The evolutionary vs revolutionary approach to cloud computing
There’s no question that the adoption of cloud computing will continue to grow as companies look to increase efficiency and reduce costs. A recent study conducted by Dell and Intel found that an overwhelming majority (78% in Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) and 60% in North America) of IT and business staff plan to "significantly or moderately increase use of cloud" in the next 12 months.
Furthermore, when asked what the most significant driver for adoption of cloud computing were, 64.1% in North America and 63.5% in EMEA said to "reduce spending on infrastructure (ie CapEx)". Improving the IT organisational agility was a very distant second…
Cloud Computing: Protecting Data at Rest in Public Clouds
Protecting Data at Rest
One of the important concerns on utilizing the public cloud and the SaaS-based service model is about ‘How to protect the data at rest,’ which means organizations are worried about how the data is protected in a public cloud scenario, and when the data centers are physically away from the enterprise.
There are multiple methods organizations can adopt to protect data at rest. Each of the following methods are complimentary in securing the data…
As Computing Changes, Hewlett-Packard Struggles to Follow
Hewlett-Packard, a stalwart of the previous era, finds it hard to keep up.
It is not alone in that struggle. H.P., along with well-established tech companies like Dell and Cisco Systems, is contending with a faster-than-expected move by consumers and businesses from personal computers and small racks of computer servers toward mobile phones and tablets that are connected to millions of servers, all lashed together in remote supercomputing “clouds.”
The new systems are cheaper and more flexible, which businesses found appealing in a slow-growing economy. As for consumers, they have been dazzled by the new devices and abilities of those devices enabled by the cloud…
Interest in Cloud Computing Has Peaked
Recent stats from Google’s Insights service appear to confirm the trend. Using the Google Insights service, which attempts to gauge web search interest, I compared both the terms “cloud computing” and “the cloud”. What I discovered is that interest in both terms is down significantly from its previous highs set back in June 2011. According to Google, the level of web search interest is sitting roughly at July 2010 levels and dropping fast. Although its forecast does show an uptick for the coming months, which to me seems unlikely given the trend over the last year. Keep in mind this particular stat says nothing of revenue or venture funding, it purely shows web search interest. But it’s an interesting metric none the less. I’ve include a screenshot below…
Disaster Management Checklist For Cloud Computing Customers
Last week I covered some aspects of disaster management on the cloud. I will continue where I left off and cover more details on the disaster planning part. Here is a checklist of things you must have for disaster planning and recovery.
- What are the emergency contact number and email addresse(s) of the cloud service provider (CSP)?
- Is there a backup account with another CSP? How soon can the backups be activated to restore services?
- Are the data and applications in the backup regularly updated?
- What is the minimum working subset that should be run until the system is fully restored? If this is an e-commerce website, then a tool to track customers’ existing purchases and a static page that states the website is down for maintenance could form the minimum working subset…
Days of ‘One-Size-Fits-All’ Cloud Contracts Are Numbered
Combined legal and market factors may force online companies to offer more flexible contract terms, suggests new research from Queen Mary, University of London.
The paper examines how and why companies providing IT services over the internet, also known as cloud computing, have begun to negotiate standard contract terms to better meet cloud users’ needs, minimise operating risks and address legal compliance obligations.
The research, by the Cloud Legal Project at the Centre for Commercial Law Studies at QM, is primarily based on in-depth interviews with global and UK cloud providers, cloud users, law firms and other market players…
Build your own open-source cloud with ownCloud 4
Big businesses use cloud services. You and I use cloud storage services like DropBox, Google Drive, and Amazon Cloud Drive every day. But, with each you have to trust your data on other people’s systems. With ownCloud, an open source file sync and share project, which began as a KDE project, you can keep your data on your servers and decide what other public cloud services you want to integrate into your personal cloud.
OwnCloud is primarily as an Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) cloud service. With it you can store your files, folders, contacts, photo galleries, calendars and more on a server of your choosing. You can then access that storage from your mobile device, your desktop, or a Web browser. You can also sync your date with local devices and share your data either with the world at large or specific approved users…
Tips for Contracting Cloud Services
Cloud services contracts often provide little to no wiggle room for organizations. In planning to use cloud computing services, what steps do organizations need to take before signing any contract? IT security lawyer Françoise Gilbert offers some key strategies.
Gilbert, a founder and managing director of the IT Law Group, says most cloud providers offer their services with no room for customization, except for their bigger customers. Knowing this, organizations need to approach service agreements cautiously.
To begin, organizations need to figure out if they can enter a cloud contract legally. This means if a U.S. healthcare organization, for example, wants to enter into a contract with a cloud provider, they need to abide by the regulatory requirements of HIPAA, which might suspend them from doing that, Gilbert says…
Cloud Code Of Practice Needed, Says Industry Forum
The cloud computing industry needs a common code of practiceand certification if users are going to trust cloud services, says Cloud Industry Forum (CIF).
Proposals for the code practice, intended to strengthen customer trust in cloud computing and demonstrating “clarity in ethics, practices and processes”will be presented at the Cloud Computing Industry Forum, at Earls Court in London on the 12th and 13th of June.
Code Calling
The Cloud Computing World Forum is the highest attended cloud event in Europe. It will attract over 4,000 senior IT decision-makers from around the globe, host 150 seminars and feature exhibits by 150 cloud companies…
Cloud Computing? 10-60TB Hard Drives Coming to Tablets, Notebooks, Desktops by 2016
Several days ago, IHS iSuppli released a report on storage market and technologies called “HDD Industry Enjoys Best Performance despite Volume Fluctuation”.
In this report, the analyst firm IHS iSuppli confirms what Seagate and Western Digital already stated – doubling of drive density and increase in operating speeds. The way to achieve such density is – heat. Even though heat is an unwanted side-effect with semiconductor products such as CPUs, GPUs, APUs, SoCs and the like, technology called HAMR (Heat-Assisted Magnetic Recording) is finally coming to production…