Category: News

Grazed from eWeek.  Author: Darryl K. Taft.

OpenStack has announced “Essex,” the fifth version of its community-driven, open-source cloud operating system, with a focus on quality, usability and extensibility across enterprise, service provider and high-performance computing (HPC) deployments.

The OpenStack Essex news comes just days after Citrix announced its plans for the next version of its CloudStack cloud platform, which the company submitted to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) and itself became a sponsor of ASF.

Speaking of sponsorships, GigaOm reported that IBM and Red Hat are poised to lend their substantial might behind the OpenStack open-source cloud project at the upcoming OpenStack Spring 2012 conference…

Grazed from MidSize Insider.  Author:  Megan Mostyn-Brown.

Telecoms like Verizon and CenturyLink have joined Time Warner Cable in what’s turning out to be a highly competitive cloud computing market. These popular domestic telecommunications services have snapped up cloud service and infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) providers like NaviSite, Qwest, and Terremark in hopes of competing with companies like Amazon, Microsoft Azure, HP, and Google to name a few and to make up for their flagging revenue from traditional services.

The Advantages

Why would an enterprise that’s already satisfied with their cloud service provider chose to switch over to a carrier provider? The answer is infrastructure, security, and the potential for a unified communication platform. ComputerWorld consulted with independent analyst Bob Rosenberg, who predicts that telecoms have an edge over other cloud service providers because they have trusted wired networks. Enterprises have depended on many of these companies for decades to provide telephone and internet services with good results. Their proven dependability and security is a key component in attracting customers looking for a "low-latency connections for large amounts of data transfer." Having a trusted name can do a lot for enterprises or consumers that are nervous about the security aspect of cloud computing…

Grazed from CM Crossroads.  Author: Steve Abrams.

There is a lot of buzz in the IT industry around cloud computing and its impact on driving greater efficiency across an IT organization, but when considering adoption of cloud computing infrastructure, where should an organization begin? The application development lifecycle can be a good starting point. Infrastructure utilization is low, labor costs are high, and the lifecycle is ripe for automation. Cloud computing can dramatically streamline the lifecycle by reducing the need to acquire dedicated infrastructure, providing pre-configured application lifecycle management environments, and providing needed resources on demand. All of this reduces cost and time to market while improving quality.

Studies [1] have shown that 30 to 50 percent of all servers in a typical IT organization are dedicated to test, with most of the servers running at 10 percent utilization or less. Paradoxically, one of the top challenges in moving applications into production is the limited availability of servers on which to test the app. Test backlog is often the single largest factor delaying new deployments. Generally, the root cause is the difficulty in properly deploying and configuring test environments on the available servers…

Grazed from MidSize Insider.  Author: Marissa Tejada.

For businesses of all sizes, deploying the cloud is a serious undertaking as it can change the shape of an IT budget and the IT personnel group needed moving forward. In the end, it means overall innovation in IT and a broader consideration of what skills are needed to compete today.

According to a recent Computerworld article, embracing cloud computing can be both a positive and negative force when it comes to looking at job security in IT today.

Generally for enterprises, it’s about cost savings because deploying the cloud means reducing the number of staff generally needed and therefore reducing budgets. The article cites a study by IT service provider CSC that claims 14 percent of companies reduced their IT staff head count after deploying a cloud strategy. Simply put, the cloud creates greater efficiencies, thereby reducing IT staff…

Grazed from CloudTweaks.  Author: Jeff Norman.

It is now official: cloud computing now has serious gov cred. We recently learned that the Air Force was strongly considering the possibility of leaping into the cloud, as a strategy to slash the girth of maintenance and operations in their budget, as well as to tighten security measures. Many readers will wince at that last aim; cloud computing and great security are hardly synonymous, they will muse. The Air Force has nevertheless honed in on several of the cloud’s virtues from a military perspective.

These advantages may lie in cloud’s capacity for “zero” and “thin clients;” the former entails the classic cloud computing setup of just a keyboard, monitor, and mouse, no additional processor to be found. A “thin client” expands on the “zero client” with the addition of an integrated processor, ideal for graphics and media — which might come in handy for an everyday military operation, we think. (Wink, wink.)…

Grazed from Healthcare IT News.  Author: Geoff Webb.

While many industries are reliant on information technology to deliver services and drive innovation, none is so deeply entwined in IT than healthcare.  Whether it’s federal government mandates to move towards fully electronic information processing, or the explosive growth of consumerized tools like tablets and smartphones, the healthcare industry both shapes, and is shaped by, the technology it uses.

As such, it should be no surprise that the potential impact of cloud computing is being felt, with mixed feelings, most acutely in this industry.

Cloud, as a platform, has been sometimes dismissed as nothing more than a new name for old technology.  That’s understandable – cloud doesn’t rely on anything especially new nor are the business models especially novel.  After all, companies have been delivering software services over the internet for some years.  However, simply examining the constituent parts of cloud misses the fact that cloud represents so much more than a lot of virtual servers accessed through a browser.  Cloud is as much the effect as it is the cause; it is both the technology and the way that the technology is being used.  Cloud may be made up familiar building blocks, but the end result is something radically new…

Grazed from InforWorld.  Author: David Linthicum.

It looks like OpenStack won’t be the only open source cloud computing player. Earlier this week, Citrix Systems released its CloudStack software to the Apache Software Foundation as an alternative to OpenStack. Formerly a member of the project, Citrix cited difficulties in making OpenStack work with its technology as a major driver behind the defection.

CloudStack will launch with about 30 technology partners, many of them already involved with OpenStack. CloudStack claims an Amazon Web Services-compatible native API set. OpenStack has an AWS API compatibility feature as well.

For those expecting an apples-versus-apples fight, you’re way off. CloudStack is a software product with an install base that’s been moved to open source for marketing purposes. This game has been played many times before, with everything from CRM software to ESBs. Indeed, you’ll find open source versions of most major software patterns…

Grazed from InfoWorld.  Author: Mikael Ricknäs.

Ubuntu developer Canonical is working on a new provisioning platform called Metal as a Service (MaaS), which will be used to activate new servers, on top of which a cloud can be deployed, founder Mark Shuttleworth said in a blog post on Wednesday.

The way computing systems are built is changing. Instead of big boxes, the future belongs to clusters consisting of "hyper-dense racks with wimpy nodes," according to Shuttleworth. More power is added by adding more nodes to clusters, rather than buying beefier nodes, and reliability is improved by doubling up, so services keep running when individual nodes fail, he wrote.

However, the benefits of these systems will only be realized if the management can be done efficiently and that’s where MaaS comes in, according to Shuttleworth…

Grazed from Federal Computer Week.  Author: Camille Tuutti.

How’s this for a cautionary tale?

A lawyer who represented a medical facility found out during cross-examination that his client had moved its important information into a cloud environment. So far, it sounds like a typical cloud migration.

But it was only later that the client learned the cloud provider was deleting all data every 60 days. Lacking the evidence that would have been in those records, the client had no choice but to settle the case…

Grazed from IT Business Edge.  Author: Robert McGarvey.

Ask network administrators and CIOs perhaps four years into what was supposed to be a cloud computing revolution that was going to shattered traditional file storage mindsets and the cruel reality is that the majority would plunk down their wagers on unicorns.

Cloud, so far, just has not lived up to expectations — it’s slow, it has troubles housing huge enterprise critical data, and it is perceived as insecure. A key reason is that many historic clouds achieved their cost savings by using "older technology," said Jared Wray, CTO at cloud provider Tier 3. And "they have not excelled at network performance," he added, mainly for technical reasons…