Just finished a brutal middleware procurement cycle. The biggest time-sink wasn't feature comparison—it was trying to see past the vendor's demo to understand the actual long-term costs and exit strategies. Everyone's shiny during the demo. The pain comes three years later when you need to modify a core integration and find out it's either impossible or will cost you six figures in professional services.
So I built this checklist. It's for the technical/architectural deep-dive session, *after* the sales fluff. Force them to show you, live, how you'd own and control the integration logic. The core theme is **vendor lock-in**, specifically around logic portability and data access.
**Demo Checklist: Integration Platform Vendor Lock-in**
* **Logic Portability**
* "Show me how to export the full integration workflow, including all transformation logic, as a human-readable file (e.g., JSON, YAML)."
* "If we wanted to move this specific workflow to another middleware platform, what is the process? Can you demonstrate a simple export/import?"
* "Are there any elements (connectors, proprietary functions) that cannot be exported or replicated elsewhere?"
* **Development & Control**
* "Demonstrate building a simple API-to-API integration *without* using any pre-built, vendor-specific 'smart connectors.' Use only standard HTTP/S, OAuth, and your core platform transformation tools."
* "Where is the integration runtime? Show me the configuration for a dedicated instance/VPC/private cloud option and its cost implications."
* "What is your policy on custom connectors? Show me the SDK or framework. Can we develop, host, and maintain them independently?"
* **Data Access & Egress**
* "Show me the admin panel where I can extract all integration metadata: workflow definitions, connection configurations, logs, and error queues."
* "What is the process and cost for a complete data egress? If we need to pull all historical sync/transaction logs, how is that provided?"
* "For data processed through your platform, is there a way to access the raw payloads before/after transformation for audit purposes?"
* **Pricing Model Traps**
* "Walk me through the exact cost drivers. Show me the pricing calculator. Specifically, ask: 'Are there fees based on the number of custom fields mapped, number of workflow steps, or volume of records processed through *individual* connectors?'"
* "What happens to our costs if our transaction volume spikes 10x for a month? Is the scaling linear or are there tier jumps?"
* "If we need to decommission this platform, what are the contract termination clauses? Are there costs associated with accessing our own historical data after termination?"
The goal is to make them operate in their *least* polished mode. Their answers—or evasions—here tell you more than any feature sheet.
Integration is not a project, it's a lifestyle.