Pay no attention to the lamps behind the curtain

Bob Warfield has a pair of articles that touch on ideas I've been pondering recently.

Virtualization vs Multitenancy at Workstream: SaaS Quandry?

Lack of Good Platforms is Stunting SaaS and Business Web 2.0

The two articles provide interesting analysis of key issues in SaaS and PaaS.

The connection between these topics and a recent conversations about Lamps (also here) with Mark Masterson seems particularly interesting.

For example, it is possible to implement the logical equivalent of a multitenant environment using a pile of lamps. It would require a level of design not normally found in cluster and virtualization environments, but it's possible. At the very least, it could provide useful fodder for other people interested in the topic.

Whether it makes sense is another topic, but what the hey - it's all part of a conversation...