What is the prime difference between a Web Application and a SaaS Application?

[mark...@virtuon-inc.com]

[Nicolas Fonrose]

Hi Mark,

A SaaS application is a business service that :

  - is immediately accessible after a self-service sign-in (on the Web or on Mobile)

  - can scale up/down to the number of users you want without friction

  - is pay-per-use (most of the time on a per month.user basis)

SaaS applications are mostly delivered via the Web, but this is not mandatory. For instance, Spotify which is a SaaS music service, is distributed only in native packaging (for Desktop and Mobiles/Tablets). I'm sure we can expect many business applications to be distributed that way (especially using Tablets).

A Web application is any application that is accessible via a Web browse. Be it on the Internet or on a Intranet. It's 'Web nature' doesn't give it the properties of a SaaS application.

Cheers,

Nicolas

-- 

Nicolas Fonrose | Teevity | Founder

Cloud costs monitoring, analytics and management

+33.6.61.35.43.31

http://cloudcost.teevity.com

twitter - @nfonrose / @teevity

On Fri, May 18, 2012 at 12:02 AM, mark...@virtuon-inc.com <mark...@virtuon-inc.com> wrote:

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[Miha Ahronovitz]

Nicolas, we touched this subject  about the importance of billing on Cloud Computing Google Group from Mar 28 2009 or  Jun 18 2009 .

Glad to see you are in this space, together with  many. 2 years ago, they were practically none.

Miha

[Miha Ahronovitz]

Mark, maybe this reference helps answer your question:

   Convert your web application to a multi-tenant SaaS solution
   http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/cloud/library/cl-multitenantsaas/?ca=drs-

The article is thorough But the key difference have to do with the business model - billing, no need to own a license and pay-as-you-go. Quote:

To convert your web application to a SaaS application you have to do seven things:

1. The application must support multi-tenancy.
2. The application must have some level of self-service sign-up.
3. There must be a subscription/billing mechanism in place.
4. The application must be able to scale efficiently.
5. There must be functions in place to monitor, configure, and manage the application and tenants.
6. There must be a mechanism in place to support unique user identification and authentication.
7. There must be a mechanism in place to support some level of customization for each tenant.

Chhers,

Miha