Stoner's World

An email (one of our partner’s marketing newsletters) forwarded to me by my manager had this quote in it:

“SaaS represents a technology evolution that will eventually displace ERP client-server models, much like ERP client-server models displaced mainframe models in the 1990s.”

Boy, someone’s really hitting the Koolaid hard. If you strip away all the buzzwords from the past 20 years, strip away all the crap, you’ll find we’ve only come full circle. Consider this:

mainframe + dumb terminals

• the dumb terminal connected to a serial “network” allowing you to run the app stored on the mainframe
• all processing was done on the mainframe
• the dumb terminal couldn’t do anything else

client-server

• much of the work, like input validation and data display, was pushed from the sever to the desktop/client
• the desktop/client connected to an actual network
• the desktop/client had games, allowing the user to keep occupied when the server or network was down

SaaS

• the desktop/client was replaced with the dumb terminal, called the browser
• all data validation moved back to the server, the browser’s only function is as an eye-candy display that used display technologies (XHTML, DHTML, CSS, Javascript, etc.) generated/stored on the server
• the user still has games to occupy themselves when the server or network is down

The only difference between the mainframe/terminal days and SaaS is: the “mainframe” is managed by someone else and the network is a bit more complex than plain, old serial lines.