About Centrally-Hosted Applications |
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The
concept of hosting an application centrally is not a new one. In the early years
of office IT systems most terminals connected to a centrally located mainframe in
order to share and access the same data source. They were known as ‘dummy-terminals’
because they didn’t have software applications or data loaded onto their hard drive:
they merely provided a means of accessing the mainframe.
It was the role of the mainframe to host the software application and share
information.
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Whilst mainframes have been relegated to the annuls of computing history the
concept is still very much in use in the world of the internet. In fact many
of the web applications you use today are loosely based around the mainframe
business model, and is known as the ASP (Application Service Provider) model.
This is where you connect via your 'dummy terminal' (your browser) to the
'mainframe' (the web site), where the software application is hosted. All
software and data is hosted by the web site, which eliminates the need for
software purchasing, licensing, expensive training and IT support. These are huge, often intangible, cost-savings that
many people overlook.
The following diagram shows how SySurvey works.
Please read below for an explanation:
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Diagram to illustrate the SySurvey process
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1. Administrator creates and distributes survey via SySurvey server
2. Respondent receives and opens survey
3. Respondents completes survey and sends back to server
4. Administrator accesses results via server |
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