Author: David

Grazed from MSPNews. Author: Laura Stotler.

Virtualization, the growing prominence of "bring your own device" in the workplace, the push to move applications to the cloud and the growing presence of big data all present unique challenges for today’s managed service providers (MSP). In the face of these changes in technology, end devices and the way services are delivered, perhaps the most important solution MSPs can offer their customers is solid security services.

And yet delivering security in a changing marketplace isn’t as simple as offering firewall management – not in a world in which data centers are migrating throughout the globe, mobile devices are multiplying faster than hardware can be manufactured and users are demanding more and more from their service providers…

Grazed from Federal Times. Author: Nicole Blake Johnson.

For some federal network managers, the topic of cloud computing causes palms to sweat and hearts to race.

That is because “moving to the cloud” really constitutes a huge leap of faith for managers used to controlling every switch, router, firewall and wire that makes their network responsive. In short, it’s about ceding a lot of control, said Joe Beal, director of security services and chief information security officer at Creative Computing Solutions Inc., a program management and information technology services firm.

These managers are transitioning from being infrastructure and systems owners to data owners, Beal said…

Grazed from CloudTimes. Author: Florence de Borja.

Business organizations are increasingly moving towards the cloud. However, there are still some obstacles to its widespread acceptance and ongoing development. While many are happy about how things are evolving in the cloud, there are also some missing pieces that must be taken into consideration.

For one, service administration is still far from being perfect. Cloud computing services must be managed by enforcing policies, offering service authentication, and allocating such services only to authorized users. There are very few cloud computing providers who can offer an acceptable service administration but majority of these suppliers have to step up in order for cloud computing implementation to be successful…

Grazed from ITBusiness.ca. Author: Editorial Staff.

According to a global survey conducted by data recovery vendor Kroll Ontrack, data loss and data recovery aren’t top of mind for all IT organizations implementing a cloud computing or virtualization deployment.

Conducted at VMware Forums globally, 367 IT professionals participated in the in-person survey, with 51 per cent representing enterprises and 32 per cent being service providers.

The survey found that while 62 per cent of respondents are leveraging the cloud and/or virtualization, only 33 per cent of these organizations test data recovery plans regularly to ensure proper protocols are in place to protect this data…

Grazed from eWeek. Author: Jeffrey Burt.

Cisco Systems continues to be the dominant player in a growing Ethernet switch market that is being fueled by such trends as cloud computing, virtualization and mobility, according to IDC analysts.

In the second quarter, revenue for Ethernet switches worldwide jumped 8.5 percent, to $5.5 billion, while 10 Gigabit Ethernet switch sales increased 22.9 percent from the same period last year. In addition, 10GbE port shipments hit a record 3 million in the quarter, leading the overall market growth.

The strong performance of Ethernet switches—which saw revenue increases in every region, including economically troubled Europe—is an indication that networking continues to play a key role in new IT infrastructure deployments, according to Rohit Mehra, director of the Enterprises Communications Infrastructure business at IDC…

Grazed from Business2Community. Author: Kirill Bensonoff.

There’s usually nothing very complicated about paying sales taxes. You go to the store to buy an Xbox game and, at least in most states, you pay a few extra bucks.

When you start talking about the cloud, things get more complicated very quickly. After all, the whole point of cloud computing is that your software and storage space is remote—often in a different state or even a different country. Maybe your data is duplicated in two different places with wholly different tax laws.

The issue is so complicated, and so new, that most states don’t have clear rules yet about how to levy taxes in the cloud…

Grazed from Channelnomics. Author: Justin Crotty.

Enterprises have been dabbling with cloud computing and IT outsourcing services for years. Many have reached the point where they’re either comfortable with the functionality and reliability, or see that the economic benefits certainly outweigh the potential risks. This move to mainstream acceptance of cloud and IT outsourcing marks a significant evolution from “the dev/test period” to the “mission-critical era” and brings a great opportunity to the channel.

For one, this new era pushes IT needs and services beyond your block and tackle hosted e-mail and cloud-based backup. Rather than replacing or adding servers to their data centers, enterprises are looking to move application servers into hosted environments, or replace them with software services. In an effort to achieve this, many businesses are turning to systems integrators (SIs) for software, infrastructure, platform and professional services needed to support their cloud environments…

Grazed from CloudTweaks. Author: Walter Bailey.

1 – SalesForce

SalesForce is a very strong market leader, having developed 105,000 cloud computing applications that run in real time. The aim of the company is to develop applications that allow running the social media communication in real time.

Why? The Ruby platform developed by SalesForce is deemed impenetrable by most of the corporate giants. Apart from that, the company has successfully integrated enterprise CRM solutions over the cloud platform…

Grazed from TheStreet. Author: Chris Ciaccia.

Expectations for the high-flying Salesforce.com’s second-quarter earnings release, which takes place after the close of the stock market Thursday, are particularly lofty this time around. The shares have rocketed 45 percent this year.

Led by CEO Marc Benioff, Salesforce has become a leader in the cloud computing (learn more) industry, providing software-as-a-service (SaaS) to companies. Salesforce has expanded its social-media offerings, buying Radian6 and recently purchasing Buddy Media for $689 million, as it takes on rivals Oracle [ORCL 31.585 -0.115 (-0.36%) ] and SAP [SAP 64.52 -0.51 (-0.78%) ]. That acquisition closed Aug. 13…

Grazed from CRN. Author: Rob Wright.

As more applications move to the cloud and software publishers embrace the SaaS model, software piracy will decline and eventually become a thing of the past.

Or, maybe it won’t. Maybe users will simply find new ways — trading SaaS account login credentials, or setting up "dark clouds" — to get around paying for software.

A debate has been sparked by new data from the Business Software Alliance (BSA), which surveyed nearly 15,000 PC users in 33 countries; the study did not include smartphones or tablets. The survey shows that 42 percent of respondents say they share login credentials for paid cloud services inside their organizations…