RWC understands that any good system is incomplete without a seamless transition with existing systems. Our goal is to ensure that all collaborating systems are integrated in a manner that optimizes each individual system’s performance. In addition to the other systems, it is vital that the supporting management brought up to speed at every step of the way to ensure adequate systems support.
Our clients can be assured that our team will provide an abundance of resources to reduce anxiety and increase confidence during the transition. Understanding our clients goals and vision enables us to integrate the solutions in a way that meets their level of comfort...every systems integration ought to be unique, just as our clients.
Methods of integration...
-Vertical Integration; is process of integrating subsystems according to their functionality by creating functional entities also referred to as silos. The benefit of this method is that the integration is performed quickly and involves only the necessary vendors, therefore, this method is cheaper in the short term. On the other hand, cost-of-ownership can be substantially higher than seen in other methods, since in case of new or enhanced functionality, the only possible way to implement (scale the system) would be by implementing another silo. Reusing subsystems to create another functionality is not possible.
-Star Integration or also known as Spaghetti Integration; is a process of integration of the systems where each system is interconnected to each of the remaining subsystems. When observed from the perspective of the subsystem which is being integrated, the connections are reminiscent of a star, but when the overall diagram of the system is presented, the connections look like spaghetti, hence the name of this method. The cost of this method of integration can vary due to the interfaces which subsystems are exporting. In a case where the subsystems are exporting vendor-specific interfaces, the integration cost can substantially rise. Time and costs needed to integrate the systems increase exponentially when adding additional subsystems. From the perspective of implementing new features, this method is preferable since it provides extreme flexibility to reuse the functionalities from existing subsystem into new system.
-Horizontal Integration or Enterprise Service Bus; is a method in which a specialized subsystem (BUS) is added to the system which is dedicated to communicate with other subsystems. This allows cutting the number of connections (interfaces) to only one per subsystem which will connect directly to the BUS. The BUS is capable of translating the interface into another interface. This allows cutting the costs of integration and provides extreme flexibility. With systems integrated using this method, it is possible to completely replace one subsystem with another subsystem which provides similar functionality but exports different interfaces, all this completely transparent for the rest of the subsystems. The only action required is to implement the new interface between the BUS and the new subsystem.
