What is SaaS? – Software As a Service

Software as a Service

Software as a Service (SaaS), a.k.a. on-demand software, is a software delivery model in which software and its associated data are hosted centrally and accessed using a thin-client, usually a web browser over the internet.

SaaS in which software is licensed on a subscription basis and is centrally hosted.

SaaS can be accessed on any web browsers.

Simply put, SaaS is a method for delivering software as a web-based service via remote access. The software service can be purchased with a monthly fee and pay as you go.

What is SaaS?

Software As A Service is Multi-tenant architecture or we can say Virtualization as an alternative.

It is a Pricing model pay as we go, the relatively low cost for user provisioning

It also provides Configuration and customization and Accelerated feature deliveryIt means a much shorter release cycle.

It also based on Open integration protocolsTypically HTTP/HTTPS, JSON, REST, SOAP.

We are in the era of Cloud Computing!

• Cloud computing stack
• Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)
• Platform as a Service (PaaS)
• Software as a Service (SaaS)
• Monitoring as a Service (MaaS) – emerging
• Communication as a Service (CaaS)
• Anything as a Service – emerging

There are so many services but SaaS is one of the most widely used service models in the world.

Business’s perspective

SaaS has a lot of appeal to businesses. Here are a few reasons why:

• Multi-tenant software architecture
• Low cost, fast investment, shared license
• High manageability
• Free of deployment and support
• Cost-effective: pay as we go
• Customization is easy
• Can scale well – commercialization

 Advantages of SaaS

• Easy to use – Most of the applications in Saas require the only web browser to run.
• You don’t need to worry about upgrade software or security, these are the responsibility of Saas provider to upgrades, uptime, and security.
• Work anywhere.
• Lower cost of entry – The pay as you go pricing model of SaaS makes it affordable to small businesses and individuals.
• Scalability: As SaaS application is On-Demand software so it can be easily scaled up or down to meet consumer demand. Consumers do not need to worry about different computing infrastructure on their own side.
• Applications are less chances of data loss since data is being stored in the cloud and SaaS provider’s servers.
• Compared to other traditional applications, SaaS applications are more capable as they do not require to install binary code on each machine.
• SaaS applications can be run on many devices and operating systems.
• Provides better communications between teams since the data is centrally stored.
• SaaS applications are much faster and also favors an Agile development life cycle. Software changes and frequent and on-demand.

SaaS case studies

Here are the details of services provided by two of the biggest SaaS providers today: Amazon & Google.

• Amazon Web Services(AWS)
• Storage
  • Amazon simple storage services(S3)
  • Amazon Elastic Book Store(EBS)
• Networking
  • Amazon Virtual Private Cloud (VPC)
  • Amazon Route53
• Database
  • Amazon Dynamo DB
  • Amazon Relational Database Service (RDS)
• Compute
  • Amazon Elastic Cloud Compute (EC2)
  • Amazon Elastic Map Reduce (EMR)
• Google App Engine