“SAP SE on Friday shared more details with CIO Journal on its Apple Inc. partnership aimed at creating a marketplace for iOS applications that tap into its flagship HANA cloud platform,” Tom Loftus reports for The Wall Street Journal. “The agreement reflects a wider desire shared across many enterprises to transform complex business processes into simple (or at least simpler) mobile applications. The ongoing effort started way back with the appearance of Apple’s iPhone and today, increasingly, that same device maker is helping underpin the transition via a popular programming language.”
“SAP plans to build the first 100 applications,” Loftus reports. “Some will be industry-specific, addressing fields such as health care and retail. But as Steve Lucas, SAP’s president for platform solutions, tells CIO Journal’s Steven Norton, the hope is that developers will take advantage of the software development kit to create applications of their own.”
Loftus reports, “The new SDK uses Apple’s Swift, an open source programming language, that has become a major enterprise player in the last couple years.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Welcome to the future.
SEE ALSO:
Nearly half of OS X devs want to learn Swift – May 5, 2016
Google mulls adopting Apple’s Swift language for Android – April 8, 2016
Want a developer job? Time to learn Apple’s Swift as demand skyrockets – March 1, 2016
Apple’s open source Swift will open the door for HomeKit – December 16, 2015
Apple has hugely ambitious plans for open-sourced Swift, and hints on what’s coming to iOS – December 15, 2015
After Apple open sources it, IBM puts Swift programming in the cloud – December 4, 2015
Apple officially releases Swift programming language as open source – December 3, 2015
Apple’s open-sourced Swift programming language could change everything – November 25, 2015
Apple’s Swift programming language could soon infiltrate data centers – November 24, 2015
Developers band together to create Mandarin Chinese translation of Apple’s Swift programming language – August 6, 2015
Apple’s Swift breaks into top 20 in dev language survey; bad news for Microsoft’s Visual Basic – July 2, 2015
Apple’s Swift: The future of enterprise app development – June 10, 2015
When I read this is scary and exciting at the same time.
Winter is coming for the Mac. In the same way that it came for the mainframe and the minicomputer, it is coming for the personal computer.
In the not too distant future, all of the “analysts” will claim to have seen it coming. Apple’s shift from powerful conventional computers to cloud dependent information appliances is underway. The “i” iOS and iPhone and iPad stands for information. The “i” in iMac stands for interim.
Apple’s focus is on the iPhone and the IPad. The iPhone has made Apple a behemoth, and enterprise giants like IBM and SAP, are focused on developing for iOS. IBM is also focused on maintaining Macs, in the interim.
With Macs lasting 6 and 7 years now, I’ve been telling clients to take a good look at the Mac in front of them. It very well may be the last Mac they purchase. Businesses aren’t technology enthusiasts. They won’t buy unless there is a need. Businesses like cheap, secure, easy, and future-proof.
The Mac Pro is fading. It was obsolete when it was announced, and you can build far more powerful machines for half the cost. The Mac Pro doesn’t compete well against 18 and 22 core machines with the latest GPUs. And real pros don’t want a sealed machine that can’t be upgraded. The writing is on the wall.
In the not too distant future, when iPads are invading the enterprise at a rate the Mac never achieved, we’ll look back and think it was obvious.
With a modicum of additional flexibility, it would be easy to convince most casual computer users (the majority) that all they need is an iPad. I believe Apple is holding off on that flexibility in order to (as Jobs said) Milk the Mac for all its worth.
IT is beginning to decline in the traditional sense. Instead of lots of systems and network people running around and keeping things going, it will evolve into the mobile device management and information services. The end of in-house servers is near for small to medium sized businesses.
But Jon Snow lives!
Interesting post, but a little overboard IMO. These transitions tend to take much longer than a few years. Desktop computers are fading in popularity, but will still be around for a while. Laptops are relatively more popular due to their portability combined with significant improvements to processing and graphics power since the mid-2000s. Laptops and related tablet-keyboard laptop derivatives will be around for a lot longer than desktops.
Eventually miniaturization and ubiquitous connectivity and next generation human i/o (elimination of keyboards and displays) may lead to wearable/implantable computing resources that eliminate the need for desktops and laptops. That time has not yet arrived.
I’m not really looking at wearables and implanted thingies, but I am looking at tablets. The iPhone and the iPad are both tablets and this is where the major development is now.
If you look at the iPad now, even though most people might complain about the “limitations” of iOS, you can:
• Perform most daily computer tasks including
– Internet Browser based activities
– Word Processing
– Email
– Database Management
– Spreadsheets
– Collaboration Software
– PDF Management (Multiple tools)
– File Transfer
– Document Management System Interface
– Calendaring
– CRM
– Project Management
– Task Lists
– Time Tracking
– Note Taking
– Education Apps
– Personal Finance / Banking
– Outlining
– Presentations
– Brainstorming
• A myriad of different types of apps for productivity that I can’t think of.
People can substitute an iPad for a conventional computer now and I only expect it to become easier.
When I tell people they may have purchased their last Mac, this doesn’t apply to enthusiasts such as yourself. This applies to companies who keep machines around for 6 or 7 years. The next big upgrade for these folks will most likely be all iPads.
With cheaper more powerful microcomputers like CHIP and Rasberry Pi and the like coming up, the future may have desktop power and OSes in portable size. With possible future technologies that replace touch with air gestures and displays with HUD in glasses and contacts we could be walking around with the equivalent of workstations in the decades to come. This would possibly replace all mobile devices before contemporary desktops should it come to pass.
PROBLEM: Apple still has not replaced their POOR system of Enterprise developer security certificate signing. Steal one, and you can stuff it into malware for fun and financial profit.
The ability to steal an Enterprise security certificate and use it elsewhere has GOT to end immediately. It’s shaming the hell out of Apple every day this dirty trick remains possible.
Example:
Another pirated app service uses Apple enterprise license to distribute stolen software
Swift language was invented by Taylor Swift in 1989.
Undo command = “shake it off”
I think there is a bright future for Swift but it’s hardly become a major player in the enterprise at this point. Interest sure, actual applications and developers ? Hardly.
It’s not there yet, it’s a young language and needs time to grow. It needs to be integrated farther and one day I think it will be a strong language with a lot of support. I just do not believe it’s there yet. In time I expect it to be.