services and not an authoring environment delivered over the browser. I like Windows Live Writer because it gives me the advantage of both Web and desktop. When i create my post, i need not be connected at all, only when i have to publish, i get connected.

[mammerman]

Amy, you are right on the money with this one. Thanks.

- Matt Ammerman, Apprenda