Category: News

Grazed from TalkinCloud. Author: CJ Arlotta.

IBM and automated server migration software developer Racemi have partnered to provide customers with a free automated migration path to any IBM cloud offering for a limited time. Racemi’s Cloud Path software automates migration of existing Microsoft (MSFT) Windows and Linux servers to public cloud services. Infrastructure to deploy or manage is not needed on a customer’s site with this software as a service (SaaS).

Customer data is secured and compressed using AES/RSA SSL encryption over firewall. Racemi Product Management Vice President James Strayer said in a prepared statement that the partnership "ensures there is a fast, easy way to move existing workloads to IBM’s cloud computing platforms."…

Grazed from ZDNet. Author: Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols.

On September 17, IBM will announce at LinuxCon 2013 that it will invest $1 billion in new Linux and open-source technologies for its Power Systems servers. This announcement comes 12 years after IBM famously announced that it was backing the then unproven Linux with a billion-dollar investment.

Jim Zemlin, executive director of the Linux Foundation, said, "The last time IBM committed $1 billion to Linux, it helped start a flurry of innovation that has never slowed. We look forward to seeing how the Power platform can bring about further innovation on Linux, and how companies and developers can work together to get the most out of this open architecture."…

Grazed from Forbes. Author: John Foley.

The market for government clouds is rapidly advancing. I recently highlighted 10 game-changing developments in government clouds, and now there’s another: Oracle ORCL +1.57% has unveiled Oracle Government Cloud, a new offering for federal, state, and local government agencies.

Oracle Government Cloud is an enterprise-class cloud environment and family of cloud services designed specifically for the needs and requirements of government organizations. It gives CIOs in federal government a new and better way to meet Uncle Sam’s Cloud First policy, which requires agencies to use cloud computing where it makes sense in lieu of dedicated, do-it-yourself systems. “A quick look at what Oracle is offering shows that it dovetails nicely with the US federal government’s 2010 Cloud First policy,” writes CMSWire…

Grazed from IT Business Edge. Author: Arthor Cole.

A cloud of many faces is taking shape before our eyes. It is common knowledge by now that the cloud is not merely an extension of the data center but an entirely new data ecosystem that can grow, change, and yes, evolve into a wide range of configurations, just as any organic creature is able to adapt to changing environments. In many ways, this change can be anticipated and planned for, but as the market matures, you can bet there will be a fair number of unexpected developments as well.

But to get the kind of flexibility to handle both the expected and the unexpected, enterprises will have to shed much of the thinking that has governed cloud deployments so far. This is not merely an extension of current data infrastructure but an entirely new way to doing things. Much of the attention in the cloud is turning away from simple applications and infrastructure to fully cloud-based development platforms because of this new way of thinking…

Grazed from Wired. Author: Dan Conde.

Cloud computing has been on minds of many people, but there are many definitions depending on who you ask. For some people, it means services or apps that are run off-premises as Software as a Service (files stored in the cloud, or music that is stored and played from the cloud instead of your own disks). For others, it is defined as servers or other resources are spun up on-demand from a data center somewhere in the cloud.

Let’s look at the second definition since we’re talking about how networking needs to be re-invented, and because the performance of cloud servers rely heavily on the networking. On top of that, many providers of Software as a Service use an on-demand model in their data center, so ultimately, the network underpins cloud computing in general. When people designed the datacenter systems with traditional servers, storage and networking gear, it was carefully designed with a particular workload in mind…

Grazed from Infosec-Magazine. Author: Bill Hackenberger.

When organizations move their data to the cloud, traditional security measures may not be effective. With some basic knowledge, Bill Hackenberger of HighCloud Security says companies can take advantage of Infrastructure-as-a-Service, while keeping their data private. If your organization is considering use of Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) from a cloud service provider (CSP), be aware that traditional security measures, such as full drive encryption, may not translate.

Most IaaS rely heavily on server virtualization to achieve the elasticity and rapid deployment we expect from the cloud. But virtualization introduces new technologies and attack surfaces that must be considered from a security perspective. If you are concerned about the privacy of data running in virtual machines (VMs) in the public cloud, there are some basics you need to know…

Grazed from TalkinCloud. Author: Chris Talbot.

Following up on the launch of its Box DLP offering earlier this year, cloud security specialist CipherCloud is now incorporating encryption into the offering with the hope of providing something to Box customers they currently don’t have access to.

There are other encryption offerings that touch Box, but according to CipherCloud, its new encryption capabilities provide a seamless experience that its competitors don’t offer. Most importantly, the company takes an approach to encryption and security that places the encryption keys in the hands of the customer, giving them ownership and control, said Praveen Kothari, founder and CEO of CipherCloud…

Grazed from ITWorld Canada. Author: Howard Solomon.

Linux has made the operating system fight into a “two-horse race”, the head of the Linux Foundation told the opening of the annual LinuxCon conference. It’s “the end of an era” for Microsoft’s Windows, Jim Zemlin, executive director, Linux Foundation told the New Orleans gathering of developers and vendors this morning.

Web-based and cloud computing is exploding and making the shift to open source operating systems and software easier. “Linux is at a tipping point.” As head of an organization whose job is to promote Linux, Zemlin didn’t hold back…

Grazed from NetworkComputing. Author: Brian Prince.

A new report from analyst firm Transparency Market Research predicts the global market for software-defined networking (SDN) will reach more than $3.5 billion by 2018. According to the report, the SDN market is driven primarily by the need for efficient infrastructure and mobility, as well as the increasing demand for cloud services. "Nowadays, many organizations are storing, computing, and networking through cloud-based infrastructure.

They are doing this for more agility, flexibility, manageability, and programmability in their network infrastructure," the firm said in a prepared statement. The report breaks out four categories of SDN technologies: SDN switching, SDN controllers, cloud provisioning and orchestration, and security and services. Cloud provisioning and orchestration dominates the global SDN market and also is expected to be the fastest growing area as it helps to design, optimize, secure, and monitor the network, according to the research firm. SDN switching had the second largest revenue share of the SDN market in 2012. The firm forecasts an overall compound annual growth rate for the SDN market of 61.5% from 2012 to 2018…