Month: November 2013

Grazed from Datamation.  Author: Pedro Hernandez.

Cisco and NetApp celebrated their three-year FlexPod partnership by teasing the cloud-enabled upgrades that that companies have planned for the platform.  In a brief statement, the companies said that they are preparing "several technology enhancements to better enable IT and service providers to become cloud providers." FlexPod is an integrated system offering (compute, storage and networking) meant to speed IT infrastructure deployment and configuration in enterprise computing environments.

Their joint FlexPod solutions have caught the attention of data center operators, according to Marcus Phipps, senior manager of Data Center Solutions Marketing for Cisco. He noted in a blog post that during the past three years, "we’ve experienced some tremendous growth, more than doubling new installations year-over-year, and now we have more than 3,000 customers globally."…

Grazed from ECNS. Author: Editorial Staff.

Chinese search engine Baidu launched an online shopping mall Thursday, but the e-mall powered by cloud computing was shut down in less than 24 hours due to suspected copyright issues. The e-mall provides service allowing users to trade electronic files, including videos, pictures, documents as well as music. Users can also post transaction information and comments. All the transactions are done via Baidu’s payment platform, baifubao.

Baidu said earlier it doesn’t own copyrights of all the electronic files uploaded by its users nor does it have the obligation to check the files, according to a statement detailing its cloud computing operating system. The search engine required potential users to sell copyrighted resources based on an honor system. If any copyright complaints were filed, the use of related electronic resources will be stopped, Baidu said…

Grazed from DataCenterDynamics. Author: Nick Razey.

For those working in the fast moving world of cloud computing it is easy to take the somewhat arrogant view that the choice of data center is irrelevant; that although it is an essential piece of the jigsaw, one data center is just the same as another when compared to the complexities of differing Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) platforms. On this basis it is assumed that all the value in the IT chain will migrate to the cloud provider’s leaving data centers to earn meagre commodity margins.

The data center, however, is a very long way from being a commodity. A commodity typically has three characteristics; the product is the same, the quality is the same and the price is the same. And because the products are interchangeable they are usually bought and sold via efficient spot markets which exactly match supply and demand and which prevent any suppliers earning excessive returns…

Grazed from TMCNet. Author: Kathleen Richards.

Virtualization and cloud computing have advanced rapidly despite overarching security concerns. Industry guru and provocateur Chris Hoff predicted a bumpy ride, and some of the vendor and technology fallout, as virtualization deployments spun up — and lowered costs for some companies — but security lagged behind. After two years of research and "solid hands-on collaborative work with networking, security and audit practitioners and managers" at enterprises and service providers worldwide, Hoff delivered a landmark presentation on the issues surrounding virtualization security at the Black Hat conference in 2008 that caught people’s attention.

Five years later, we are thrilled that he is the author of our November cover story, "Virtualization Security Dynamics Get Old," and catching us up on the past, present, and perhaps most importantly, future of virtualization, cloud computing and security. Many of the problems he initially outlined remain, but progress is being made, writes Hoff:..

Grazed from TalkinCloud. Author: Editorial Staff.

According to most all credible research including Gartner, cloud computing promises economic advantages, speed, agility, flexibility, infinite elasticity and innovation—and at Tech Data, we too believe in that philosophy. So with so many obvious advantages, why aren’t more solution providers investing in and leading with the cloud?

Consider this question: We all love cloud in theory, but do we,in fact, really “get it”? I would assert that we’re not there yet. It’s a bold statement, but one that I’m willing to stand behind. In fact, I’ll take it one step further and say that the true success of cloud in the channel collectively depends on all of us—through our collective adoption and enablement. The sooner that we as an industry are educated and understand and embrace the value of cloud for the end user, the sooner we can begin to truly capitalize on everything that the cloud has to offer. The potential of cloud solutions is significant and multi-layered. We have, in fact, barely tapped the surface…

Grazed from ComputerWorld. Author: Brandon Butler.

The website for MegaCloud, a provider of free and paid consumer cloud storage, is inaccessible and users of the service are complaining on social media sites that they have not had access to their data for days. It’s unclear why the service is not working and whether it is because of a technical glitch or if the company has gone out of business. When attempting to access MegaCloud.com, it returns a notice that the site could not be found. None of the other sites associated with MegaCloud work either, such as the features page, pricing information and the contact links.

The service appears to have been dark for at least a couple of days. Users on various Internet forums have been posing questions about the service and why it is down, for two days, as of Friday. The site IsItDownRightNow.com shows that the site is not accessible, and has about a dozen people questioning why…

Grazed from InfoSecurity. Author: Gavin Hill.

Secure Shell (SSH) is the de facto protocol used by millions to authenticate to workloads running in the cloud and transfer data securely. Even more SSH sessions are established automatically between systems, allowing those systems to securely transfer data without human intervention. In either case, this technology underpins the security of vital network communications. According to the Ponemon Institute, organizations recognize SSH’s role in securing network communication and list threats to their SSH keys as the number one most alarming threat arising from failure to control trust in the cloud.

SSH authentication holds only as strong as the safeguards around the authentication tokens, the SSH keys. Failure to secure and protect these keys can compromise the environment, breaking down the trust that SSH should establish. Malicious actors take advantage of common mistakes in key management, the following are some of the common pitfalls organizations fall prey to…

Grazed from TalkinCloud. Author: Chris Talbot.

SafeNet is adding encryption to Amazon (AMZN) EC2 workloads, as well as the ability for customers to maintain full ownership of encryption keys, to its ProtectV data protection offering. SafeNet ProtectV with Virtual KeySecure was designed to run entirely on Amazon Web Services (AWS) infrastructure and is also compatible with AWS CloudHSM.

Cloud encryption and, more specifically, the ownership of encryption keys has been getting additional notice lately as customers look for security solutions that not only can protect their cloud-based apps and data, but also place the encryption keys in their hands, giving them a certain amount of ownership over the security of their own cloud endeavors…

Grazed from Forbes. Author: Janel Ryan.

Today’s business environment requires CFOs to improve efficiencies and reduce costs. Given that the topic is cloud computing, a CFO will likely hear a lot of hype, but the most important thing to consider in a cloud solution is, “Which business problems do I want to solve?” Consider these:

Maximize Cost Efficiencies
From a cost savings perspective, cloud computing can preserve capital, turning a large, upfront CapEx into an OpEx. Cost savings stem from providing a “pay as you go” model.

Strategy
Cloud computing is not one-size-fits-all. As you review your business needs and priorities, understand that while some applications will be a better fit for cloud. The low barrier to entry in terms of capital outlay can make it possible for you to reach new customers across the globe. Further, new customers can come online faster because resources are readily available and scalable…

Grazed from CloudComputingNews. Author: Tim Jennings.

Oracle’s September 2013 customer event was notable for a series of announcements designed to help the company’s customers improve the speed and agility of their information systems. The flagship news revolved around Oracle’s core competence of database technology, with forthcoming releases of an in-memory option for Oracle Database 12c that promises to significantly speed up analytic queries, and of an enterprise-grade Database as a Service (DBaaS) offering, part of the Oracle Public Cloud. The latter is reaching a new level of maturity, assisted by the acquisition earlier in 2013 of cloud infrastructure specialist Nimbula.

One of the dominant themes of the conference was machine-to-machine (M2M) technology and the Internet of Things (IoT), and here Oracle is positioning its Java technology as an end-to-end platform for solution development. It also announced an upcoming new version of its Java as a Service offering, which again provides enterprise-grade development capabilities in the Oracle Public Cloud. These headlines were further supported by new engineered systems for in-memory computing and for database backup, and by good progress across many areas of the product portfolio…