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IBM Rational makes first cautious steps towards cloud

Tony Baer

IBM Rational makes first cautious steps towards cloud

As part of IBM's global rollout of cloud services, the Rational software unit has announced the release of its first batch of cloud-based offerings branded as IBM Rational Software Delivery Services for the Cloud. The new offerings cover Rational's Jazz-enabled collaborative and quality management offerings. The IBM Rational release is a good first step as it addresses application lifecycle management (ALM) tasks that Ovum research has already identified as best suited for the cloud. But it only scratches the surface in offering end-to-end services that could address critical business needs in application delivery such as integrating software quality with application performance management.

IBM Rational is delivering on its promises

There is little surprise in Rational's first major release of tooling for the cloud. IBM held a series of technical preview announcements last June concerning the Software Group's overall cloud computing strategy. The bulk of the offerings were made available in a limited release to select clients through the summer.

The releases, which fall under the umbrella brand IBM Rational Software Delivery Services for Cloud Computing (SDS), cover planning, team collaboration, and testing. They largely map to Ovum's recommendations regarding software development in the cloud, encompassing enterprise architecture planning, software asset management, workflow collaboration, and quality assurance. The Ovum Report ALM and SaaS: should developers get their heads in the cloud? found that communications-focused or highly variable compute-intensive tasks were best suited for cloud consumption because of the ability of cloud-based tools to address wide audiences. By contrast, source code related tasks and processes were not as well suited. Unless the cloud is kept private, IP protection will be a concern for running source code control repositories in the cloud. In turn, latency issues are a show-stopper for the cloud when it comes to writing code.

IBM is not rushing into the cloud and neither are its large enterprise clients

IBM is hardly doing anything 'bleeding edge' here. Rivals such as HP Software, CollabNet, and Rally already have well established hosted offerings in areas ranging from testing to project planning dating back to the first half of this decade. IBM's relatively slow embrace of the cloud mirrors the cautiousness of its enterprise client base.

And when it comes to ALM, there is no cut and dry answer for whether an IT organization should use cloud-based development tools or services. That will depend not only on the ALM task, but also the sensitivity of the software project from a corporate strategy or intellectual property standpoint. For instance, project planning may not be a sensitive area for most internal software development projects and therefore could be easily let out into the cloud. However, if it is software development for the next version of the iPhone, Apple would have to be crazy to let the plan sit in a public cloud, no matter the level of security that the cloud provider claims to offer.

One of the significant offerings in this release comes from IBM's Global Technology Solutions (GTS) consulting group, which adds packaged services that help clients prepare for adoption of the Rational cloud-based software delivery services. IBM must get credit for correctly sensing demand for change management services related to ALM cloud adoption.

Rational's cloud announcement only scratches the surface in providing end-to-end ALM services

In the long run, the cloud gives IBM a chance to develop new composite solutions combined from its Rational and Tivoli toolsets that could deliver unique benefits to the business. Especially promising could be integrations of Rational quality and Tivoli performance management tools that could close the loop on software quality. The Ovum report, ALM: applying a business process-oriented paradigm points the way to solutions that address not specific software development tasks such as requirements, build management, or testing, but business issues relating to the reliability of software delivery. We expect IBM to step up to the plate with more combined Rational and Tivoli offerings when it convenes the next Tivoli Pulse conference in early 2010.

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