Grazed from HostReview.  Author: Christa Joe.

One of the major advancement in technology that organizations use these days to optimally utilize their IT infrastructure services is Cloud Computing. Cloud computing platforms allow companies to use infrastructure, software and other applications as a service rather than a product. This minimizes the extra cost of installation of resources at unit level and installing a single infrastructure unit supports a cluster of users, while each user thinks of resource as a dedicated unit for him.

But the technology is never granted to a single authority and a number of cloud computing companies are present in the market providing platforms, according to the budget and requirement of the client. So, the main concern for a client is to choose a correct platform for its working. Many cloud providers are available in the market with the same core functionality but along with it they have a USP of their own, the parameter that differentiates them with others providing the same service to the client…

Grazed from Windows IT Pro.  Author: Sean Deuby.

Identity as a service (IDaaS) was developed to deal with a new need that’s arisen with the popularity of cloud computing: identity management for the exploding number of Software as a Service (SaaS) applications available on an almost instant basis. At the end of 2011, Gartner estimated that global SaaS revenue hit $12 billion, a 21 percent increase over 2010, and that SaaS will account for 15 percent of enterprise application purchases by 2015. And right along with this growth is the problem of how to manage user identities for all of these applications.

Adding the on-premises capability of securely managing cloud identities for SaaS applications requires some work. You need to set up an Internet single sign-on (SSO) federation solution, and once you’ve set it up, you have to manage it. One of the larger tasks in running your own federation solution is managing the relationships of the ever-increasing number of SaaS vendors. Many companies simply don’t want to be adding these on-premises costs at the same time they’re shifting some of their IT capabilities to the cloud…

Grazed from Accounting Times.  Author: Henry Chao and Dr. Paul Foote.

One of the hottest IT trends promoted by vendors such as Amazon, Google and Microsoft is cloud computing.

They advertise the cloud to businesses as the solution to all IT data storage needs with significant savings to the bottom line. Although IT departments are concerned with the security and reliability issues that the cloud brings, business executives are adopting the cloud without necessarily understanding the risks involved in cloud computing.

Visiting any of the cloud providers Web sites, you will see promises of reliability, security, 99 percent-plus uptime, SAS 70 Type II audits, and various certifications such as HIPAA, PCI and SOX compliant. But can you trust handing over your data and applications to the cloud?…

Grazed from Livemint.com – The Wall Street Journal.   Author: Leslie D’Monte.

Grazed from The Malta Independent.  Author:  

In the recently presented Global Competitiveness Report 2011-2012, Malta falls within the third and most developed stage together with another 34 countries out of the 142, according to Microsoft Malta Country Manager Adrianna Zammit.

Opening a recent half-day conference on how ‘The Cloud’ has opened a new wave of innovation in computing, Ms Zammit outlined Microsoft Malta’s plan for encouraging innovation and embracing the cloud, and highlighted the benefits that businesses can derive by moving to the cloud…

Grazed from Sys Con Media.  Author: Jonathan Gershater.

In prior blog posts, I described Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Platform as a Service (PaaS).

To recap:

• If I use IaaS I get servers onto which I can load software and applications which I then maintain, though I don’t need to maintain the hardware. I can customize the applications and software running on the servers, at will.
• If I use PaaS, I get a platform of ready to use web servers, application servers, databases etc. I write my own software application and host it at the PaaS provider. I maintain the software I write, but not the application servers, databases or hardware. I can customize the software I write, at will

Finally, we reach the top of the stack: Software as a Service (SaaS)…

Grazed from Dilbert.com.  Author: Scott Adams
 

 

Grazed from The DataCenter Journal.  Author: David Palmer-Stevens.

Organizations of all sizes are looking at how their data center facilities can support their IT requirements for greater flexibility and responsiveness using cloud computing and virtualization. But implementing these technologies and strategies in existing data center environments is easier said than done. Data center managers must take their data center, which can be up to 15 years old, and rebuild it using the latest deployment principles.

One approach here is to take a more modular approach to data center design. The initial adopters of this strategy five years ago were Amazon and Google, and they are usually the reference for data center best practices in current deployment methodology. For companies evaluating where modular data center assets can help their own strategies, there are both lessons to be learned and pitfalls to avoid…

Grazed from Sys Con Media.  Author: Roger Strukoff.

I reported earlier on a new report entitled The Power of Cloud from IBM, in which it said cloud computing’s potential within enterprise IT remains "virtually untapped," and in which it identified three types of cloud adopters: optimizers, innovators, and disruptors.

I was able to follow that up with a Q&A with Saul J. Berman, Ph.D., Partner & Vice President, Global Strategy Leader & Innovation, and Growth Services Leader within IBM’s Global Business Services (GBS)…