Adam Thomas, Principle Solution Architect
I come from a farming family. My dad is a full-time farmer and my mom does all the book keeping and helps manage their rental properties. Back in the late 90’s, my mom decided to take some courses at the local college on how to better use the computer in business. I remember her having to do a report on PDA’s, Personal Digital Assistants. This was back when BlackBerries and Palm Pilots ruled the mobile business device market. Those devices aspired to give you the same great service that an administrative assistant or personal assistant would give you.
Prior to starting TOPHAT LTD, I worked for a large company that had admin assistants. Admin assistants take care of those pesky operational details that stand in the business’ way, making sure what should get done actually does get done. They’re usually underappreciated despite their necessity to smooth business operations and high utilization.
And yet, in the 90’s, we thought we could make a device that could replace the assistance of a real human being. Being the founder of a tech startup that’s using the latest, greatest technology (I have an iPhone I carry in my pocket that’s over 2x as powerful as the computer I wrote my first program on!), I can definitely say that, while an admin assistance is not a luxury I can afford at the moment, it is a position that is a critical part of TOPHAT LTD’s strategic growth plan. A position that can’t be replaced by a slick device in the palm of your hand.
However, the popularity of smart phones and tablets has demonstrated that there is some sort of need that is begging to be met by a handheld device. I believe that, just like an admin assistant will help tasks get done between humans, we also have a need for something to help tasks get done between different software applications.
Today, we can have a hundred different apps all in the palm of our hand, providing us valuable information, but we’re still functioning as the admin assistant for apps. We mentally or physically transfer information from one app to another. We take a picture with the camera app on our phone, attach it to an email, email it to ourselves, open the email on our computer, copy the picture into a photo editing program, edit it, save it, insert it into a Word document template we use for a report, save it, convert it to PDF, and finally send it to our client for review. Didn’t it used to be easier when we just took a picture with a real camera and then handed the film to our dear admin assistant who took care of developing it, putting it into the report for us, and sending it to the client?
It doesn’t have to be this way! Most apps now come with an API: an application program interface. Essentially, an app with an API can talk to and share information with another app. If this is possible, why do all these apps still seem to be so disconnected? Well, the caveat is that, while one app can now talk to another app if it has an API, it doesn’t mean they talk the same “language.” What you need in most cases is a third app to serve as translator. This app makes sure that the two apps you care about communicating with each other both communicate and understand each other. This third app is what we call a data integration or application integration, depending on the situation.
Most companies have considerable opportunities for integration apps—over 50% of projects currently require some amount of integration work. So, before you get frustrated with the amount of time and effort you spend tapping on your smart device, consider replacing that PDA with an integrated solution. Utilize an API.
And yet, in the 90’s, we thought we could make a device that could replace the assistance of a real human being. Being the founder of a tech startup that’s using the latest, greatest technology (I have an iPhone I carry in my pocket that’s over 2x as powerful as the computer I wrote my first program on!), I can definitely say that, while an admin assistance is not a luxury I can afford at the moment, it is a position that is a critical part of TOPHAT LTD’s strategic growth plan. A position that can’t be replaced by a slick device in the palm of your hand.
However, the popularity of smart phones and tablets has demonstrated that there is some sort of need that is begging to be met by a handheld device. I believe that, just like an admin assistant will help tasks get done between humans, we also have a need for something to help tasks get done between different software applications.
Today, we can have a hundred different apps all in the palm of our hand, providing us valuable information, but we’re still functioning as the admin assistant for apps. We mentally or physically transfer information from one app to another. We take a picture with the camera app on our phone, attach it to an email, email it to ourselves, open the email on our computer, copy the picture into a photo editing program, edit it, save it, insert it into a Word document template we use for a report, save it, convert it to PDF, and finally send it to our client for review. Didn’t it used to be easier when we just took a picture with a real camera and then handed the film to our dear admin assistant who took care of developing it, putting it into the report for us, and sending it to the client?
It doesn’t have to be this way! Most apps now come with an API: an application program interface. Essentially, an app with an API can talk to and share information with another app. If this is possible, why do all these apps still seem to be so disconnected? Well, the caveat is that, while one app can now talk to another app if it has an API, it doesn’t mean they talk the same “language.” What you need in most cases is a third app to serve as translator. This app makes sure that the two apps you care about communicating with each other both communicate and understand each other. This third app is what we call a data integration or application integration, depending on the situation.
Most companies have considerable opportunities for integration apps—over 50% of projects currently require some amount of integration work. So, before you get frustrated with the amount of time and effort you spend tapping on your smart device, consider replacing that PDA with an integrated solution. Utilize an API.
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