Month: November 2013

Grazed from CNME. Author: J.D. Sartain.

Cisco Systems’s third annual Global Cloud Index forecasts that global cloud traffic will more than quadruple, from 1.2 zettabytes in 2012 to 5.3 ZB in 2017. That works out to about 443 exabytes a month, or about 476 billion GB. More than three quarters of that data will originate in the data centre, “Largely generated by storage, production and development data in a virtualised environment” and “used in activities that are virtually invisible to individuals,” the report says. An additional 7 percent, “primarily driven by data replication and software-system updates,” will flow between data centres. The remaining 17 percent of this traffic will come from end users’ multimedia and project-oriented cloud services.

Forrester infrastructure and operations analyst James Staten thinks Cisco “under-represented” end-user cloud traffic. “End users will fuel far more than 17 percent of data center traffic,” he says, “Especially if you think about public data centres hosting online and cloud services and not just enterprise data centers.”…

Grazed from ITProPortal. Author: Jamie Hinks.

Over two thirds of companies have deployed business critical apps on an infrastructure-as-a-service [IaaS] platform as cloud usage continues to grow amongst businesses. A survey carried out by Riverbed Technology at the recent AWS re:Invent conference in Las Vegas showed that some 80 per cent of attendees have deployed an app in an IaaS cloud for the first time.

When it comes to concerns about the IaaS cloud, 90 per cent stated that reliability is the top concern with performance [88 per cent], security [86 per cent], and costs [84 per cent] trailing closely behind. “Given that reliability and performance topped the concerns for the trail-blazers at AWS re:invent, these are evidently very serious challenges,” added Dormain Drewitz, senior solutions marketing manager at Riverbed Technology…

Grazed from The Silhouette. Author: Rachel Faber.

The recent popularity of cloud email systems has some Canadian universities concerned about the level of security of their email servers. Discourse suggests that with these U.S. based companies, the U.S. government or NSA may be able to gain access to secure information and intellectual property through American cloud services such as those offered by Google and Microsoft.

Richard Godsmark, the senior manager of Security, Technology and Risk at McMaster University pointed out that this is a security concern, however it is a difficult issue to address due to a lack of information on the subject. To improve customer service, Google is attempting to sue the U.S. government, to ensure that they will have to go through actual court proceedings before accessing information. However, in order to really address Internet security, Godsmark believes that it will require a global policy on the matter. “[Information] crosses borders without any kind of passport, and so traffic is always going to end up in other countries,” said Godsmark…

Grazed from CMSReport. Author: Gil Allouche.

One of the most common concerns businesses have when they consider adopting a cloud computing solution is that they will have less control over their IT system. Thus, they worry that their data will not be secure enough, and their concern is understandable. Data breaches are expensive, both financial-wise and reputation-wise, and with attacks becoming more and more sophisticated, security has become a top priority. Luckily, adopting cloud computing does not mean that you have to give up security, but you will want to do your research when comparing options.

1. Dedicated Hardware

One important component to look at when evaluating a cloud database provider is where your data will actually be stored. Will there be a single machine that is dedicated to your data only? Knowing where your data resides is important to ensuring its safety. It is also important to find out what happens to your data should you decide to leave a particular provide or if the provider should go out of business. Be sure your contract addresses all of the possibilities so that you know for sure where your data will be at all times, and that you will have access to it…

Grazed from ProfitBricks. Author: Andy Lurie.

Remember When CPU Performance was Guaranteed? Since the early launch of the PC in the early 1980’s, CPU performance has been defined by the clock speed and front side bus of the processer. It was simple and easy to understand and Intel and AMD battled the MHz and GHz wars over the years.

Server CPU Speeds

This infographic looks at server class CPUs from the Pentium era CPUs of 1993 to today. Along the way, a lot of new technologies totally transformed the way we look at CPU performance. Beginning with the advent of X86 server virtualization in 2001, VMware and other virtualization technologies permitted multiple operating systems, and their related processes, to be run in parallel on a single CPU. Instead of relying on the old model of “one server, one application” which lead to under-utilized resources, virtual resources are dynamically applied to meet business needs without any excess “fat.”…

Grazed from CSO. Author: David Braue.

Businesses concerned about the security of cloud-computing systems should appoint a ‘cloud purchasing czar’ whose sole responsibility is to evaluate cloud service providers (CSPs) and manage their interactions between business and IT executives, a leading security consultant has advised.

Speaking at the recent CSO Perspectives Roadshow, BRM Holdich director of information security and IT assurance Jo Stewart-Rattray said the czar model – promoted by the likes of Gartner analyst Daryl Plummer – offers the important ability to bring order to what is often a chaotic process of cloud-system purchasing and deployment…

Grazed from The Washington Post. Author: Mohana Ravindranath.

San Francisco-based cloud computing giant Salesforce got big as one of the few companies that helped businesses manage and store customer data. Fifteen years later, it is trying to help businesses reach those customers through their smartphones, tablets and social media.

Salesforce’s recent product launches and acquisitions suggest the company is expanding its focus from business-to-business communication and branching out into business-to-consumer services. At its recent Dreamforce, Salesforce’s annual conference and product launch, the company unveiled Salesforce1, a cloud-based system helping businesses, sell, market and deal with customer service issues through smartphones and tablets. It also announced the ExactTarget Marketing Cloud, which tailors advertising to customers on e-mail, Web, mobile and social media sites…

Grazed from TalkinCloud. Author: CJ Arlotta.

Security vendor Symantec (SYMC) seems to be shutting down its Backup Exec.cloud service in January, according to a report this morning by Bloomberg News. The report noted that the security vendor began alerting customers this month of its decision to discountinue the service, adding that "the decision was prompted by changes in the PC market."

In an email statement prepared for Talkin’ Cloud, Symantec said it is aligning with a new offering strategy and efforts to streamline its product range to provide fewer, more integrated solutions for customers. "We are firmly committed to doing everything we can to help our partners and customers successfully navigate this process," the company said…

Grazed from CMSWire. Author: Ashish Thusoo.

Data silos days are numbered. Businesses that organize around products or business functions and not data will disappear. The development and adoption of service oriented architecture (SOA) and cloud computing created a steady stream of incentives to abandon data silos. However, data inertia — the difficulties of easily giving access or moving data — and organizational structures have posed significant stumbling blocks in exploiting them fully and organizing businesses around data at the same time.

A Turning Point

We are at a turning point with big data. SOA and cloud computing were about efficiencies — which could be ignored — big data is a strategic shift and will transform businesses in a way that adopters will supersede the stragglers. Businesses, especially large ones, have long been trying to break down the silos of data storage and computing…

Grazed from Midsize Insider. Author: Marissa Tejada.

Cloud computing is being embraced by an increasing number of midsize firms, according to a new study. The researchers from Spiceworks, Inc. found that, in addition to the cloud, two other third-platform technologies, virtualization and mobility, are what midsize firms are using to increase productivity and to meet their business goals.

More Cloud to Go Around

The new report, "State of SMB IT 1H 2013," featured in ChannelPro SMB, took into account the responses of IT departments with fewer than 1,000 employees. The semiannual study found that employees at these smaller firms used more cloud services compared to larger firms. Virtualization grew as well; more than 80 percent of firms with 250 to 999 employees have adopted virtualization technology. As for mobility, tablets are ruling the roost at midsize firms; almost 60 percent of IT professionals said that they have tablets in their networks. Researchers expect that the percentage will grow, with 70 percent of midsize firms adopting tablet use by the end of 2013…