application integration Archives • TxMQ Solutions

IBM Cast Iron Options: Appliance Vs. Live (SaaS)

Posted on September 19, 2014 | by admin

Software as a Service (SaaS) is fast becoming the deployment du jour, but appliances haven’t lost favor yet. The decision over an on-premise install or appliance versus an SaaS solution should still be made on a case-by-case basis. IBM Cast Iron offers both options and each enables cloud-to-cloud, cloud-to-on-premise and on-premise-to-on-premise integration and real-time, near-real-time and batch.
Here’s a brief look at both options.

Cast Iron As Appliance

Cast Iron can be deployed as either physical hardware or a virtual machine. With this style of deployment, the Integration Appliance is installed on-premise – normally behind the firewall, but not within a DMZ.
The runtime environments for the dev, test and prod lifecycles are typically separated, each with its own Integration Appliance to access necessary endpoints within the environment.
The user maintains full control of projects and their orchestrations on the appliance through the WMC. The orchestrations are started through activities which include polling, scheduling or an incoming request – an HTTP Receive Request, for example. Data flows through the Integration Appliance and is stored internally as XML variables. Users control the logging for each orchestration.

Cast Iron Live

This multi-tenant, browser-accessed deployment model includes key components for users to design, run and manage integrations all in the cloud. Those components are:

A clustered runtime engine that runs the integrations with built-in fault-tolerance and recovery mechanisms
A multi-tenant, highly available system to store the designed integrations
A load-balancer to intelligently manage the loads throughout the various runtime engines
Highly available file systems to store and manage logs that are related to the integrations

The Live version also includes a Design environment with the same capabilities as the on-premise Studio environment
TxMQ specializes in application integration. Initial consultations are free and communications are always confidential. Contact vice president Miles Roty for more information: (716) 636-0070 x228, miles@txmq.com.

Four Different Options For WebSphere Cast Iron Deployment

Posted on September 11, 2014 | by admin

IBM’s WebSphere Cast Iron cloud-integration product is the industry’s best-in-class solution for two reasons: 1. Its cross-service flexibility, and 2. Its ultra-easy graphical interface. Deploy Cast Iron then drag and point your different integration preferences.
Cast Iron is perhaps best known for easy and complete Salesforce integration – use Cast Iron to integrate Salesforce data with the rest of your enterprise data – but Cast Iron recently reached a new critical mass centered on the integration and synchronization of mobile-application data and social-media data across the enterprise. Cast Iron is especially effective for integrating contemporary data, like that from mobile and social, with legacy data driven by homegrown applications.
Cast Iron is easy to adopt and deploy and there are four different deployment options. They are:

Cast Iron Hypervisor Edition: This is a virtual appliance that sits on existing servers by way of virtualization technology. It’s a great way to speed the path through demo and staging to production, and as of June 2014 it includes Xen server support.
Cast Iron Express: A cloud-based version that assists in the integration of Software as a Service (SaaS) data with other data sources. This is the most popular Salesforce solution.
Cast Iron Live: This is a cloud-based multi-seat version that’s best for cloud/on-premise hybrid environments.
DataPower Cast Iron Appliance XH40: This is real metal – a self-contained, physical appliance that connects cloud and on-premise applications.

TxMQ specializes in Cast Iron integration solutions for businesses of all sizes. For more information, contact vice president Miles Roty – (716) 636-0070 x228, miles@txmq.com – for a confidential and free initial consultation.