Entropy is "the energy within a system that's unavailable for work."
Such has been the problem with project-driven IT, says Miko Matsumura, VP and Deputy CTO of Software AG webMethods. IT funds have been going into projects, versus a more holistic approach to leveraging enterprise technology.
ebizQ colleague Beth Gold-Bernstein recently spoke with Miko, who said SOA offers a solution to what he called 'IT entropy.'"
"The general idea is that as we build IT systems project by project, which is the way they are funded, as time goes on we end up with a lot of code which the organization has expended energy and dollars on, but which is no long usable to do work," Miko said. "Over time, entropy in IT systems increases. The general idea is that if we adopt a SOA approach to building systems, we create more of reusable code and less entropy, making more of the IT investment available for new work on an ongoing basis."
Historically, IT has been funded by "an endless stream of funded projects sent into IT," leading to a tangle of complexity, Miko explained. IT systems need to be moved to more harmony and order, thus making more of IT available for work.
Miko also sounds an optimistic note: "If you get an SOA architect together with a finance person, you can actually have a legitimate conversation about things like reusability.. things like non-recoverable engineering... and how the majority of IT dollars are now going towards maintaining systems that are degrading and falling apart because of so many years of ignoring these systems..."
The complete podcast with Miko can be found here.
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