In the traditional approach to IT service delivery, Users must disclose confidential information (such as accounts, email addresses and passwords) to Experts; otherwise, the Expert cannot access the User's systems and load them with the User's data. This disclosure is a limitation of the current approach, not a requirement.
In the SOFIns Approach, the technical procedures taken by an Expert are separated from the site-specific and confidential information unique to each User. Expert references the User’s site-specific or confidential information using variables, and the SOFIns System looks up the variables and substitutes the actual value. This allows the same procedures to be combined with confidential information belonging to different Users and for Users to keep that confidential secure.
Elements Define Actions
Elements are parameterized scripts created by an Expert. They represent the coded-form of an Expert's manual IT procedures and may be written in common scripting languages such as bash, python and expect. Elements are a marketable form of intellectual property. They belong to the Expert and can be licensed to Users, with the SOFIns platform enforcing the licensing terms.
SOFIns deploys Elements on behalf of the Expert and under the control of the User. After a Target is connected, the Element is combined with the User's data and the Expert's IT procedures are replicated in the remote environment to the User's Target.
Profiles Hold Users' Site-Specific and Confidential Information
Users maintain all site-specific and confidential information in a SOFIns “Profile,” which is a secured, hierarchical data structure with inheritance and scope rules to allow an environment to be organized logically.
Most site-specific information can be gleaned from the User environment automatically by performing basic network, hardware and software analysis. User and business-specific information, such as account codes, customer records, etc., are specified by the User directly.
The User may elect to keep the Profile stored on the User’s own laptop or desktop computer instead of storing it on the SOFIns System. In that scenario, the User will upload only the necessary subset of the Profile to the SOFIns System in order to deploy an Element to a Target.
