Category: News

Responding to the needs of its customers and the overwhelming interest in Logstash – the leading open-source alternative to Splunk, Stratalux has released a hosted version of Logstash to the public.

Centralized logging solutions like Stratalux’s Hosted Logstash help companies solve operational problems faster by collecting, tracking and analyzing logs from applications, systems and AWS without the cost and time required to manage similar solutions like Splunk or running Logstash internally.

Stratalux’s Hosted Logstash is a fully-managed, open-source IT log management solution for companies who need the ability to customize a solution, but don’t want the IT overhead or enterprise software price. Stratalux Hosted Logstash provides the scalability and availability of managed AWS and includes 24/7 support to ensure the service is always running. In addition, customers get the added assurance of a team of Logstash open-source log management experts that can address any required customization. And unlike other solutions, Stratalux’s Hosted Logstash no lock-in promise means that clients have the power and flexibility to migrate and assume management responsibility anytime they like.

Grazed from TheStreet. Author: Eric Johnson.

Government agencies that supervise China’s digital economy want Chinese companies to control more of the domestic and world cloud computing markets. Beijing policymakers are encouraging state-run companies such as China Mobile (CHL_) and Hong Kong-listed ZTE to expand their existing cloud services. And they’re accepting applications for government funding from any domestic company with a major cloud project that meets certain criteria.

The government hasn’t said how much it plans to spend on the project, which was rolled out late last month jointly by the National Development and Reform Commission, Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and Ministry of Finance. NDRC said the government now ranks cloud computing as a nationally strategic industry. Companies in other strategic sectors, such as military hardware manufacturers, are eligible for market protection…

Grazed from Investors. Author: Patrick Seitz.

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella has earned high marks for his first four months at the helm of the software giant. His performance garnered the company’s stock an upgrade Thursday from research firm FBR Capital Markets. FBR analyst Daniel Ives raised his rating on Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) stock to outperform from market perform and hiked his price target to 49 from 43. Microsoft stock was up 1.5% near 41 in afternoon trading on the stock market today.

"We have a high degree of confidence in Satya Nadella’s plan for Microsoft’s future," Ives wrote. "With Nadella at the helm, Microsoft is off to a golden start with his improved transparency and strategic focus on the mobile/cloud space," Ives wrote. Based on the company’s March quarter results and FBR checks with customers, Microsoft is experiencing accelerated traction in cloud computing with its core cloud Office product (Office 365) showing good subscriber momentum, he said…

Grazed from SysConMedia. Author: Ignacio LLorente.

OpenNebula features unique functionality for virtualization of the datacenter. Among them, it is worth highlighting its support to build cloud bursting architectures where private cloud resources can be easily supplemented with resources from a remote public cloud to meet fluctuating demands. The reason behind this uniqueness is the transparency to use and maintain the cloud bursting functionality for both end users and cloud administrators.

The latest version of OpenNebula, Carina, offers a simple but comprehensive framework that enables resource allocation to different groups of users in federated data centers and hybrid cloud deployments. OpenNebula offers a single management point for both local private and remote public cloud resources, with an end user self-service portal (Cloud View) that enables the consumption of hybrid virtual machine templates…

Grazed from ScientificComputing. Author: Rob Farber.

A complicated decision: To purchase infrastructure or run remotely in the cloud? Bandwidth and data security issues provide the easiest gating factors to evaluate, because an inability to access data kills any chance of using remote infrastructure, be it the public cloud or at a remote HPC center. If running remotely is an option, then the challenge lies in determining the return on investment (ROI) for the remote and local options including:

1. using a hybrid local and remote solution
2. running entirely in a remote cloud
3. pursuing a traditional infrastructure procurement…

Grazed from ITProPortal. Author: Jeramiah Dooley.

It’s hard to imagine a conversation that happens between C-Level enterprise executives without ‘the cloud’ coming up. While cloud computing is obviously nothing new, breaking through the noise and determining the best strategy is still a very real and difficult issue for CIOs. Everyone seems to be sharing a different opinion on the changing landscape of the cloud.

At the centre of the cloud debate we often have legacy hardware vendors trying to push their own agendas. They’re doing everything they can to protect their market share by delaying the innovation of their customers. We know they’re doing this because there are certain things surrounding cloud that are not being discussed…

Grazed from InformationWeek. Author: Charles Babcock.

Federal agencies looking to buy cloud services, just like the private sector, need to develop a common method for evaluating cloud providers, the services they offer, and the prices they charge. That’s the advice from TechAmerica Foundation, a nonprofit formed to advise government on cloud computing in its newly updated guide on how government agencies can adopt the cloud.

TechAmerica Foundation’s cloud computing initiative was formed three years ago to convey best practices in adopting the cloud to the federal and state governments. The new guide makes such common sense recommendations as mapping agency priorities, then finding a business case that fits them. The business case must define requirements, set performance objectives, and estimate costs, it said…

Grazed from SmallBusinessComputing. Author: Pam Barker.

It’s hard to imagine a small business owner today who hasn’t heard how moving business processes to the cloud saves money and lets you access data from anywhere. And that you’d be a fool not to jump on board the cloud computing bandwagon. To hear cloud services vendors tell it, moving everything to the cloud is a no-brainer, and it’s so easy-peasey that you’re crazy to keep buying, installing and maintaining your own software and servers. You might have even heard that cloud integration—getting all of your various cloud services to play well together—is also a simple thing.

Conversations with some cloud vendors can sometimes sound like this: save money, they said. An application programming interface (API) makes cloud integration a snap, they said. You can lay off your IT people because you won’t need them with the cloud, they said. Those things can be true but they aren’t always. That kind of buzz is only a half-truth…

Grazed from CloudComputingPath. Author: Pravin Anchan.

Apple’s iCloud Drive takes Dropbox head on. Launched at WWDC 2014, iCloud Drive resembles Dropbox with a similar file system to store files related to each app separately in the cloud. Such files can be synchronized with Windows, iOS and OSX even if you do not install any iCloud apps. Windows users can access iCloud Drive but Apple is yet to open up APIs for the Windows Phone and Android platform.

However, it is easy to access files using Mac but on other iOS devices you have to fiddle a bit. Apple has not yet created an iCloud Drive app for iOS. This means users must launch an iCloud Drive storage app to access files independently of related applications. iCloud Drive does come as a boon for Apple device users but it may not convert other cloud drive users that offer similar or even more reliable services despite competitively priced offerings of $ 0.99 per month for 20 GB and $ 3.09 per month for 200 GB…

Grazed from Business2Community. Author: Chris Patterson.

NaviSite works with many businesses getting started with cloud technology and one question we often hear is, “Where do I start? Which part of my infrastructure should I move into the cloud first?” IT leaders must pick a starting point for cloud adoption, and the decision becomes easier when they understand that leveraging cloud technology can take place incrementally, one task at a time. We call this approach “out-tasking,” which often begins by migrating small, low risk applications onto the cloud, where they can be easily tested, debugged and improved through an iterative approach.

The out-tasking framework helps IT leaders overcome the common misconception that moving onto the cloud means transferring their entire infrastructure in one fell swoop. In reality, we’ve found that businesses experience vastly better results when they don’t use cloud as a replacement, but instead begin to augment and modernize their existing compute environment…