Post a Comment On: Network of Things

Looks like Cisco is getting into web services and middleware.

This is not surprising at all. Just look at the history of Cisco and networking. Everytime the transfer syntax was standardized at a layer in the OSI stack the functionality of that layer migrated out of the server and into appliances like switches. XML and SOAP help standardize the transfer syntax at L6/L7 and now we should see a network at these levels as well.

The ramifications of having a network at these levels is quite profound.

We have to get used to new vocabulary like application overlay networks or service oriented networks. On these networks one can resolve among two components of an application and provide differentiated services to those components just like today's network resolves among two IP addresses and offers differentiated services to each. (Hopefully the guys defining the WS-Addressing specification are reading this).

Instead of a synchronous API call, a developer simply sends an asynchronous message. This message has to traverse a path across heterogenous systems, multiple transports and now-a-days multiple brokers as well. For this to work we would need switches/routers that offer a fast path based on middleware based control.

Applications themselves have to be choreographed instead of developed-- just like today's business process.

The guy who wrote the HBR article "Does IT matter?" is going to be quoted like IBM's CEO who said the world only need two or three of his mainframe computers ;)