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January 8, 2010

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle - Sustainable Software Development

by Dave Blickstein, Director of Technology

Software development has changed dramatically during my 35 years in the field. I want to draw your attention to one new paradigm that plays a key role in Spiral's strategy.

Let's say that you wanted to add new features to your software that had been previously implemented by other companies. In the old days, there were many barriers in trying to reuse code from others. You might have been writing in different programming languages, or targeting different platforms.   Even if you solved all the technical challenges, maybe no one wanted to share their code with you. And if you had the right skills to recreate the same features on your own, it would take significantly more time, and obviously cost much more money.

Now we are the midst of a true "software convergence."  Over the years these barriers have been gradually eroded by the development of standards, protocols, network services, and open source licensing. Now software developers can focus on their core competencies, and yet offer a product that is "best in class" by using the building blocks provided by their partners or open source communities.

Spiral's partnership with Ext JS is a good example, profiled recently in the "Implementation Spotlight" on the Ext JS blog. Their Ext GWT component library allowed us to produce complex yet user-friendly software in much less time than if we had built each component ourselves from scratch. Better yet, whenever Ext JS, Google, Sun Microsystems, or our other technology partners enhance their products, our users benefit from improved performance in Spiral.

Our imminent migration to Ext GWT 2.1 will be another step in making the Spiral user experience better.  And all we have to do is... well... we don't have to do anything.  That's the point.

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