Grazed from Virtualization Review.  Author: Elias Khnaser.

As we bid farewell to 2011 and welcome 2012, I figured we would end this blogging year with a reading of the crystal ball "Eli style." It has been a great year and I have enjoyed all the comments and the responses that I have received from all of you on all the social media channels I am connected on. That being said, let’s see if we can end this year with a bang of predictions:

Desktop Virtualization
I am sure you were expecting this one from me so I will keep it brief. In 2012, the adoption of desktop virtualization will continue to grow and enterprises will recognize that the effects of consumerization will force them at some point to start rolling out Windows 8 even as they’ve yet to complete or even start their migrations to Windows 7. Couple that with the expiration of Windows XP in 2014 and I think 2012 will be the year of the desktop…

Grazed from NextGov.  Author: Medhat Galal.

As policies from the new federal chief information officer, Steven VanRoekel, become better known, cloud computing technology is proving more important than ever. VanRoekel has pledged not only to continue the Cloud First policy established by his predecessor, Vivek Kundra, but also to expand it with an additional initiative known as Future First.

Business process management and other applications delivered through the cloud speak directly to VanRoekel’s requirement to maximize information technology investments. Moreover, the cloud increases collaboration and the use of shared services…

Grazed from Sys Con Media.  Author: Pat Romanski.

"One part of the connection between big data and cloud computing is the scale – big data implies large scale and the problem of managing large scale is similar in both. The difference is in the emphasis on the types of workloads – in big data the emphasis is on trying to keep the data local and in cloud you are looking to optimize resources," explains Rohit Valia, Director of Enterprise Marketing at Platform Computing, in this SYS-CON.TV interview with Cloud Expo Conference Chair Jeremy Geelan at the 9th International Cloud Expo, held Nov 7-10, 2011, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, CA…

Grazed from CRN.  Author: Greg Pierce.

Windows 8 is an operating system that is a great fit for tablets — far better than a phone OS that can be jiggered to deliver enterprise functionality, says Pierce, Managing Director of Cloud Computing at Tribridge. Windows 8 is equal parts PC and tablet. Here’s Pierce’s advice for selling the functionality of cloud computing and the Windows 8 OS as a perfect match for companies facing the challenge of consumer-based mobile computing devices n the workplace.—Jennifer Bosavage, editor

A major driver for the adoption of cloud computing has been the rapid acceptance of consumer devices into enterprise IT. It wasn’t very long ago that IT professionals and C-level executives were debating the merits and prudence of allowing Droids, Tablets and iPads onto the corporate network. Those debates are essentially over. The consumer device has become a part of almost every Enterprise network. The conversations have morphed into how to manage, secure and most importantly – create functionality for those devices…

Grazed from The Fiscal Times.  Author: Susan McGee.

For more than a decade, we’ve all been referring glibly to “cyber space” – that place where misdirected e-mails end up; the home of countless websites peddling discount-priced Viagra; the source of music and movies that stream almost magically onto our tablet devices. Now cyber space, under its proper name of “the cloud,” has become one of the hottest investment trends around – it even has its own exchange-traded fund, the First Trust ISE Cloud Computing Index Fund (SKYY) to prove it. Over the last three years, the index on which that ETF and other investment products have been based has soared 235.53 percent…

Grazed from Business2Community.  Author: Allen Oguis.

It is a common reality that people spend a lot of time collecting data and then finding ways to store it. 

 To illustrate this scenario, let’s start on the most basic level of computing. Say for instance you are downloading and saving files like movies, music and photos. You store these in your hard drive. But when there is no more space for new data and you don’t want to delete any of your old files, what do you do? You buy a bigger hard drive, of course. The more data you collect, the more space you need…

Grazed from Reuters.  Author: Richard Beales.

Cloud computing and cybersecurity are both hot, fast-growing markets. But faith in the cloud took a knock with outages at Amazon and elsewhere in 2011. And the hacking of targets from Sony to Hollywood star Scarlett Johansson, whose email was broken into, underlines the need for better security.

Keeping data and services on someone else’s servers in the so-called cloud – all the while just clicks away – means companies don’t have to invest up front. They pay for what they need, and scaling up is easy. Hence the fast growth observed by research firms like Forrester, which pegs the cloud market at more than $60 billion by the end of 2012…

Grazed from eWeek.  Author: Frank Ohlhorst.

Once viewed as the formula for desktop PC provisioning and management roles, Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) technology is moving into the mainstream via a new path, as a solution for business services.

Most enterprise administrators have viewed Virtual Desktop Infrastructure as a way to deliver enterprise desktops to users more efficiently. However, VDI can deliver more than just a typical business desktop; the technology can also be used to deliver specialized business services.

A case in point is bank hardware vendor Diebold, which is now running a pilot program to deliver ATM (Automated Teller Machine) services via VDI. Diebold’s program aims to transform how enterprises deliver business services by divorcing the dedicated/proprietary hardware from the business service through virtualization technology….

Grazed from CRN.  Author: Andrew R. Hickey.

The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) gained more vocal opponents from the cloud computing and Web community this week as DreamHost and Domain.com publicly denounced the bill.

DreamHost’s and Domain.com’s moral opposition to the proposed legislation, which is currently making its way through Congress, comes as rival Go Daddy faces a boycott and mass customer exodus over its support of the Hollywood-backed bill that, on the surface, seeks to stop online piracy and copyright infringement.

The companies also join a growing list of tech top dogs speaking out against SOPA. Some of the bill’s most vocal opponents include Google, Twitter, Facebook, and AOL…

Grazed from VMBlog.com.  Author: David Marshall.

Global studies prove that ‘cloud services’ could add US $800bn in net new business revenue by end of 2013.

The time when IT was just a support function to a few businesses around the world is over. Global politics and the global economy are being shaped by IT. For the IT leader to survive and sustain in this environment they must lead by consistently changing the strategies and re-create IT. This new era brings with it urgent and compelling forces : the cloud, social, mobility and an explosion in information.

Fleming Gulf Conferences launches Cloud Computing Imperative 2012 to be held on 12-13 March followed by a cloud security workshop programme on 14 Marchin Dubai – UAE, which will set the stage for IT specialists from public, private and government entities to network with industry peers, share experiences and learn how to view and implement Cloud and its security…