Software as a services (SaaS), also known as Software on demand, is deployed over the internet to run behind a firewall on a local area network or personal computer.
Important characteristics of SaaS are given below:
SaaS application is associated with user interactive web applications accessed directly over the internet, SaaS as a concept caters for the full spectrum of functional software.- Coming to the location, SaaS applications are mostly associated with the internet hosted web application, in reality this only represents one of many location (hosting) models that are available including remote, on premise, appliance and virtualised.
- Characteristics of the SaaS are completely managed by the vendors and the management of SaaS includes Provisioning, billing, monitoring and supporting the user. Implementation of management tasks and responsibilities is clear to the subscriber and service level agreements govern the quality and availability.
- Licensing for SaaS is provided as a subscription-based model rather than the single up-front license fee and this model can be realized by a relatively simple time based approach.
- SaaS developer communities often surround a particular application often extending the platform capabilities, providing integration solutions, etc.
- Reach is defined as the number of customers to whom SaaS has been provided and it is important to make a note of issues such as language and business processes while marketing the SaaS application globally.
- Some SaaS applications are designed in such a way that each user can easily customize the applications to fit their business processes without affecting the common infrastructure.
The above are the different characteristics of SaaS.