Question

What, in your opinion, is the difference in decentralized/distributed (client/server) architecture and centralized (Cloud Computing or Mainframe) architecture?

Give an example of a business decision that would be affected by the choice of the architecture

Answer 1

Decentralized vs centralized architecture:

There are many differences between these two architectures. Decentralized systems can work well without any central control or owner. There are many central owners and they all store resource copies.

In centralized architecture, there is availability of a central system that controls the entire network.

Decentralized architecture	Centralized architecture
These are also called distributed architectures because nodes are geographically distributed.	In such an architecture there is the concept of transparency. Even when data is stored on different servers, there is no concept of distribution and data seems to come from one station only.
Lateral coordination is used in such systems.	Vertical coordination is used in such systems.
Database is placed at different sites with fragments.	Single database is placed at one location in the network.
Data replication and fragments help in productivity when there are many users using the data.	When there are many users trying to access the data, productivity might slow down.

Business decisions and the choice of architecture:

Consider an example where the organization wants to digitize the processes in the business. This will help in the scalability and flexibility of the business. With respect to the decision, there is a need to understand the long term business goals. While selecting architecture, there are many things to be considered such as infrastructure, principles, applications, and finally investment.

• If the organization wants an easy to manage approach and use great deal of management and control over user access and workloads, centralized architecture would be the best.
• If not, decentralized architecture can be used. It will decrease the downtime. But it is not easy to implement so would require expertise.