Making new software work with existing systems costs 40% to 60% of the cost of the software itself, and the cost of making existing systems work together is even higher.
That`s the view of June Julyan, Mobius product manager of Bateleur Software, who says these costs arise because traditional application integration requires custom coding to develop software adapters which serve as communication layers wrapped around existing applications.
"This is expensive, time-consuming and must be done frequently to keep up with changing business processes and applications," she points out.
Bateleur Software is the local agent for Mobius Management Systems, the leading provider of total content management solutions which support e-business and streamline internal operations.
There is an easier and more cost-effective way to achieve integration - by integrating at the content level. All applications produce content, and while the volume of content may be constantly increasing, the type and format of content remains fairly constant.
According to Julyan, sharing content between applications delivers the benefits of application integration with none of the problems. "It`s easy to capture and relate content with indexes, and to incorporate content from both new and changed applications," she says. "Furthermore, no programming, APIs or wrappers are required, and there`s less risk to security and to the performance of critical systems."
Organisations which leverage their content and share it across all applications are able to drive up service levels, ensure data quality, keep management informed and reduce costs. This is made possible with a total content management system such as ViewDirect TCM from Mobius - an integrated set of software facilities which capture, manage, store and deliver content that supports e-business processes and internal operations from supply to demand and from design to support.
"A total content management system performs the daunting task of managing not just the billions of pages that are made available via Web sites and other browser-based applications, but also managing application output, presentations, documents, contracts, forms, templates, database extracts, news, company events, catalogues, email, streaming video and audio, and any other form of content the company may have," Julyan says.
"A system like ViewDirect TCM is based on the premise that, over time, organisations have stored the content needed for day-to-day operations in multiple, disparate content repositories on any number of software platforms. It`s essential that the system enables the organisation to leverage these investments by providing access through a single interface to all content in any repository."
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