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AWS CloudFormation vs. Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect

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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    AWS CloudFormation

    Score8.8 out of 10
    N/AAWS CloudFormation gives developers and systems administrators a way to create and manage a collection of related AWS resources, provisioning and updating them in a predictable fashion. Use AWS CloudFormation’s sample templates or create templates to describe the AWS resources, and any associated dependencies or runtime parameters, required to run an application. Users don’t need to figure out the order for provisioning AWS services or the subtleties of making those dependencies work.…

    $0

    Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect

    Score8.4 out of 10
    N/AEnterprise Architect is the flagship architecture management platform from global, Australian-headquartered company Sparx Systems.

    $229

    per license

    Pricing
    AWS CloudFormationSparx Systems Enterprise Architect
    Editions & Modules
    Free Tier - 1,000 Handler Operations per Month per Account
    $0.00
    Handler Operation
    $0.0009
    per handler operation
    Professional
    $229
    per license
    Corporate
    $299
    per license
    Unified
    $499
    per license
    Ultimate
    $699
    per license
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    AWS CloudFormationSparx Systems Enterprise Architect
    Free Trial
    YesNo
    Free/Freemium Version
    YesNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    YesNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional DetailsThere is no additional charge for using AWS CloudFormation with resource providers in the following namespaces: AWS::*, Alexa::*, and Custom::*. In this case you pay for AWS resources (such as Amazon EC2 instances, Elastic Load Balancing load balancers, etc.) created using AWS CloudFormation as if you created them manually. You only pay for what you use, as you use it; there are no minimum fees and no required upfront commitments. When you use resource providers with AWS CloudFormation outside the namespaces mentioned above, you incur charges per handler operation. Handler operations are create, update, delete, read, or list actions on a resource.—
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    AWS CloudFormationSparx Systems Enterprise Architect
    Considered Both Products
    Amazon AWS
    No answer on this topic
    Sparx Systems
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    100%
    Would buy again
    5 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Delivers good value for the price
    100%
    Delivers good value for the price
    5 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Happy with the feature set
    80%
    Happy with the feature set
    4 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    80%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    4 Answers
    No answers on this topic
    Implementation went as expected
    100%
    Implementation went as expected
    5 Answers
    No answers on this topic
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    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    AWS CloudFormationSparx Systems Enterprise Architect
    Likelihood to Recommend
    7.6
    (5 ratings)
    9.0
    (5 ratings)
    Support Rating
    -
    (0 ratings)
    7.5
    (2 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    AWS CloudFormationSparx Systems Enterprise Architect
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Amazon AWS
    AWS CloudFormation is well suited for scenarios where all of your resources need to be provisioned on AWS but it is not suited for hybrid cloud deployments. It's very easy for someone new to learn. The level of customization offered as part of the template specifically for AWS services is great. There is also a UI tool where we can drag and drop the services we want and it generates an yaml file which is very easy to use. The visibility of stacks and its resources and one place where we can track and identify the issues in deployment is great.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Sparx Systems
    Enterprise Architect can be used to capture business requirements, design and management of all successive models, algorithms, process flows/workflows, design of business data objects and other artifacts. The strong point is the ability to link the items in all models with each other, the more time the analysts and designers "invest" into making nice and clearly defined models, the higher the future pay-off by any successive changes to the systems. Enterprise Architect is not a good tool for capturing rather unstructured business requirements, use e.g. Confluence or other solutions instead. EA should comprise the extracted models with very little unstructured information. Management of the changes process should not be done in Enterprise Architect, rather use JIRA/Confluence or similar.
    Incentivized
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    Pros
    Amazon AWS
    • IaC, transactional on top of that
    • Support for "mainstream" general programming languages
    • Sharable IaC "snippets" that can setup standardized environments for individuals quickly
    • OOP techniques are available thanks to OOP languages
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Sparx Systems
    • Open Architecture - A wide and extensive set of options, plug-ins and customization options make Sparx EA more of a tool kit than just a tool. Most tools allow customization but Sparx EA is built from the ground up with this in mind.
    • Wide variety of formats, lexicons, standards and data import export capabilities allow different roles to interact with the information in different ways.
    • Automated report generation allows architects and designers to spend less taking on word processing and more time on performing architecture and design.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Amazon AWS
    • Error Description upon Failure Needs to be Improved.
    • Slow to create, delete or update.
    • Need to delete resources manually. It can ask before starting deletion whether to skip those resources or delete them.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Sparx Systems
    • Needs someone that is very conversant with business modelling terminology
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Usability
    Amazon AWS
    It's easy enough to get a shared template & apply it. You don't even have to download-then-upload or copy-and-paste, a publicly-accessible url works.
    Diving deeper, it has enough powerful capabilities to make the life of a platform / DevOps engineer bearable.
    However, you need equally deep knowledge to troubleshoot issues, when they inevitably pop up. This is the same for all IaC technologies, as they are additional abstraction layers on top of the native API provided by the cloud providers.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Sparx Systems
    No answers on this topic
    Support Rating
    Amazon AWS
    No answers on this topic
    Sparx Systems
    The support team of Sparx EA, based in Australia, is always willing to help and give direction.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Alternatives Considered
    Amazon AWS
    Cloning a virtual machine creates a virtual machine that is cloning a virtual machine creates a virtual machine that is a copy of the original. The new virtual machine is configured with the same virtual hardware, installed software, and other properties that were configured for the original virtual machine. For information about persistent memory and PMem storage, see the vSphere Cloning a virtual machine creates a virtual machine that is a copy of the original. The new virtual machine is configured with the same virtual hardware, installed software, and other properties that were configured for the original virtual machine. For information. Management guide.For information copy of the original. The new virtual Cloning virtual machine creates a virtual machine that is a copy of the original. The new virtual machine is configured with the same virtual hardware, installed software, and other properties that were configured for the original virtual machine. For information about persistent memory and PMem storage, see the vSphere Resource Management Guide. For information is configured with the same virtual hardware, installed software, and other properties that were configured for the original virtual machine. For information about persistent memory and PMem storage, see the vSphere Resource Management Guide. For information
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Sparx Systems
    BiZZdesign represents a different new concept to enterprise architecture, its gravity center is not technical modelling, but rather a view on capturing the whole end-user experience or customer journey. It also allows to grasp areas as internal company capabilities, required for adoption/changes and operation of the solution, uses the same Archimate modelling language. This solution is in my opinion a new generation enabling to not only design the solutions, but also manage the whole application portfolio with respect to capabilities and requirement parameters.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Return on Investment
    Amazon AWS
    • + We can standup a VPC in minutes
    • - It took a lot of inital time to set up
    • + With logging/rollback, made testing much easier.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Sparx Systems
    • This program speed up the development process. It generates the actual code with my model classes after modeling
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots

    AWS CloudFormation Screenshots

    Screenshot of CloudFormation - How it works overviewScreenshot of CloudFormation - High level how it worksScreenshot of CloudFormation - Template exampleScreenshot of CloudFormation - Template inputs overview