Cisco Cisco Application Performance Assurance Network Module White Paper

White Paper

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Optimizing Service Based Networking with Cisco
Application-Oriented Networking

The pressure to deliver real-time information across the enterprise is unyielding. Whether

because users demand information in a particular format or at a particular time, or

because regulatory oversight and corporate governance require a single integrated view,

or simply because the pace of business outstrips the ability to deliver IT services at an

acceptable cost, the task for enterprise IT is to build an application infrastructure that can

scale and evolve, all at costs lower than today. Clearly, one solution is to drive

virtualization, which can do wonders at the infrastructure layer. Equally clear is that IT

needs a solution to address the problems of managing distributed business processes.

For most organizations, the costs of building and maintaining an application integration

infrastructure are huge. And as many IT organizations experience, the ability to evolve an

application or business process is often hamstrung by the inability to evolve the application

infrastructure as quickly. Increasingly, business processes not just spread across departments, but

reach across companies, locations, and technologies. Supporting these processes with a flexible

and resilient architecture across heterogeneous technologies and environments is a serious

challenge.

Application-oriented networking (AON) bridges heterogeneous software worlds in today’s IT

network environments. As traditional silos between IT functions and expertise are being

eliminated, business processes are more dependent on networked connectivity and functionality.

AON technology bridges these gaps by providing application and middleware control points within

network devices themselves. Rather than relying on costly and error-prone server components,

AON extends the network to understand and control all major middleware protocols, including IBM

MQ Series, Tibco, BEA, J2EE, and standard Web services protocols.

With AON, the challenges to enterprise IT are significantly reduced in four respects:

●

Reducing overly complex application and middleware infrastructure: Software and

application infrastructures are heterogeneous in most companies. The cost and complexity

of maintaining and integrating them pressures many companies to consider architectural

consolidation. However, this project alone can entail many years and still not lead to a

substantive increase in IT or business flexibility. With AON, the network can play the role of

the standard intermediary. Beyond reducing the server and software component, AON can

normalize messages and content from different application bases and provide centralized

administration and management to ensure rapid implementation and change.

●

Lowering the cost of business partner integration: Integration with business partners in

either the supply or demand chain is a costly proposition. For a large organization, the cost

of maintaining a gateway can amount to maintaining a custom software project for each

business partner. The cost can also be a barrier for smaller partners forced to “pay to play”

or raise the overall cost and maintenance where a company is forced to automate its supply

or demand chain on its own. AON can provide the basis for a standard business-to-