Is this the time of Portals Based Application Development?

Portal based application development is a better way of delivering web based applications than the traditional software development methodology. Portal based development provides the smallest distinct application possible (Portlet) which includes Presentation, business layers and data layers. The portal framework and architecture supports this, within a highly flexible application delivery mechanism.

Because these building blocks are loosely coupled and highly configurable, it is possible to use them in many applications and potentially within many parts of a single application. The potential for re-use is substantial. In addition the cost of developing portal based applications is potentially lower due to the fact portal platforms provide frameworks, architectures and portlets common to all applications. If the total cost of ownership is considered, the cost of maintenance and modification to the application delivered must be included and the cost of modifying and maintaining a portal based application is lower as modification can be made purely through configuration rather than redevelopment.

Of course this is new technology and does have some obstacles. It’s changing, it includes some additional security risk, it includes upfront costs for portal platforms and standards are yet to be completely ratified providing platform dependencies.

Web Designers, Developers now have the ability to reduce the cost of delivering Websites to customers at lower cost intitially and lower ongoing costs through dynamic portal based software.