Protect
your investment - use web-application to lower the lifetime
cost of ownership
Sillero specialises in producing web-based applications. These
must be distinguished from websites, which are usually just
electronic catalogues.
A web-application is an interactive application, very much like
any desktop application, that runs within a web-browser. The
application can run on the Internet, an Intranet or even on a
stand-alone computer.
"But why would I want web-applications for my business
operations?"There are many advantages to this approach,
amongst them:
- Deployment of the application is just a matter of
publicising the URL
- Updates to the application are made in one place and
all users immediately have access to the changes
- The operating system of the client machine is
irrelevant, as long as it can run a web-browser
- Little or no disk space is required on the client
machine
The lifetime cost savings in centralising the
deployment of the application, particularly in a growth
environment are usually substantial.
We have found that one of the biggest pluses is that we can
quickly scale from a single user all the way through an
Intranet-linked group of users to an Internet based application
with many users from anywhere they happen to be. So we make
sure that no matter how limited the scope of the application
is, it will be e relatively simple task of scaling it
up.
Of course, there are some disadvantages, such as:
- Users could get used to watching the hourglass as data
is moved up and down the wires
- Security could be an issue
- If connectivity goes down, so does your app
"So what do you do to get around the
disadvantages?"Well firstly, there are times when a
web-application is the wrong technology - and that's why
Sillero always carefully evaluates the best technology to
use.
Secondly the disadvantages mentioned are greatly diminished or
eliminated by proper use of technology. Let's take a look at
some of these issues:
- Developed properly, web-application can be every bit as
fast as traditional client-server applications. The trick
is to minimise trips to the server. This is done by browser
caching using Javascript and background transfer of data
using Ajax. We pay particular care to the efficiency of the
browser based code to make a good, productive user
experience.
- Security is always an issue and is often not as
stringent in client-server LAN-based applications as in
Internet web-applications because the latter face real
security threats. The fact is, application security should
never be compromised, no matter how deployed. We use
industry standard security, from user authentication to
data encryption on all our applications, no matter where or
how deployed.
- Disconnection from the network carries no more risk
with web-based application than on client-server
applications - it's just a matter of the degree of
distribution. And where the application is Internet-based,
there is the added plus of the Internet itself never going
down - just individual connections, that can always be
re-routed.
Technologies used:
Sillero develop web-applications using the following
frameworks and technologies:
- .NET web-applications and SOAP services
- PHP frameworks - especially Prado
- Caché Zen
- MS SQLServer
- MySql
- Caché Objects
We at Sillero always work with the customer to decide on
the best set of technologies for any project. We have the range
of skills and the depth of experience to design, build and
deploy the right solution.
Please contact us for more
information.
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