Ensuring cloud computing performance on data communications networks
Cloud computing promises to reduce IT expenditures, increase network flexibility, and streamline communication infrastructure. This is the first in a series of three articles in which we will examine communications technologies as key enablers that can make cloud computing a reality. Specifically, we will look at protocols, traffic management, and the control of wide-area communications and how the application of industry-standard techniques can assure network designers robust performance in their cloud offerings.
In this article, we’ll define specific communications reference points (RPs) within cloud computing networks so that software designers and network architects can better understand and address specific problems. Each RP presents unique requirements and challenges for creating, maintaining, and managing connectivity. Creating proper communication paths on the network and configuring them correctly at these RPs, or interfaces, will maximize cloud performance. The communication RPs will be defined individually; for each RP we will analyze the type and characteristics of the data communicated, describe the expected traffic patterns at the RP, and discuss the reliability requirements, the need (or lack thereof) for real-time traffic delivery, quality of service (QoS), and other characteristics of communication technologies, such as security…
FXI Demonstrates Any Screen Connected Computing
FXI Technologies, a hardware and software startup based in Trondheim Norway, demonstrated today the world’s first any screen, connected computing USB device. Codenamed "Cotton Candy", this sweet little device serves as a technology bridge between any display, the Cloud, and any input peripheral.
The vision for Cotton Candy is to allow users a single, secure point of access to all personal Cloud services and apps through their favorite operating system, while delivering a consistent experience on any screen. The device will serve as a companion to smartphones, tablets, notebook PCs and Macs, as well as add smart capabilities to existing displays, TVs, set top boxes and game consoles…
Jelastic Enables Java Applications to be Built and Deployed in the Cloud
Now, using the next-generation platform‑as‑a‑service (PaaS) offering Jelastic, it is possible to build and run any Java application in the cloud instead of from a personal computer — speeding development time and maximizing computing resources.
Jelastic allows developers to make code changes and rebuild applications in the cloud, removing the lag time caused whenever files are updated and uploaded from a personal computer. Jelastic can take application source code directly from version control repositories, via either the Git or SVN protocol.
Using Jelastic, developers can easily swap test and production environments with simple point-and-click. The same is true for cloning an exact copy to test or prepare an application for production deployment. Jelastic is fully compatible with existing Java applications and libraries…
OpDemand service aims to ease IaaS deployments
Grazed from InfoWorld. Author: Nancy Gohring.
OpDemand on Thursday opened its service that automates deployment of cloud infrastructure to all users. The service is free to use initially.
OpDemand was created to make it easier for businesses to use hosted cloud computing services. Gabriel Monroy, OpDemand’s CTO, helped start the company after doing cloud consulting work. "During the time I spent helping companies adopt the cloud, I realized the problems they were facing were namely that the tools they had available to them were complicated and exposed a lot of technical detail," he said.
Users of OpDemand’s C2 (Command & Control) service can choose from a library of preassembled networking, middleware, Web, processing, and other templates to compile their software to run in the cloud. The library includes cloud services templates for Ruby on Rails, Django, Node.js, and Wordpress as well as databases like CouchDB…
Cisco, Corous360 and IAHGames Take Online Gaming to the Cloud
Infocomm Asia Holdings (IAHGames), a leading publisher, operator and distributor of popular online games, today announced that they are the first gaming company in Southeast Asia to use the power of unified computing to deliver efficiency and scalability to their operations in the region. IAHGames achieved this using Corous360, a leading independent online games cloud service provider that chose the Cisco Unified Computing System(TM) (Cisco UCS(TM)) to take their operations of managing interactive entertainment into the virtual space.
The implementation provides a highly secure, scalable, efficient and cost-effective platform that reduces information technology infrastructure costs and complexity, while improving IAHGames’ business agility. The business value in using cloud computing has also resulted in IAHGames offering the platform to all game developers and providers, as they collaborate to share knowledge and cost-savings measures with other companies in the industry, taking the business of online games to a future-state…
Clarifying Cloud Computing
There’s obviously a lot of confusion these days about the distinctions between public and private cloud computing, managed hosting and managed services. In fact, it’s not all uncommon for IT organizations to start investigating cloud computing only to discover what they really want is some form of managed hosting or managed service.
The reason for this comes down to concerns about data security and the nature of the application workloads that the IT organization wants to run. In an ideal security world, many IT organizations don’t want to have their applications running on multi-tenant systems where not only is security a potential issue, but where events such as “noisy virtual machine neighbors” can have unexpected consequences for the applications they have running on shared IT infrastructure…
New Center for Cloud Computing Will Impact Mobile Computing and Internet Security
As part of its research efforts to help create safer and faster computing, the Department of Computer Science at The University of Texas at Austin has partnered with SunGard Availability Services to improve emerging cloud-based technologies through a new center for cloud computing research…
IBM Report Shows Cloud, Mobile, Analytics Skills in High Demand
To harness the power of the sophisticated, disruptive technologies coming to the enterprise market in the coming years, IBM research suggests that companies will place a premium on talented IT departments…Showdown: Public vs. Private Cloud
Cloud computing is an information technology revolution on par with the advent of the personal computer. Few technology fads claim to deliver so many benefits together with so much cost savings. And as the hype has grown, more and more vendors are rushing into the fray with their own "cloud" solutions. But not all clouds are created equal, and some clouds are not even really clouds at all. One of the debates that is starting to emerge in this area is "public cloud" vs. "private cloud". In this article, we will attempt to describe some of the key differences between public and private clouds, ultimately leading to the conclusion that private cloud is an oxymoron and there is only one type of cloud…
Learning Tree International Introduces a New Course: Cloud Computing with Amazon Web Services
Learning Tree International /quotes/zigman/55860/quotes/nls/ltre LTRE -0.13% has announced the introduction of a new Cloud Computing course– Cloud Computing with Amazon Web Services(TM). This course provides extensive hands-on experience developing cloud solutions with Amazon Web Services…