Web based verses Web enabled solutions - Answering the question of 'Dot Com' versus 'Not Com'

Abstract
The explosion of the Internet's popularity to process business based, ecommerce transactions has led many individuals to believe that simply putting a web browser on an existing enterprise application will automatically generate value for their company. However, leveraging information technology to gain market advantage requires a deeper understanding of the technology and of the business processes to which it will be applied in order to reap the potential rewards they possess. The differences between web-based and web-enabled applications may be subtle for now, but the differences are significant and will become more apparent over time. Web-based applications provide the basis for more cost-effective solutions that result in creation of greater value for an organization than other alternatives provide. From connectivity of data and support of popular computing devices, to the total cost of ownership benefit paradigm, web-based applications are the only real choice for companies adopting solutions for new mobile business environments.

Mobile and wireless Internet solutions are now seen as an obvious marriage of technologies that enable companies to extend business process reengineering to a portion of the user population that up to this point have been untouchable. Mobile and field workforces, particularly those in the “blue collar” world, are notoriously independent and have traditionally not welcomed change. Failed mobile computing projects litter the IT world, but not for the reasons most would suspect. Traditional mobile projects did not have the technical infrastructure to support a successful rollout. Rugged/durable computing devices to date have been expensive and under- powered when compared to back office desktop computers. Integration issues between custom-developed, mobile applications and mainframe/client-server systems delayed implementations and have not delivered benefits trapped in field service organizations. Ongoing costs associated with the maintenance of these proprietary systems limit their life span. More important, the cost of customizing each of these systems to specific user needs causes many companies to abandon their investment in these once promising projects. Overall, traditional mobile computing projects do not adequately address the issues surrounding Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) of mobile field service solutions, the cost and the quality of integrating data, nor supporting the standards that enable companies to take advantage of emerging technologies.