4 Causes of Legacy Systems Syndrome and Some Ways to Mitigate Them
Does your organisation have a system, which while critical to some business function is proving nearly impossible to update and change? Does every upgrade cycle take months and require serious effort and testing? Is the application starting to creak at the seams and proving occasionally unstable?
Data Quality Is A Design Problem
Many organisations have data quality problems. Some organisations have data quality problems so serious it stops them from using key systems in a meaningful way. When that happens, sometimes the consultants get called.
The fallacy of “national” systems
Merging Service / creating a “national” Software / Platform for Local Government.There have been suggestions that some councils are just too small. You can see the whole discussion here: I thought I would pull out some of the points I have made in the discussion, as I thought they were worth sharing: In terms of… Read more »
Barriers to digital change in Local Government
The Department for Communities and Local Government recently conducted an extensive study into the use of digital technologies by those in Local Government. The report discovered that for 72.7% of authorities, legacy systems and infrastructure is the biggest barrier to developing their digital offerings. This statistic was echoed by the suppliers taking part in the… Read more »
Five reasons why Councils should be using the cloud
Having recently joined Arcus from a District Council, I can see very clearly the benefits that cloud computing, whether software or infrastructure, can have on most public sector organisations. Here are my top five reasons why councils should be looking to the cloud for their ICT future.1 ) Cost Every organisation is feeling the effect… Read more »
Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt over ICT jobs
There has been a recent survey highlighting the barriers to adoption of Cloud computing done by the Cloud Industry Forum (CIF). The survey was reported on publictechnology.net (can be found here) http://www.publictechnology.net/sector/central-gov/public-sector-cloud-booming-where-are-standards?goback=%2Egmp_2981638%2Egde_2981638_member_133502379 The survey comes up with all of the expected findings about growth, trajectories etc… One particular section is interesting (quote from the page… Read more »
So the G- cat is out of the bag!
Earlier this month, central government released the first iteration of the G-Cloud Framework. It is being wildly discussed on the partner networks, with lots of cloud providers planning to bid. Indeed, according to a Linked in post by Mark Craddock, it attracted something like 80 suppliers on the first day. This is hardly a surprise.… Read more »
The proliferation of layers in the Cloud and what to do about it
There’s an old adage in Computer Science, which goes: “There’s no problem, which cannot be solved by adding another layer of indirection.” One usually goes on to add: “Except, of course, for the problem of too many layers of indirection.” Truth is, layers are great. They have been intimately involved in almost all the great… Read more »
A bit like an iceberg…
When buying a car, apart from all the comfort and flexibility that it brings, we expect further expenses, beyond the initial list price of the vehicle. With expenses such as road tax, insurance, MOT tests, servicing and parking, the costs can soon build up, especially for car enthusiasts. This example is something many people can… Read more »
Do I Really Want One of Those?
When I was a kid I idolised another lad, he was so very cool. He could do that there robot dancing that was so very popular in the 80?s. He was called by his 2nd name rather than his Christian name (something I used for my own sprogs) and he had a Big Trak. Big… Read more »
New Commercial models emerging from the Cloud
As many people are no doubt aware, Cloud Computing is presenting a growing number of innovative commercial models. The next 2 posts will explore some of the ones that we have deployed with out clients
“individuality is likely to carry a high price tag”
(Many thanks to txay for permission to use this fantastic image) Wow! What a quote from Martin Read, taken from this article in publicTECHNOLOGY.NET. It reminded me of something I read on gigaom some while ago when they were looking at barriers to the take up of cloud based solutions. To put the quote into… Read more »