What is interoperability? As businesses grow, they require connected software solutions to improve their management and administration. Companies have different software applications for their operational needs, but these may be developed in different languages. So what’s the solution? The key is to have integration tools to synchronise all the data efficiently.
Regardless of the type of business or business strategy that your company follows, software integrations favour productivity and the study of data, with interoperability being the key to the success of many. Shall we see?
What is a software integration and what is it used for?
Software integration or application integration consists of getting different devices to communicate, pass information from one to another and understand each other in real time. In short, contacting and unifying different software to efficiently have all the information in a single system.
Where can integrations be found? In almost all companies, it is common to have different apps to carry out daily activities. The different applications have to connect and talk to each other to get one system to do what they do separately, saving time and resources.
In this way, integrations help companies in their digitalisation processes, becoming a key process to have an optimal internal management.
What are the objectives of integration?
The first step to take into account before carrying out integrations is to know the objective behind them, in order to know exactly the steps to follow, these are some of them:
- Data integration: in this case, the aim is to improve the quality and availability of data, thus also generating reports and complete records without the need to access different applications.
- Process integration: on the other hand, this integration is carried out to monitor and optimise the global processes of the application.
By having these integrations, we only need one programme to store the information and improve our company’s service by connecting the different tools we need.
What types of integration are there?
By connecting two different softwares, information is shared, saving time as it is an automatic process and reducing the possibility of making mistakes.
These are the most common ways of integrating software applications:
- Application Programming Interface (API): becoming the most common method of connecting programs. APIs are a set of code languages that allow programs to access and share functions or data from other tools.
- Integration Platform as a Service (iPaaS): cloud-based service platforms provide an environment for developing integration flows between on-premises and software applications.
- Enterprise Service Bus (EBS): EBS are tools that facilitate the exchange of data between two or more applications and are typically used in large enterprises to connect internal enterprise applications.
4 steps in the integration process
Once a software data integration method has been selected, management teams can follow these steps:
- Gather requirements and specifications: you should determine and document the different requirements of the software you plan to integrate, asking yourself questions to tell the best understanding of your software.
- Analyse the data and information: once noted down, you should analyse and determine if the integration is possible, evaluate your processes.
- Develop management plans and create the software integration system: create a plan for the integration that includes details on the tools to be used. Periodic testing should also be done to ensure that it is working as planned and to pay attention to details before proceeding.
- Use the system and evaluate it
After these steps, you can start using it, downloading and configuring it correctly so that integration can begin. Afterwards, it is advisable to carry out a performance evaluation, also analysing the points to be corrected and the incidences.
Tips for good interoperability
First of all, do not underestimate the integration between systems; it takes dedication and effort to ensure that it is well detailed and planned. It is also necessary to have a person in charge to ensure that the planned deadlines and steps are followed.
We must not forget that the fact that an integration can be carried out does not mean that it is necessary, it is essential to know what is necessary to integrate and what is not. It is also important to bear in mind that systems are constantly being updated. Therefore, every time a change is made to the systems, the integration must be reviewed to check that it continues to work correctly.
Integrations increase productivity and save time and resources by coordinating and improving the organisation of the different tasks in the company.
It also reduces the number of applications we use, optimising technological resources and system security. As in all the processes that we implement in our company, the integration of systems benefits us according to our needs.
Want to know more about how to integrate your company’s ecosystem with Xpendor? Use the public APIs, connect and centralise all financial information in the tool used in your company.
We offer ready-to-use integrations, we invite you to discover them!
