Grazed from Datamation.  Author: Sean Michael Kerner.

Hybrid cloud deployments are attractive to many enterprises in that they offer the best of both public and private cloud approaches.  The move to hybrid is part of the evolution of cloud, according to IDC Research VP Mary Johnston Turner. It’s an evolution that will require a new generation of IT management technologies.

"We see increasing interest in open standards based heterogeneous and hybrid cloud architectures," Turner said during a Red Hat sponsored webcast this week. "A couple of years ago, we mostly saw tactical cloud initiatives, focused on enabling fast self-service deployments for relatively specific needs."…

Grazed from GSN.  Author: Rutrell Yasin.

The use of cloud computing in some form is inevitable in police technology. But like many professions, law enforcement executives have particular concerns about using cloud technology, ranging from the risk that unauthorized persons could steal sensitive information to concerns about the costs of technology migration.

A report, “Mitigating Risks in the Application of Cloud Computing in Law Enforcement," aims to help law enforcement officials weigh the pros and cons of moving to cloud computing. Written by Paul Wormeli, executive director emeritus of the Integrated Justice Information Systems Institute, and presented by the IBM Center for The Business of Government, the report offers recommendations on how law enforcement organizations can successfully move to cloud infrastructures…

Grazed from CenturyLink.  Author: Editorial Staff.

The Cloud used to be nothing more than an enigma, a buzz word. Now, the Cloud has made itself a necessity for many people in many different situations. In order to take advantage of all the great advantages of the Cloud, you first need an Internet service to rely on. View CenturyLink deals to find an affordable and fast Internet plan that you can use to access the Cloud.

Using a Cloud service is something that is universal, but also personal. Here are some of the ways that people are taking the Cloud, and using it in a way that suits their specific needs…
 
1.    Studying. High school students to grad students are all looking for ways to make studying easier. One of the best ways to do that is with the Cloud. Google docs, Google hangouts and platforms like Evernote make it simple for students to share ideas. The Cloud is changing not only how students study, but when.  Students don’t even need to deal with the mess of setting up specific times to meet up. Share notes, mock tests, study guides and more virtually, instead of personally. What makes the Cloud even more beneficial to students is that if you lose your notes or your computer melts down without saving, all the material you need is already stored in the Cloud waiting for you…

Grazed from TalkinCloud. Author: Chris Talbot.

Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) is thumbing its nose at law enforcement in the hopes of better protecting its users’ data stored on Gmail and Google Drive. Although the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) gives U.S. law enforcement agencies the right to obtain data that’s more than 180 days old with nothing more than a subpoena, Google is ready to take on those agencies.

Google is demanding that law enforcement agencies obtain probable cause search warrants before it will hand over user data. Google released its biannual Transparency Report, which included for the first time information on how U.S. law enforcement agencies push service providers including Google into handing over customer data. At the same time, Google called "shenanigans" on the entire process. Even though law enforcement agencies have the right to obtain data under the ECPA, there frequently have been discussions about the fairness of the law, as well as concerns over privacy (many foreign businesses refuse to store data in U.S.-based data centers for just this reason)…

Grazed from Smart Data Collective. Author: Thu Pham.

Cloud computing has found a place in nearly every industry, from e-commerce and banking to automotive to healthcare, and all the processes in between. Research shows that cloud use in supply chains has increased dramatically over the past year, and doesn’t expect to slow down in 2013. Dwight Klappich, research vice president for Gartner, explains that supply chain management has adopted cloud use quickly, with an estimated 40% increase in 2012 over 2011. He explains in a Logistics Management article watching this shift from more traditional software to the cloud:

“Two to three years ago when we talked to shippers about software, the cloud was just one option. In many cases, cloud has now become a preference for companies.” He predicts that around 50% of the transportation subset of supply chains are currently cloud-based…

Grazed from InfoWorld. Author: David Linthicum.

InfoWorld’s own Paul Krill has the skinny around a recent Evans Data survey that found developers are split on the benefits of building in the cloud. This is an important data point: One of the true "killer" use cases for cloud computing is app dev and test. The payback from using public cloud-based assets to build, test, and deploy applications is already compelling, but it will become immense in the near future.

The results of the Evans Data Cloud Development Survey, conducted in December and released this month, found that cloud platforms reduce overall development time by an average of 11.6 percent. This is largely due to the cloud platform’s ability to streamline the development process, including the ability to quickly get the development assets online. Moreover, cloud platforms provide the ability to collaborate on development efforts, which is also a benefit…

Grazed from PRWeb. Author: PR Announcement.

Virtustream, the leading provider of enterprise class cloud software and Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS), has partnered with Etihad Etisalat (Mobily), the leading telecommunications company in Saudi Arabia, to provide enterprise cloud services in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA). The public and hybrid cloud services will be jointly provided by Mobily and Virtustream and will offer world-class cloud services to enterprises and small-to-medium businesses (SMBs). Mobily has selected Virtustream’s xStream cloud management software to run its public and hybrid clouds.

KSA businesses are now able to move mission-critical applications, both legacy and webscale, to the Mobily/Virtustream cloud, including applications like SAP, Microsoft, Oracle and hundreds of existing applications, without needing to rewrite the software to gain the cloud benefits of dynamic, multi-tenant efficiency, massively scalable and on demand IT…

Grazed from Business2Community. Author: Matthew Ramsey.

Organizations of all sizes benefit when they can run their computing and application development in the cloud. From CRM to ERP applications, your enterprise may be like many others that have struggled with the expenses of implementing and managing applications and computing infrastructure. The expansion of cloud computing in the enterprise market has yielded yet another service offering to address this issue. Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) supports a faster way of creating applications with less financial overhead.

The Benefits of PaaS

The management of storage systems, servers, and the multitude of network components in a complete internal infrastructure model is extremely costly. Financing the acquisition, staffing, and energy demands of such a system drains enterprise funds, manpower, and other resources. With PaaS, the majority of the infrastructure is managed by the service provider which is often in the form of a consolidated database…

Grazed from CMSWire. Author: Anthony Myers.

IDC consulting has produced a cloud-based worker study for Microsoft, and the focus is on how new skill sets are still not prevalent enough in the workforce. More cloud-ready, if you will, workers are needed to fill many positions as businesses continue to shift to the cloud.

Job Growth

A similar study was conducted last year by IDC, also for Microsoft, on how many jobs the cloud will help produce. The numbers are impressive, but now that we know there is a huge demand for cloud-based workers, it seems those fully trained people are in short supply…