Old and new make the warp and woof of every moment. There is no thread that is not a twist of these two strands.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Digital business transformation is not “one thing” that happens at “one particular moment.” It is a continuous process that explores and improves new business models as well as exploits new technology. CIOs and application leaders are trying to keep up with digital business demand by providing the best and most timely support for digital business initiatives. Each initiative creates additional demand, and IT needs agility and velocity to stay in sync or, better, stay ahead.
By using APIs, it is possible to “wrap” even closed legacy applications into something resembling a modern microservice.
To support this, the application organization needs to go into a continuous delivery mode. But often, legacy applications are part of the value chain, and introduce impediments and delays with a negative impact on agility and velocity. Legacy applications contain valuable core functions and data that are essential for digital business initiatives. Application leaders should look to transform these legacy applications into the basis of a platform for digital business.
Rip and replace is in many cases too costly, risky and time-consuming, and has a high impact on the business. We advise organizations to instead take an iterative approach: continuous application modernization. Doing so will demand that you pave the way for digital business by understanding the impediments. Then you must prioritize these impediments and remove them one at a time.
Continuous application modernization is a gradual approach that focuses on providing digital business support and value in a timely manner. In other words: continuous delivery requires continuous modernization
Transform Your Legacy Application Into a Microservice
By using APIs, it is possible to “wrap” even closed legacy applications into something resembling a modern microservice.
Continuous modernization identifies, prioritizes and removes obstacles for digital business in our legacy applications one by one. Different modernization approaches are used to remove an obstacle, such as encapsulating, refactoring, replatforming or replacing application components.
Using continuous modernization, we are gradually transforming the legacy application into a platform for digital business to take a foundational role in our application portfolio, providing services via APIs that can be consumed by other applications (see Figure 4).
The API mediation layer also provides a point at which governance, security and monitoring can be applied. By gradually and continuously modernizing the core applications, we create platforms and support digital business innovation.