CIS510 Discussion Reply

CIS510 discussion post responses.

Respond to the colleagues posts regarding:

"Software as a Service (SaaS) and Ease of Use" Please respond to the following:

There are two discussions here that need to be responded to thoroughly. Responses must be on APA format 150+words 1-2 legitimate verifiable sources per response.

HH’s post states the following:Top of Form

There are usually three models of cloud service to compare: Software as a Service (SaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS), and Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS). Each of these has its own benefits, as well as variances. Most common SaaS are Google Apps, Dropbox, Salesforce, Cisco WebEx, Concur, GoToMeeting and Office 365. I am here will pick two examples to discuss where they are most common but differ in details based on the business needs.

Office 365 migration:

Companies used to have an Exchange server on premises and/or other email server like Louts Notes. Office 365 provides numerous advantages to employees and companies by greatly reducing the time and money spent on tedious tasks such as installing, managing, and upgrading software. This frees up plenty of time for technical staff to spend on more pressing matters and issues within the organization.

There are a few ways to help you determine when Office 365 is being utilized:

· Managed from a central location

· Hosted on a remote server

· Accessible over the Internet

· Users not responsible for hardware or software updates

Companies used to spend a lot of money to maintain their Exchange (email) infrastructure on-premises and buying Office Applications with SLA along with limitation for the number of installs on each device. Moving to Office365 saves the companies a lot of money and time to maintain their infrastructure and focus on other areas or projects to improve their business continuity. O365 helped companies to apply more Data Security measure and perform customization as needed. The only concern is the limitation for integration which is still facing issues but being improved.

Moving to Office 365 cause some conflict for users specially for those needs to recreate their outlook profiles and deleting the auto-complete address book that contains the old X500 address that result in mail delivery failure when they reply to an old message specifically. These causes conflict for the user and especially for older users whom doesn't know much about technology.

In a creative way to overcome this learning curve and make the transition more seamless to the end user, I would provide a one-to-one learning session as well as creating multiple group trainings. In the mean time will create an automated script that recreates the outlook profile for the end user and delete their old Address Book.

SalesForce Migration for IT Helpdesk:

We were using an on-premises system that handle IT Help desk tickets where users sends an email to a dedicated email address that automatically generate a ticket and send a response to the the sender. Moving to Salesforce wasn't that easy as it is a customized service that needs a lot of interaction and awareness from the IT staff on how to handle it. Te end user has not been impacted by this process like the IT team. A multiple training session has been conducted to explain how ticket handling is being processed and getting used to the interface with multiple options was very time consuming but it makes tickets handling more convenient and productive.

With both cases we have implemented a set of policies to secure access to these services like implementing two-factor authentication at Office 365 and blocking external emails from sending email to the dedicated IT Helpdesk queue.

AN’s Post states the following

Software as a Service (SaaS) is one of the most popular forms of cloud computing. It is categorized as as one of the three major cloud services along with infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) and platform-as-a-service (PaaS). IaaS provides access to IT resources in a virtualized environment, across a public connection via the Internet. PaaS is a clould-based offering in which service providers deliver platforms to clients that allow them to develop. The true benefit of SaaS is you can access software across all corners of the business world. At my current place of employment for many years we used Lotus Notes. This application offered limited security, changes are required by a technical administrative support person and Domino Server and Lotus Notes must be updated constantly. Also, let's not forget the application must be backed up for optimal processing unlike Microsoft Outlook. There is also a high cost as it pertains to staying with Lotus Notes within your organization. Lotus also has a user interface that is not user-friendly to say the least. Some of our users struggle to understand the basic functions of the email client. Outlook allows for creating public folders, share e-mail and contacts and overall flexibility.

Outlook is a component of the Office 356 application suite. Having the ability to use the components such as Word, Excel, Access and PowerPoint from anywhere that has an Internet connection, makes it a step above the rest. At my place of employment we migrated from Lotus to Office 365 a couple of years ago and have not looked back. The portal we have setup offers many advantages to those that do not want to carry a laptop or tablet. Via the cloud, you are able to access all your Office 365 applications along with documents that have been saved to the cloud. Basically, our ease of use is the cloud flexibility of our ability to incorporate SaaS when our daily equipment is not accessible (ie laptop, tablet, etc.). Incorporating Ping ID and two factor authentication within our organization has also allowed the ease of use.

Before we implemented Ping ID and Two Factor, our primary resource to outside the organization connection was with Cisco Anyconnect (VPN) utility and Vasco token. Problems would occur when users would either lose the token or the battery would die. At that point, there would be no way of them getting connected to the business. We later implemented Digipass soft tokens which consisted of downloading an app which gave you authentication information (six digit number) which you would enter into the Cisco Anyconnect application. We have come a long way and through some obstacles, have figured out a way to make access to the business easer while away from the office.