Why are most of the bespoke software solutions we design for our clients web-based?
Web-based applications offer a range of business advantages over traditional, stand alone desktop applications. The article bellow briefly outlines those advantages.
Definition
A web application uses a website as an interface (i.e. the “front-end”). Users can access the applications from any computer connected to the Internet via a secure, password-protected login page. Technically speaking, a web-based application is a software program that uses HTTP for its core communication protocol, and delivers web-based information to the user in HTML language or via Flash technology.Installation and Maintenance
Installation and maintenance becomes less complicated. Once a new version or upgrade is installed on the server, all users can access it straight away. There is no need to upgrade each client PC, with all the related migration problems that might bring. And as the upgrades are only performed by an experienced professional, the results are more predictable and reliable.
Increasing processor capacity also becomes a far simpler operation. If an application requires more power to perform tasks, only the server hardware needs to be upgraded.
Security
Your web-based application will be deployed on our dedicated servers, which are monitored and maintained by experienced server administrators. This is far more effective than monitoring hundreds or even thousands of client computers, as is the case with new desktop applications.
Cost effective development
With web-based applications, users access the system via a uniform environment—the web browser means that there’s no need to test the application on all possible operating system versions and configurations. This also makes troubleshooting much easier. This is even more true for web applications that use a Flash front end.
Using internet technologies based on industry-wide standards, it’s possible to achieve a far greater level of interoperability between applications than with isolated desktop systems. This means that it’s possible to rapidly integrate them within existing infrastructures and platforms.
Technologies
There are three main solutions that can be used for building web-based applications. The Java-based solutions (J2EE) from Sun Microsystems involves technologies such as JSP and Servlets. The newer Microsoft .NET platform uses Active Server Pages, SQL Server and .NET scripting languages. Of the two, the Microsoft solution is faster, more scalable and more user-friendly. However, having been in use for longer, Java is known to be reliable, with more models already having been built.
The third option is the Open Source platform (predominantly PHP and MySQL), which is more suited to smaller websites and lower budget applications.