Personal ideas about enterprise software.

     After reading the case study, The Trouble With Enterprise Software, I think that both software programmer and business executives may ask too much from enterprise software. Software is just like a boat with some little leap. It can carry a certain weight without any problem. However, as the business becomes larger and larger, the soaring weight makes the situation more and more dangerous. We can move the weight to another bigger boat, which is just like companies buying new ERP. But according to the reference from the case study: “It is not possible to guarantee that the program as a whole has no flaws”, therefore it’s just a matter of time that the bigger boat sinks.

     Service-oriented architecture, connecting the relevant pieces of functionality from various IT systems, seems to be a prescription for the huge and terrible enterprise software trouble. However, how do we know if SOA is just another legacy system? The ideas of ERP are quite simple and making sense, just like the ideas of SOA. But after so many years, no software can reach the goal and hope of ERP. SOA already has some noticeable and inevitable problems, including robust protocols for accessing the application, high-quality integrated data stores and a sound methodology for managing the overall process. Even though SOA can finally overcome all these difficulties, it may take many years. At that time, business environment and market will no longer be what they are now.

     I have read some article about successful ERP case, such as http://static.mega.com/wp/active/document/customer/mega-success-story-hp-bsc-en.pdf

But there is no objective statistic data to support what the article claims, and there is no time to prove if the software really successes. I believe the real situation was not as simple as the article claims too. It makes this article looks more like a commercial than a research data.

     Building simple and single software which can run a monumental, changing, complex real-world business may be more ridiculous than building Noah’s ark. Perhaps IT programmers and executives should know where the limits of software are, and maximize the benefits of software within the limits. This is an important task of Enterprise Architecture, maximize every benefits from a macro perspective.