Many businesses do not have expertise in developing real-time applications. Here are some do’s and don’ts to get started down the right path.
Real-time applications are playing an increasingly important role in business operations. Applications span industries from retail to financial services to facilities management and more. The common theme among all use cases is the need for rapid data analysis, an ability to quickly accommodate new data sources and analysis techniques, and support for constant updates.
These factors can make real-time application development challenging. Additionally, many businesses do not have extensive experience in this arena. To help organizations get started on the right foot, VANTIQ has put together an infographic of real-time application development do’s and don’ts. These recommendations are based on best practices and lessons learned in real-world deployments and engagements.
Some critical Do’s
Real-time applications use cases include smart shopping carts, smart workplaces and buildings, anti-money laundering and fraud prevention, energy grid management, intelligent supply chains, and a slew of manufacturing improvement opportunities.
Real-time applications development in these diverse use cases can all benefit from these best practices:
Design event-driven systems: Deploy an Event-Driven Architecture so processes operate independently no matter when or how often data arrives, enabling highly scalable loosely coupled applications.
Build with agility in mind: Build applications faster using low code tools and continuous deployment capabilities to easily modify applications on the fly.
Plan strategically, deploy tactically: Define a set of intelligent applications as a digital nervous system, then deploy them one at a time based on near-term business priorities.
Automatically trigger business actions: Design real-time systems to analyze situations and take immediate action whenever possible, bringing in humans to make critical decisions when necessary.
Bring computing closer to the source: Achieve low-latency and high performance of real-time systems by deploying processing logic at the edge as close to the source as possible.
Important don’ts for real-time applications development
There also are some things to avoid. The recommended don’ts include:
Default to Big Data thinking: Instead, sense, analyze, and act upon streaming data as it arrives to enable the quickest and most useful response, only storing it at the end.
Prototype with one set of tools and build with another: Instead, use one integrated IDE to reduce complexity and training, thereby dramatically shortening time to value.
Reinvent the wheel: Instead, compose new applications by reusing features or components that can be dragged and dropped from libraries or previously built applications.
Display and call it a day: Instead, go beyond data visualization and embed automated, real-time intelligence to reflexively act on critical information as it arrives.
Build it and forget it: Instead, evolve real-time applications over time as requirements change and new technologies become available.
View the infographic below or download it.
