Jitterbit, a service that helps companies bridge and integrate data from different sources, has released a new 2.0 version of its software along with a new pricing model that it hopes will make it more appealing to businesses and consumers alike.
Jitterbit is an open source project that allows users to efficiently use and modify data from multiple sources that may not typically communicate directly. While the company is partially targeted towards the enterprise market (which often handles such issues when dealing with SaaS applications like Salesforce), it also strives to appeal to smaller scale, consumer operations.
The new version of the software allows users to utilize a drag-and-drop interface to generate functions that will collect data from one input and modify it elsewhere, without having to enter any code. For example, I could use Jitterbit to collect the average price of an iPhone on eBay, and then automatically adjust the price on my own webstore to be 2% less than that figure in order to keep my online storefront competitive.
The new release coincides with a shift in the company’s monetization strategy. In the past, Jitterbit attempted to provide support for both standard releases and “bleeding-edge” nightly builds from the open-source project, which are often prone to bugs because they haven’t been thoroughly tested. From now on the company will no longer support these nightly builds, but will instead offer a for-pay “rock solid” version that includes support (adventurous users can still download the untested version without support for free).
There are a number of similar services in this space, including Talend and SnapLogic.
iMacros is used for this kind of application for years. And it has a proven monetization model
http://iopus.com/imacros/web-scripting.htm
Jitterbit is quite different from that product. It is used for system to system integration scenarios from writing complete business integration processes that integrate back-end systems supporting say an order to cash process, consuming web services to leverage investments is SOAs to ETL processes for supporting data warehouses. In addition, any integration process can be exposed as a service.
Finally, Jitterbit provides a complete environment and is used by technical business analysts as well as developers. It uses graphical constructs to built an integration project vs. only scripting. Simpler integration scenarios should not require any scripting.
I hope you find time to try it out.
Does anybody have first-hand experience using Jitterbit and can comment on how user-friendly it is by comparison to SnapLogic?
Jitterbit’s sole purpose is to simplify the process of integration as the process of integrating applications and services can be accomplished in many ways. As a result its tool is very user-friendly compared to the typical interfaces and products available for this type of activity.
I hope you find time to try it out.
I prefer the first one.
Could haarg.com be another open source project.
Looks like some of those capabilities could be handy. I don’t think I’ve heard of Talend… will check that out as well.
Interesting. Going to have the check this solution out.
Another “open source” company, eh? Their SVN is behind a password, they use the MPL 1.0.
Our 200 person company simply can’t contribute the modifications made for in-house use back. It isn’t practical.
Aaron, you can contribute to Jitterbit.
With MPL you are not forced to turn your modifications or systems that you use Jitterbit into open source. This license is preferred by enterprises and ISVs that are utilizing Jitterbit as they have no fear that their proprietary systems must be contributed.
You are welcome to join the development team on source forge and contribute. All Jitterbit source code is on source forge.
This looks kinda like something a friend of mine did for the Mac. See http://www.metafy.com/
Aaron,
You aren’t required to contribution modifications back as work on Jitterbit is completed in the GUI itself. We have been working with Jitterbit for awhile now, their customer base is the is NASA, Continental Airlines, Dow Jones, and a lot more.
These companies, like mine, are extremely large, and don’t require any contributions. You should check them out as we think they have the strongest product and staff in the business.
I was evaluating ETL software and was disappointed by Jitterbit’s unagnostic install on Linux - their install is RPM only. I know there are ways to unpackage it and install on a Debian-based distro but why throw up barriers?
Used Pentaho Data Integration (Kettle) instead. It has its warts but install isn’t one of them.
Cheers
ETL is my main job. I have tried JB, Pentaho and Talend. I love Talend and use it regularly. And it is completely free.
For a big corp, something like Informatica is better suited.
How does compare to a real Message Bus like BizTalk or Tibco? Big enterprises want flexibility and reuse, and point to point is pretty limited in general.
Integration Builder from IntApp (Integration Appliance) does this ‘data integration’ thing:
http://www.intapp.com/products/ib.html
We have tried Kettle and Talend, both are great products, we took a look at Jitterbit in the past, and it was not that good, hope this version is better.