Category: News

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…

Grazed from PCWorld. Author: Tom Bradley.

Everything’s coming up mobile these days. Gartner estimates that PC sales will make up only about 13 percent of device sales in 2013—and some undisclosed portion of those PCs are notebooks. The more we rely on small, mobile devices to get things done, the more we also depend on cloud storage and services to extend functionality beyond what the mobile device itself is capable of. That’s why mobile and cloud will become mobile cloud.

The IEEE Computer Society lists mobile cloud as one of its Top Technology Trends for 2014. IEEE explains, “Mobile devices are constrained by their memory, processing power, and battery life. But combined with cloud computing, data processing and storage can happen outside of mobile devices.”…

Grazed from Wired. Author: Klint Finley.

Docker wants to help developers run their applications anywhere and everywhere. This week, the project got a little closer to that goal by bringing the platform to all major versions of the Linux operating system. Docker is a tool for bundling everything you need to run a particular application into a single “container.”

These containers can be moved from computer to computer — be they physical machines or virtual computer servers — in much the same way a standardized shipping container can be loaded onto any ship or train or loading dock. Each container runs in isolation of all the other containers on a computer…

Grazed from ZDNet. Author: Colin Barker.

I recently attended a discussion of the key components of the phenomenon known as Amazon Web Services (AWS), which I’ve turned into a basic walkthrough for anyone considering making a first move into cloud computing. AWS is Amazon’s fast growing cloud service: each day AWS adds server capacity equivalent to what Amazon had when it was a $5bn company back in 2003.

In 2006 Amazon servers handled 2.9 billion requests and in 2010 that hit 262 billion. This year the company expects its servers to handle 2 trillion, which works out at a million requests per second. That’s some pretty heavy computational lifting, and at these volumes Amazon benefits from great economy of scale…