8 new technology trends and methodologies for app modernization

App modernization has become a pivotal strategy for global businesses. In a survey of over 400 leading IT executives across different domains conducted by IBM Institute for Business Value (IBV), 83% of respondents said that updating applications and data was important to their business strategy. The primary reasons for modernization are agreed to be to enhance the security, reliability, and scalability of the existing system.

This article explores 8 new technologies and methodologies that will likely shape this endeavor in the coming time.

Microservice architecture

Microservices, or microservice architecture – is a design approach that decomposes large, monolithic applications into smaller, independently deployable services. Each of these services operates its distinct process and uses well-defined APIs to communicate.

Services are typically organized around business capabilities with each of them being owned by a single small team.

In app modernization, leveraging this architecture yields the following benefits.

Enhanced productivity
Microservices architecture allows development teams to operate independently. Therefore, they can create and manage distinct services without the need for constant coordination. This approach accelerates productivity by minimizing delays and allows for more efficient testing because each service can be evaluated independently.

Better alignment with business goals
By adopting microservices, the development teams are responsible for distinct, service-based components that operate almost like standalone products. This structure complements agile practices and organizational strategies effectively.

Maintenance efficiency
With microservices, updates or fixes to one service do not impact others, simplifying maintenance efforts and enabling safer and quicker updates. Furthermore, the reusability of services across different applications enhances operational efficiency and reduces redundant work.

Technological agility
The decoupled nature of microservices allows developers to freely choose the best tools and programming languages for each service. This flexibility is more manageable than monolithic structures, where integrating multiple technologies can be cumbersome and restrictive. This capability supports continuous innovation and adaptation in a rapidly evolving tech landscape

Low-code and no-code development

Low-code and no-code platforms are tools and environments for software development that allow users to create a functional application using drag-and-drop components. Low-code platforms may require a certain amount of coding knowledge to customize the application and enhance its functionality. Therefore, they are ideal for developers who want to speed up their progress. Meanwhile, no-code platforms aim to eliminate completely the need for coding. Therefore, they are suitable for non-tech professionals such as domain experts, office administrators, small-business owners, and business analysts.

When being adopted in app modernization, this approach leads to:

Faster innovation
Low-code and no-code development reduces the time it takes to launch a new application because key stakeholders can create the exact application, they want and then have developers refine and improve it. Therefore, the process of feasibility-testing and validating the new initiative is faster.

Alleviated developer shortage
A 2021 Gartner survey revealed that IT talent shortage was considered the biggest challenge to adopting and leveraging emerging technologies. No-code and low-code software development can streamline simple programming tasks to reduce the effort needed, thus resolving the lack of human resources to handle the growing workload.

Democratization of technology
Both low-code and no-code solutions are built to empower different kinds of users. This reduces dependency on IT specialists and technologists, who can be either challenging or expensive to hire.

Gathering customer feedback quickly
Prior to investing significant resources in a project, low-code/no-code allows developers to get feedback from customers by showcasing easy-to-build prototypes. This shifts the go/no-go decision earlier in the project schedule, minimizing risk and cost. It also results in faster agile releases.

Stronger collaboration across different departments
Thanks to low-code and no-code development, the business and IT departments now have an increasingly larger common ground to exchange insights to further improve the efficiency of their collaboration.

Cloud-native development

“Cloud-native” describes software built to run in a cloud computing environment. These applications are designed to be scalable, highly available, and easy to manage, unlike traditional solutions designed for on-premises environments and then migrated to a cloud environment.

Using a cloud-native approach in app modernization enables you to move from the idea phase to production quickly. Compared to traditional monolithic apps, cloud-native applications allow for iterative improvements by leveraging Agile and DevOps processes. These apps are made of individual microservices, so improvements and new features can be continuously added in a non-intrusive way, causing no downtime and avoiding disrupting the end-user experience. This helps the cloud-native development process more closely match the speed and innovation demanded by today’s business environment.

DevOps

DevOps refers to the tools, practices, and philosophies that foster stronger cross-team communication and collaboration in the development process.

App modernization through DevOps offers significant advantages over traditional monolithic application development.

*Iterative improvements *
By leveraging Agile and DevOps processes, cloud-native applications can be developed and enhanced continuously, aligning with the rapid pace of today’s business environment.

Cloud-native applications, composed of individual microservices, enable incremental and automated improvements. This microservices architecture allows for the addition of new features and enhancements without impacting the overall system. As a result, improvements can be made non-intrusively, ensuring no downtime or disruption to the end-user experience. This seamless update process is a critical advantage in maintaining high availability and reliability for users.

Enhanced scalability
Another major benefit is the scalability offered by the elastic infrastructure underpinning cloud-native applications. Scaling up or down becomes straightforward, allowing businesses to efficiently manage resources and handle varying loads. This elasticity ensures that applications can meet demand without unnecessary expenditure on infrastructure, providing both cost-effectiveness and performance optimization.

Enhanced adaptability and fast-paced innovation
Moreover, the cloud-native development process, supported by DevOps practices, aligns with the speed and innovation demands of modern business environments. Continuous Integration and Continuous Deployment (CI/CD) pipelines automate the integration and deployment of code changes, facilitating rapid and reliable delivery of new features and updates. This automation enhances the agility of development teams, enabling them to respond quickly to market changes and user feedback.

Containerization
Containerization is the packaging of software code along with only the essential operating system libraries and dependencies needed to execute the code. This results in a lightweight, standalone executable, known as a container, that can run consistently across various infrastructures.

Why is containerization becoming a key approach to app modernization?

Portability
Containers encapsulate software into executable packages that are independent of the host operating system. This abstraction ensures that containers can run consistently across various platforms or cloud environments.

Agility and speed
The Docker Engine, an open-source standard for running containers, introduced simple developer tools and a universal packaging method compatible with both Linux and Windows. The container ecosystem, now governed by the Open Container Initiative (OCI), allows developers to continue using agile and DevOps methodologies for rapid application development and improvement.

In addition, containers are lightweight, sharing the machine’s OS kernel, which eliminates the need for additional overhead. This leads to higher server efficiency in app modernization due to reduced server and licensing costs and faster start times since there is no need to boot an operating system.

Fault isolation
Each containerized application operates independently, so a failure in one container does not affect others, allowing developers to fix technical issues in one container without causing disruptions to another. Containers can also utilize OS security isolation techniques, such as SELinux access control, to manage faults effectively.

Ease of management
Container orchestration platforms automate the installation, scaling, and management of containerized workloads and services. They simplify tasks such as scaling applications, rolling out new versions, and monitoring, logging, and debugging. Kubernetes, a popular open-source container orchestration system, automates these functions and works with various container engines that conform to OCI standards.

Security
In containerization, by isolating applications within containers, malicious code will be prevented from affecting other containers or damaging the host system. Security permissions can be set to automatically block unwanted components or limit unnecessary communications, which enhances overall security.

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