A future ready IT Infrastructure

Monday, June 01, 2009

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There's been a dramatic shift in the way organizations are using IT post the slowdown last year. Most of them have finally found time to take stock of their existing IT infrastructures, which had become extremely complex and difficult to manage over the years. The efforts are now on to simplify it. That's why, we're seeing business processes getting better managed, or the manual ones getting automated. We're seeing consolidation of multi-locational server rooms
into fewer, centralized server farms in data centers.

However, what concerns me most here is that these might be mere quick-fix solutions. The moment the market starts looking up again (which we presume it would now that the new govt. is in place), these solutions will all fall apart, and organizations will be back to hunting for fresh ones. Instead of doing that, why not plan your IT infrastructure consolidation in such a way that it serves as a solid foundation to build on later? Why not optimize, and be ready for the future at the same time?

One way to do that would be to use open standards. Whether it's processes your automating, or applications you're deploying, make sure that they will be able to easily integrate with applications you're likely to deploy in the future. Interoperability between multiple platforms would be key here. So you might have deployed an Open Source application that runs on Linux today, bu will it be able to talk to say, another application on Windows tomorrow?

Anil Chopra, Editor anilc@cybermedia.co.in

Along with open standards, keep scalability in mind as well. Will the same application that's able to handle 'x' number of transactions today, be able to handle twice of that in the future? Again, going back to the Open Source example, many organizations are deploying Open Source software today as a stop-gap arrangement, to save upfront licensing costs. Instead of doing that, why not define your requirements clearly and choose something you won't have to tear down tomorrow because it didn't scale?
Another thing to do is to learn from others mistakes. For instance, most SMBs are deploying ERP solutions, the same way as large enterprises did a few years ago. So obviously, they're also likely to fall into the same traps and loopholes tomorrow. Instead of doing that, why not first evaluate alternate options, like SaaS and cloud computing based ERP? Due to lower upfront cost, they will give you a chance to experiment till the time you're comfortable. After that, when the market picks up, you can deploy the same in house.

Lastly, build your IT infrastructure in such a way today that it doesn't get bloated tomorrow, causing you to spend millions just to simplify it. Many large enterprises today are spending heavily on technologies like consolidation and virtualization to simplify their complex infrastructures. Why can't the others learn from this, and start with a consolidated infrastructure using the latest technologies right from the beginning?This would give you a streamlined and energy-efficient infrastructure right from the beginning. So go for blade server instead of racks or standalones, start with virtualization from the beginning to save server space and energy consumption, etc.

This way, your IT infrastructure will be future ready. I invite your comments on how to make IT infrastructures future ready.

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