Software as a service

About: Software as a service is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 8514 publications have been published within this topic receiving 136177 citations. The topic is also known as: Service as a Software Substitute & SaaSS.

The emerging role of data scientists on software development teams

Abstract: Creating and running software produces large amounts of raw data about the development process and the customer usage, which can be turned into actionable insight with the help of skilled data scientists. Unfortunately, data scientists with the analytical and software engineering skills to analyze these large data sets have been hard to come by; only recently have software companies started to develop competencies in software-oriented data analytics. To understand this emerging role, we interviewed data scientists across several product groups at Microsoft. In this paper, we describe their education and training background, their missions in software engineering contexts, and the type of problems on which they work. We identify five distinct working styles of data scientists: (1) Insight Providers, who work with engineers to collect the data needed to inform decisions that managers make; (2) Modeling Specialists, who use their machine learning expertise to build predictive models; (3) Platform Builders, who create data platforms, balancing both engineering and data analysis concerns; (4) Polymaths, who do all data science activities themselves; and (5) Team Leaders, who run teams of data scientists and spread best practices. We further describe a set of strategies that they employ to increase the impact and actionability of their work.

Collaboration-Based Cloud Computing Security Management Framework

Abstract: Although the cloud computing model is considered to be a very promising internet-based computing platform, it results in a loss of security control over the cloud-hosted assets. This is due to the outsourcing of enterprise IT assets hosted on third-party cloud computing platforms. Moreover, the lack of security constraints in the Service Level Agreements between the cloud providers and consumers results in a loss of trust as well. Obtaining a security certificate such as ISO 27000 or NIST-FISMA would help cloud providers improve consumers trust in their cloud platforms' security. However, such standards are still far from covering the full complexity of the cloud computing model. We introduce a new cloud security management framework based on aligning the FISMA standard to fit with the cloud computing model, enabling cloud providers and consumers to be security certified. Our framework is based on improving collaboration between cloud providers, service providers and service consumers in managing the security of the cloud platform and the hosted services. It is built on top of a number of security standards that assist in automating the security management process. We have developed a proof of concept of our framework using. NET and deployed it on a test bed cloud platform. We evaluated the framework by managing the security of a multi-tenant SaaS application exemplar.

Cloud application logging for forensics

Abstract: Logs are one of the most important pieces of analytical data in a cloud-based service infrastructure. At any point in time, service owners and operators need to understand the status of each infrastructure component for fault monitoring, to assess feature usage, and to monitor business processes. Application developers, as well as security personnel, need access to historic information for debugging and forensic investigations. This paper discusses a logging framework and guidelines that provide a proactive approach to logging to ensure that the data needed for forensic investigations has been generated and collected. The standardized framework eliminates the need for logging stakeholders to reinvent their own standards. These guidelines make sure that critical information associated with cloud infrastructure and software as a service (SaaS) use-cases are collected as part of a defense in depth strategy. In addition, they ensure that log consumers can effectively and easily analyze, process, and correlate the emitted log records. The theoretical foundations are emphasized in the second part of the paper that covers the implementation of the framework in an example SaaS offering running on a public cloud service. While the framework is targeted towards and requires the buy-in from application developers, the data collected is critical to enable comprehensive forensic investigations. In addition, it helps IT architects and technical evaluators of logging architectures build a business oriented logging framework.

Adoption of Software as a Service (SaaS) Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) Systems in Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (SMEs)

Abstract: Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems are now offered on the cloud under the Software as a Service (SaaS) model. For small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs), this is considered the best opportunity to take advantage of the capabilities of an ERP system without the investment and management costs associated with the on-premise model. Using a cross-sectional field study conducted across four case study organizations, this study investigated the determinants and challenges in the adoption of SaaS ERP systems by SMEs. The study found that the determining factors in deciding to adopt SaaS ERP are software vendor's reputation in the market, software fit to the business, the potential willingness of the vendor to support the customer throughout the product life cycle, the vendor's participation in co-creation of value for customers and the generic benefits of implementing an integrated ERP system. With switching considered a costly option, accounting shift of capital costs to operating expenses is considered advantageous by firms. Competitive pressures faced by the enterprise, external factors, concerns about data security and system performance have no influence on adoption decision, according to this study. Change management and increasing the effectiveness of use are challenges, but the willingness of the software vendor to work with organizations' requests for changes and improvements and the continuous co-creation of value through improved product offerings is reassuring to the firms in the post-implementation phase.

Free and open source development practices in the game community

Abstract: The free and open source software (FOSS) approach lets community of like-minded participants develop software systems and related artifacts that are shared freely instead of offered as closed-source commercial products. Free (as in freedom) software and open source are closely related but slightly different approaches and licensing schemes for developing publicly shared software. FOSS development communities don't seem to adopt modern software engineering processes. FOSS communities develop software that's extremely valuable, generally reliable, globally distributed, made available for acquisition at little or no cost, and readily used in its community. Free and open source software development practices gives rise to new view of how complex software systems can be constructed, deployed, and evolved. They rely on lean electronic communication media, virtual project management, and version management mechanisms to coordinate globally dispersed development efforts. These FOSS processes offer new directions for developing complex software systems. We look at the FOSS computer game community to provide examples of common development processes and practices.