Grazed from FedTechMagazine. Author: Jimmy Daly.

Cloud computing is no longer an option for federal agencies — it’s a must. Many agencies have moved their core IT to the cloud, and the rest are either in progress or in search of the right solution. Cloud computing is one of just a few technologies that is so powerful and beneficial that the government has no choice but to adopt it.

Like email and mobility before it, cloud computing is forcing government IT leaders to make hard choices about the future of their agencies. According to IDC, the government will be spending $7.7 billion on cloud computing by 2017. MeriTalk’s Cloud Computing Exchange recently released the Cloud First Consumer Guide, the result of interviews with 15 federal IT leaders and several years of monitoring cloud-computing trends…

Grazed from Microsoft. Author: Editorial Staff.

Microsoft Corp. today announced that its Board of Directors has appointed Satya Nadella as Chief Executive Officer and member of the Board of Directors effective immediately. Nadella previously held the position of Executive Vice President of Microsoft’s Cloud and Enterprise group.

“During this time of transformation, there is no better person to lead Microsoft than Satya Nadella,” said Bill Gates, Microsoft’s Founder and Member of the Board of Directors. “Satya is a proven leader with hard-core engineering skills, business vision and the ability to bring people together. His vision for how technology will be used and experienced around the world is exactly what Microsoft needs as the company enters its next chapter of expanded product innovation and growth.” …

Grazed from PRNewsWire. Author: PR Announcement.

Offering Public or private cloud operators greater choice and flexibility in the provisioning and management of enterprise applications, MPSTOR today announced a new VMware VMDK version of its Orkestra™ Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) platform based on the open-source operating system OpenStack™.

As an innovative and award-winning leading developer of storage and cloud management software products, MPSTOR developed the Orkestra cloud management platform to make datacenter infrastructure invisible, programmable and immediately available to end users, allowing them to self-serve the exact quantity and quality of data storage, networking and computing resources required for their applications…

Grazed from Arista. Author: PR Announcement.

Arista Networks, Inc. today announced the crossing of another major milestone, shipping its two millionth, high speed, 10/40/100Gb Ethernet port for data center and cloud applications. This is being fueled by the increased acceptance of cloud computing and services, causing significant growth since the internet boom of the 1990s.

“We are pleased with the migration to modern data center and cloud platforms from legacy networks. This is providing significant opportunity for Arista’s disruptive innovations,” stated Jayshree Ullal, president and CEO at Arista Networks. “Arista EOS, coupled with advanced platforms, demonstrates our unwavering commitment to customers towards open standards and software defined networks (SDN).”…

Grazed from PR NewsWire. Author: PR Announcement.

For leading cloud server provider Infinitely Virtual (www.infinitelyvirtual.com), 2014 is getting off to a rewarding start. The company earned Top #10 rankings in two categories in the January 2014 Web Host Awards – Best Cloud Computing Provider and Fastest Growing Provider. The accolades follow on the heels of Infinitely Virtual’s finalist status in the 2013-2014 Cloud Awards Program – again in two categories, Best Cloud Hosting Provider and Best Cloud Reseller/Reseller Program.

“While we don’t develop our products and services expressly to garner awards, it’s gratifying when the industry recognizes that our way of doing business is worthy of this kind of attention,” said Adam Stern, founder and CEO, Infinitely Virtual. “In every solution we offer, we think of the real-world issues that confront small and midsize businesses as they migrate to the cloud. In our view, that partnership mentality is behind our success in the market.”…

Grazed from EFYTimes. Author: Editorial Staff.

As organizations look to consolidate their existing data centers and shift more of their workloads to the cloud, IBM (NYSE: IBM) announced that this trend has helped fuel the growing momentum for the IBM PureSystems family of expert integrated systems, which have now shipped more than 10,000 units through the 4th Quarter of 2013.

Another aspect of this trend is that as more organizations embrace cloud computing, they are looking to Managed Service Providers (MSPs) to help them quickly develop and deploy cloud based services in a more secure and economical way. These MSPs – many in key regions such as India, Brazil and China – are increasingly turning to IBM PureSystems over other vendors’ offerings in order to transform their data centers and provide the IT infrastructure that meets the needs of their clients…

Grazed from Datamation. Author: Editorial Staff.

Due to the increasing importance of virtualization and cloud computing in the enterprise, the Software Defined Data Center, or Virtual Data Center, is gaining momentum. Once applications are separated from underlying hardware, it makes sense to push the concept further. And once application assets reside in a nebulous cloud that may be difficult for IT to gain visibility into, let alone maintain and manage, ideas like Software Defined Data Centers (SDDC) start to make a quite a bit of sense. To date, the only Software-Defined market with any real traction is for Software Defined Networking products. A 2012 study by IDC predicted that SDN spending would reach $360 million in 2013, expanding to $3.7 billion by 2016.

Analyst forecasts aren’t the only way to measure the potential of SDN, though. In 2012, VMware acquired SDN startup Nicira for $1.26 billion. Brocade, Cisco, and Juniper followed suit by acquiring Vyatta, Cariden, and Contrail, respectively. Moreover, VCs are pouring serious money into this sector, heavily financing such startups as Affirmed Networks ($103 million raised to date), Big Switch Networks ($45 million), and Plexxi ($48 million)…

Grazed from PRNewsWire. Author: PR Announcement.

Based on Current Population Survey statistics from July 2012, the Computer and Internet Access in the United States infographic provides household and individual level analysis of computer use and Internet access, as well as a profile of individual smartphone usage. A set of tables will accompany the infographic. Internet address: http://www.census.gov/hhes/computer/

To view the inforgraphic directly, visit http://www.census.gov/hhes/computer/files/2012/Computer_Use_Infographic_FINAL.pdf

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Grazed from BitCloud. Author: Editorial Staff.

There’s a lot of noise and hubbub in the cloud computing marketplace, with vendors large and small vigorously promoting their individual cloud offerings, leading to a fair degree of uncertainty and confusion. How much of it is “pie in the sky” as they say? Perhaps a little history can put “the cloud” into perspective before we examine the hybrid cloud concept. Back in the 1970s distributed computers were interconnected via a networking architecture, using telephone circuits that were permanently-connected or dial-up point-to-point lines.

The early 1980s saw the arrival of packet-switched networks (such as X.25), in which the computers were connected more loosely, without permanent point-to-point lines, with the abstraction of dynamic “logical” circuits rather than a direct physical circuit connection for an entire session. Data packets for a message could travel across different circuits at different times, and the packet-switching protocols saw to the proper eventual reassembly of each message at the destination…

Grazed from Sourceable. Author: Editorial Staff.

A crucial factor for the success of a business is choosing the right location. One of the biggest challenges for efficient BIM project management has been file size, central storage, and equal and timely access to project files and raw computing power. Web-based BIM projects (located in the BIM Cloud) provide team members with the advantage of remote access to a centralized location on the Internet. This provides on-demand global team access to the BIM-based project regardless of their geographic location.

Centralized Storage: A web-hosted BIM project site provides scalable, centralized project storage. As the project grows, additional file storage can be purchased when required. Contractually, owners are requesting more documentation to be delivered for Facility Management (FM) and Operations and Maintenance (O&M)…