Building Cognitive Applications with IBM Watson Services: Volume 1 Getting Started


Book Description

The Building Cognitive Applications with IBM Watson Services series is a seven-volume collection that introduces IBM® WatsonTM cognitive computing services. The series includes an overview of specific IBM Watson® services with their associated architectures and simple code examples. Each volume describes how you can use and implement these services in your applications through practical use cases. The series includes the following volumes: Volume 1 Getting Started, SG24-8387 Volume 2 Conversation, SG24-8394 Volume 3 Visual Recognition, SG24-8393 Volume 4 Natural Language Classifier, SG24-8391 Volume 5 Language Translator, SG24-8392 Volume 6 Speech to Text and Text to Speech, SG24-8388 Volume 7 Natural Language Understanding, SG24-8398 Whether you are a beginner or an experienced developer, this collection provides the information you need to start your research on Watson services. If your goal is to become more familiar with Watson in relation to your current environment, or if you are evaluating cognitive computing, this collection can serve as a powerful learning tool. This IBM Redbooks® publication, Volume 1, introduces cognitive computing, its motivating factors, history, and basic concepts. This volume describes the industry landscape for cognitive computing and introduces Watson, the cognitive computing offering from IBM. It also describes the nature of the question-answering (QA) challenge that is represented by the Jeopardy! quiz game and it provides a high-level overview of the QA system architecture (DeepQA), developed for Watson to play the game. This volume charts the evolution of the Watson Developer Cloud, from the initial DeepQA implementation. This book also introduces the concept of domain adaptation and the processes that must be followed to adapt the various Watson services to specific domains.




Performance and Capacity Implications for Big Data


Book Description

Big data solutions enable us to change how we do business by exploiting previously unused sources of information in ways that were not possible just a few years ago. In IBM® Smarter Planet® terms, big data helps us to change the way that the world works. The purpose of this IBM RedpaperTM publication is to consider the performance and capacity implications of big data solutions, which must be taken into account for them to be viable. This paper describes the benefits that big data approaches can provide. We then cover performance and capacity considerations for creating big data solutions. We conclude with what this means for big data solutions, both now and in the future. Intended readers for this paper include decision-makers, consultants, and IT architects.




Accelerating Modernization with Agile Integration


Book Description

The organization pursuing digital transformation must embrace new ways to use and deploy integration technologies, so they can move quickly in a manner appropriate to the goals of multicloud, decentralization, and microservices. The integration layer must transform to allow organizations to move boldly in building new customer experiences, rather than forcing models for architecture and development that pull away from maximizing the organization's productivity. Many organizations have started embracing agile application techniques, such as microservice architecture, and are now seeing the benefits of that shift. This approach complements and accelerates an enterprise's API strategy. Businesses should also seek to use this approach to modernize their existing integration and messaging infrastructure to achieve more effective ways to manage and operate their integration services in their private or public cloud. This IBM® Redbooks® publication explores the merits of what we refer to as agile integration; a container-based, decentralized, and microservice-aligned approach for integration solutions that meets the demands of agility, scalability, and resilience required by digital transformation. It also discusses how the IBM Cloud Pak for Integration marks a significant leap forward in integration technology by embracing both a cloud-native approach and container technology to achieve the goals of agile integration. The target audiences for this book are cloud integration architects, IT specialists, and application developers.




Systems of Insight for Digital Transformation: Using IBM Operational Decision Manager Advanced and Predictive Analytics


Book Description

Systems of record (SORs) are engines that generates value for your business. Systems of engagement (SOE) are always evolving and generating new customer-centric experiences and new opportunities to capitalize on the value in the systems of record. The highest value is gained when systems of record and systems of engagement are brought together to deliver insight. Systems of insight (SOI) monitor and analyze what is going on with various behaviors in the systems of engagement and information being stored or transacted in the systems of record. SOIs seek new opportunities, risks, and operational behavior that needs to be reported or have action taken to optimize business outcomes. Systems of insight are at the core of the Digital Experience, which tries to derive insights from the enormous amount of data generated by automated processes and customer interactions. Systems of Insight can also provide the ability to apply analytics and rules to real-time data as it flows within, throughout, and beyond the enterprise (applications, databases, mobile, social, Internet of Things) to gain the wanted insight. Deriving this insight is a key step toward being able to make the best decisions and take the most appropriate actions. Examples of such actions are to improve the number of satisfied clients, identify clients at risk of leaving and incentivize them to stay loyal, identify patterns of risk or fraudulent behavior and take action to minimize it as early as possible, and detect patterns of behavior in operational systems and transportation that lead to failures, delays, and maintenance and take early action to minimize risks and costs. IBM® Operational Decision Manager is a decision management platform that provides capabilities that support both event-driven insight patterns, and business-rule-driven scenarios. It also can easily be used in combination with other IBM Analytics solutions, as the detailed examples will show. IBM Operational Decision Manager Advanced, along with complementary IBM software offerings that also provide capability for systems of insight, provides a way to deliver the greatest value to your customers and your business. IBM Operational Decision Manager Advanced brings together data from different sources to recognize meaningful trends and patterns. It empowers business users to define, manage, and automate repeatable operational decisions. As a result, organizations can create and shape customer-centric business moments. This IBM Redbooks® publication explains the key concepts of systems of insight and how to implement a system of insight solution with examples. It is intended for IT architects and professionals who are responsible for implementing a systems of insights solution requiring event-based context pattern detection and deterministic decision services to enhance other analytics solution components with IBM Operational Decision Manager Advanced.




Maximizing Security with LinuxONE


Book Description

LinuxONE® is a hardware system that is designed to support and use the Linux operating system based on the value of its unique underlying architecture. LinuxONE can be used within a private and multi-cloud environment to support a range of workloads and service various needs. On LinuxONE, security is built into the hardware and software. This IBM® Redpaper® publication gives a broad understanding of how to use the various security features that make the most of and complement the LinuxONE hardware security features, including the following examples: Hardware accelerated encryption of data, which is delivered with near-zero overhead by the on-chip Central Processor Assist for Cryptographic Function (CPACF) and a dedicated Crypto Express adapter. Virtualization and industry-leading isolation capabilities with PR/SM, EAL 5+ LPARs, DPM, KVM, and IBM z/VM®. The IBM Secure Service Container technology, which provides workload isolation, restricted administrator access, and tamper protection against internal threats, including from systems administrators. Other technologies that use LinuxONE security capabilities and practical use cases for these technologies. This publication was written for IT executives, architects, specialists, security administrators, and others who consider security for LinuxONE.







Designing and Operating a Data Reservoir


Book Description

Together, big data and analytics have tremendous potential to improve the way we use precious resources, to provide more personalized services, and to protect ourselves from unexpected and ill-intentioned activities. To fully use big data and analytics, an organization needs a system of insight. This is an ecosystem where individuals can locate and access data, and build visualizations and new analytical models that can be deployed into the IT systems to improve the operations of the organization. The data that is most valuable for analytics is also valuable in its own right and typically contains personal and private information about key people in the organization such as customers, employees, and suppliers. Although universal access to data is desirable, safeguards are necessary to protect people's privacy, prevent data leakage, and detect suspicious activity. The data reservoir is a reference architecture that balances the desire for easy access to data with information governance and security. The data reservoir reference architecture describes the technical capabilities necessary for a system of insight, while being independent of specific technologies. Being technology independent is important, because most organizations already have investments in data platforms that they want to incorporate in their solution. In addition, technology is continually improving, and the choice of technology is often dictated by the volume, variety, and velocity of the data being managed. A system of insight needs more than technology to succeed. The data reservoir reference architecture includes description of governance and management processes and definitions to ensure the human and business systems around the technology support a collaborative, self-service, and safe environment for data use. The data reservoir reference architecture was first introduced in Governing and Managing Big Data for Analytics and Decision Makers, REDP-5120, which is available at: http://www.redbooks.ibm.com/redpieces/abstracts/redp5120.html. This IBM® Redbooks publication, Designing and Operating a Data Reservoir, builds on that material to provide more detail on the capabilities and internal workings of a data reservoir.




Introduction to Storage Area Networks


Book Description

The superabundance of data that is created by today's businesses is making storage a strategic investment priority for companies of all sizes. As storage takes precedence, the following major initiatives emerge: Flatten and converge your network: IBM® takes an open, standards-based approach to implement the latest advances in the flat, converged data center network designs of today. IBM Storage solutions enable clients to deploy a high-speed, low-latency Unified Fabric Architecture. Optimize and automate virtualization: Advanced virtualization awareness reduces the cost and complexity of deploying physical and virtual data center infrastructure. Simplify management: IBM data center networks are easy to deploy, maintain, scale, and virtualize, delivering the foundation of consolidated operations for dynamic infrastructure management. Storage is no longer an afterthought. Too much is at stake. Companies are searching for more ways to efficiently manage expanding volumes of data, and to make that data accessible throughout the enterprise. This demand is propelling the move of storage into the network. Also, the increasing complexity of managing large numbers of storage devices and vast amounts of data is driving greater business value into software and services. With current estimates of the amount of data to be managed and made available increasing at 60% each year, this outlook is where a storage area network (SAN) enters the arena. SANs are the leading storage infrastructure for the global economy of today. SANs offer simplified storage management, scalability, flexibility, and availability; and improved data access, movement, and backup. Welcome to the cognitive era. The smarter data center with the improved economics of IT can be achieved by connecting servers and storage with a high-speed and intelligent network fabric. A smarter data center that hosts IBM Storage solutions can provide an environment that is smarter, faster, greener, open, and easy to manage. This IBM® Redbooks® publication provides an introduction to SAN and Ethernet networking, and how these networks help to achieve a smarter data center. This book is intended for people who are not very familiar with IT, or who are just starting out in the IT world.




IBM Software for SAP Solutions


Book Description

SAP is a market leader in enterprise business application software. SAP solutions provide a rich set of composable application modules, and configurable functional capabilities that are expected from a comprehensive enterprise business application software suite. In most cases, companies that adopt SAP software remain heterogeneous enterprises running both SAP and non-SAP systems to support their business processes. Regardless of the specific scenario, in heterogeneous enterprises most SAP implementations must be integrated with a variety of non-SAP enterprise systems: Portals Messaging infrastructure Business process management (BPM) tools Enterprise Content Management (ECM) methods and tools Business analytics (BA) and business intelligence (BI) technologies Security Systems of record Systems of engagement The tooling included with SAP software addresses many needs for creating SAP-centric environments. However, the classic approach to implementing SAP functionality generally leaves the business with a rigid solution that is difficult and expensive to change and enhance. When SAP software is used in a large, heterogeneous enterprise environment, SAP clients face the dilemma of selecting the correct set of tools and platforms to implement SAP functionality, and to integrate the SAP solutions with non-SAP systems. This IBM® Redbooks® publication explains the value of integrating IBM software with SAP solutions. It describes how to enhance and extend pre-built capabilities in SAP software with best-in-class IBM enterprise software, enabling clients to maximize return on investment (ROI) in their SAP investment and achieve a balanced enterprise architecture approach. This book describes IBM Reference Architecture for SAP, a prescriptive blueprint for using IBM software in SAP solutions. The reference architecture is focused on defining the use of IBM software with SAP, and is not intended to address the internal aspects of SAP components. The chapters of this book provide a specific reference architecture for many of the architectural domains that are each important for a large enterprise to establish common strategy, efficiency, and balance. The majority of the most important architectural domain topics, such as integration, process optimization, master data management, mobile access, Enterprise Content Management, business intelligence, DevOps, security, systems monitoring, and so on, are covered in the book. However, there are several other architectural domains which are not included in the book. This is not to imply that these other architectural domains are not important or are less important, or that IBM does not offer a solution to address them. It is only reflective of time constraints, available resources, and the complexity of assembling a book on an extremely broad topic. Although more content could have been added, the authors feel confident that the scope of architectural material that has been included should provide organizations with a fantastic head start in defining their own enterprise reference architecture for many of the important architectural domains, and it is hoped that this book provides great value to those reading it. This IBM Redbooks publication is targeted to the following audiences: Client decision makers and solution architects leading enterprise transformation projects and wanting to gain further insight so that they can benefit from the integration of IBM software in large-scale SAP projects. IT architects and consultants integrating IBM technology with SAP solutions.




Microservices from Theory to Practice: Creating Applications in IBM Bluemix Using the Microservices Approach


Book Description

Microservices is an architectural style in which large, complex software applications are composed of one or more smaller services. Each of these microservices focuses on completing one task that represents a small business capability. These microservices can be developed in any programming language. They communicate with each other using language-neutral protocols, such as Representational State Transfer (REST), or messaging applications, such as IBM® MQ Light. This IBM Redbooks® publication gives a broad understanding of this increasingly popular architectural style, and provides some real-life examples of how you can develop applications using the microservices approach with IBM BluemixTM. The source code for all of these sample scenarios can be found on GitHub (https://github.com/). The book also presents some case studies from IBM products. We explain the architectural decisions made, our experiences, and lessons learned when redesigning these products using the microservices approach. Information technology (IT) professionals interested in learning about microservices and how to develop or redesign an application in Bluemix using microservices can benefit from this book.