What is cloud computing?

o Every business bigger than one person needs somewhere to store its data and run its business applications and communications, including email. A o generation of businesses has installed a serveror many servers in a o data centreand hired specialist IT staff to run it.

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With cloud computing, you instead rent capacity in a providers data o centre, and connect over the internet. The providers staff installs, o maintain and upgrade hardware and software as required. Typically youll rent a service, such as data storage or email or accounting, rather than a server as such, and pay $X per user or $Y per business per month. Why is it called cloud computing? Network diagrams have traditionally used a cloud symbol to denote the internet or, before that, the telephone network outside the customers zone of responsibility. What services are on offer?

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o o You name it. Googles Gmail and Microsofts Windows Hotmail are o o email in the cloud. In the lucrative business productivity market, Google o

Companies Crikey Clarifier Online Science & Tech cloud computing

Docs and Google Apps compete directly with Microsoft Office and Exchangethe latter now in the cloud as Microsoft Online Services. Accounting, customer relationship management (CRM), project management, email marketing, spam and virus filtering, data storage, ecommerce, online publishing, audio and video streaming, general databasesall available in the cloud. Why use cloud computing? Potentially cloud services are cheaper and more flexible. Because theyre internet-based, you can access them from anywhereoften including mobile devices. Most servers and internet links lie idle most of the time. Cloud providers host many businesses on a pool of hardware, sharing the cost of servers, electricity, data links, backup systems, IT staff and even real estate. A cloud provider can quickly add extra capacity or scale it back again when you need it. Capital expenditure on servers and up-front software licenses, and the unpredictable costs of dealing with emergencies, are replaced by a predictable operational cost. Can it really cut IT costs by 80%? Thats hype. Hardware and internet costs are dropping, sure, but

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supporting end users is still a significant cost. Moving to the cloud removes the cost of maintaining your own systems, but you still need to configure the generic cloud-based service to match your business unique needs, train your staff and help them find lost spreadsheets. Is there a downside? You become dependent on your cloud providers. If theres no easy way to extract your data in a usable format, your business success is now intertwined with theirs. There may also be legal and privacy issues: will your data become subject to the privacy and data retention laws of another country; will you still be compliant with your industry requirements in Australia? Is it secure? Big cloud providers like Microsoft and Google have some of the best security staff on the planet. Their backup procedures are likely to be better than yours too. (Where are your business data backups right now?) However big cloud providers do represent an attractive target to hackersif they can break in. Is cloud computing radically new? Not everyone thinks its that big a change. Its more evolution than revolution. Cloud computing is not only the future of computing, it is the present, and the entire past of computing is all cloud, saidLarry Ellison, founder of Oracle Corporation and the worlds sixth richest man, in a passionately entertaining rant last year. Its not water vapour. All it is is a computer attached to a network. What are you talking about? I mean, what do you think Google runs on? As Ellison points out, CRM provider Salesforce.com has been running more than a decade. In many ways cloud computing is indeed just the current buzzword for what has also been called utility computing, grid computing, software as a service (SaaS), IBMs On Demand branded services, the application service provider (ASP) model, or even good ol mainframe timesharing. Where is Australia in all this? Some big companies have committed to cloud computing, including the Commonwealth Bank, Westpac, Visy and Komatsu. The Royal Australian College of General Practice will provide GPs with cloudbased e-health applications by this time next year. Even the Department of Defences CIO is advocating the cloud. On the supply side, Telstra is investing heavily to become a player theyre providing the RACGPs services. Saasu and Campaign Monitor are Australian success stories in cloud-based accounting and email marketing respectively.

Cloud computing does require solid internet links, however. Australias relatively expensive broadband infrastructure may have held back adoption. The NBN will presumably fix this.

4 Comments
1.

PAUL_MACCA
Posted Tuesday, 13 July 2010 at 1:49 pm | Permalink

Our company struggled with ISP email and then our own exchange server for many years. After reading about the Microsoft cloud solution last year they put us on to some guys called HubOne. The moved all out email and office communication to the cloud. We can finally get back to running our actual business.

2.

GGM
Posted Tuesday, 13 July 2010 at 2:03 pm | Permalink

I costed 16TB of storage+processing on, and offshore. The price differential is enormous. cloud bought from US or Europe is 10-20x cheaper than in Australia which suggests its a very VERY immature market here. Why cost it onshore? Think about getting 16Tb of data up into the cloud

3.

OOVERGRO
Posted Tuesday, 13 July 2010 at 8:05 pm | Permalink

Who makes the internet work, and why are they so nice to me?

4.

GGM
Posted Wednesday, 14 July 2010 at 4:54 pm | Permalink

we all make the internet work, and its called the n-squared law: the sum of the parts together is worth more than the sum of the parts, considered on their own. mind you, lotsa people say thats bunkum. basically, theyre nice to you because it pays to remember the golden rule.

Cloud Expo: Article

What is Cloud Computing?

The cloud is a virtualization of resources that maintains and manages itself
Give it 5/5

IVE IT 1/5

IVE IT 2/5 BY KEVIN HARTIG ARTICLE RATING: IVE IT 3/5

IVE IT 4/5

IVE IT 5/5

DECEMBER 13, 2009 12:30 PM EST

READS:

154,737

Early Bird Special at Cloud Expo June 2, 2008 - Cloud computing is becoming one of the next industry buzz words. It joins the ranks of terms including: grid computing, utility computing, virtualization, clustering, etc. Cloud computing overlaps some of the concepts of distributed, grid and utility computing, however it does have its own meaning if contextually used correctly. The conceptual overlap is partly due to technology changes, usages and implementations over the years. Trends in usage of the terms from Google searches shows Cloud Computing is a relatively new term introduced in the past year. There has also been a decline in general interest of Grid, Utility and Distributed computing. Likely they will be around in usage for quit a while to come. But Cloud computing has become the new buzz word driven largely by marketing and service offerings from big corporate players like Google, IBM and Amazon.
* distributed computing * grid computing * utility computing * cloud computing

The term cloud computing probably comes from (at least partly) the use of a cloud image to represent the Internet or some large networked environment. We dont care much whats in the cloud or what goes on there except that we depend on reliably sending data to and receiving data from it. Cloud computing is now associated with a higher level abstraction of the cloud. Instead of there being data pipes, routers and servers, there are now services. The underlying hardware and software of networking is of course still there but there are now higher level service capabilities available used to build applications. Behind the services are data and compute resources. A user of the service doesnt necessarily care about how it is implemented, what technologies are used or how its managed. Only that there is access to it and has a level of reliability necessary to meet the application requirements.

Launched in 2007, Cloud Expo is the world's largest Cloud Computing event. In essence this is distributed computing. An application is built using the resource from multiple services potentially from multiple locations. At this point, typically you still need to know the endpoint to access the services rather than having the cloud provide you available resources. This is also know as Software as a Service. Behind the service interface is usually a grid of computers to provide the resources. The grid is typically hosted by one company and consists of a homogeneous environment of hardware and software making it easier to support and maintain. (note: my definition of a grid is different from the wikipedia definition, but homogeneous environments in data centers is typically what I have run across). Once you start paying for the services and the resources utilized, well thats utility computing. Cloud computing really is accessing resources and services needed to perform functions with dynamically changing needs. An application or service developer requests access from the cloud

rather than a specific endpoint or named resource. What goes on in the cloud manages multiple infrastructures across multiple organizations and consists of one or more frameworks overlaid on top of the infrastructures tying them together. Frameworks provide mechanisms for: self-healing self monitoring resource registration and discovery service level agreement definitions automatic reconfiguration

CIO, CTO & Developer Resources

The cloud is a virtualization of resources that maintains and manages itself. There are of course people resources to keep hardware, operation systems and networking in proper order. But from the perspective of a user or application developer only the cloud is referenced. The Assimilator project is a framework that executes across a heterogeneous environment in a local area network providing a local cloud environment. In the works is the addition of a network overlay to start providing an infrastructure across the Internet to help achieve the goal of true cloud computing. Published December 13, 2009 Reads 154,737 Copyright 2009 SYS-CON Media, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Syndicated stories and blog feeds, all rights reserved by the author.

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More Stories By Kevin Hartig

Kevin Hartig currently directs and constructs projects using new software technologies and methodologies to demonstrate the feasibility of new concepts in real business applications at Sun Microsystems, Inc. He is owner and administrator of the open source Assimilator project - a platform for running distributed services in LANs and WANs.

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kirsty@wearecloud.com 07/28/10 09:59:00 AM EDT We found a great visual about cloud computing. Simple and informative, and easier on the eye than a long blog post:http://bit.ly/cZLjN3 jonrgs 12/23/09 05:50:00 PM EST Great thoughts guys !! here is my take. RBruklis 06/30/09 08:08:00 AM EDT Here is my definition... A new way to deploy or virtualize IT using the internet as a method to quickly borrow/use resources (compute, storage, infrastructure, applications) and keep those resources for any given amount of time a 'rent' vs. buy' model

Architect0001@Nubifer.com 11/21/08 02:38:40 AM EST Cloud Computing is a broad term. Simply searching "Cloud Computing" on Google will give you a listing of the Wikipedia page that has a great video at the bottom of the external links section. Personally, I reviewed the entire Wikipedia document and found many things that are familiar to me and our ASP businesses from past and present technology configurations. One very note-able difference however, is the concepts of mass consumption of data (text and binary), scalability, new abstraction layers, strong APIs and SOA Web Service offerings, and a proliferation of heavy attention being focused to solve new issues for Cross Domain Security imposed by the web browsers sandboxes. Single Sign On with SAML is now the standard for Cross Platform, and Cross Framework and SaaS offerings are the key to making the link work. A myriad of new computing and Identity Management scenarios are being born and enhanced every day in turn Glue-ing these powerful Cloud Based technologies, disparate networks, and application data stores into one or more unified Modals for business. Enterprise mashups and Meta data companies like Nubifer.com which is primarily a Data Rich company offering real time feed analytics of all of your inter and extra connected web applications. Regards, Architect0001@Nubifer.com www.Nubifer.com Neil Murphy 07/08/08 05:43:20 AM EDT Isn't this just a variation on the old bureau services of many years ago? Some different approaches etc but the same principle. Sam 06/05/08 05:50:01 AM EDT Hi, I surf with www.treehoo.com that uses most of its profit to plant trees and fight global warming and climate change. The service is free and on the site you can do Google searches plus more. Everyone should use it as their default homepage, I do!

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Despite its possible security and privacy risks, Cloud Computing - according to a magazine article due to be published later this Fall - has six main benefits that the public sector and government IT organizations are certain to want to take advantage of. In very brief summary form they are as follows:

CIO, CTO & Developer Resources

Reduced Cost Cloud technology is paid incrementally, saving organizations money. Increased Storage Organizations can store more data than on private computer systems. Highly Automated No longer do IT personnel need to worry about keeping software up to date. Flexibility Cloud computing offers much more flexibility than past computing methods.

More Mobility Employees can access information wherever they are, rather than having to remain at their desks. Allows IT to Shift Focus No longer having to worry about constant server updates and other computing issues, government organizations will be free to concentrate on innovation.

The final article will appear in a magazine called Public CIO.

A recent survey carried out by PEER 1 Network Enterprises found that of the 88% of key decisionmakers that do not use cloud computing, 39% said it was because they don't know enough about it. So, for those who are still in the dark, what is cloud computing anyway? Cloud computing enables users to store files and software remotely, rather than on a hard drive or server at their office. The fact is many people may already be using cloud computing without realizing it, whether through work or personal use. Examples include web-based email like Gmail and Hotmail, communication tools like Skype, video sites like YouTube and Vimeo and music-sharing sites such as SoundCloud. Some examples of cloud computing applications include software as a service (SaaS), Customer Relationship Management, file storage, file synchronization and file back-up. It's now possible for businesses to have their own private cloud, which incorporates specific services and is only accessible to specific people.

The Benefits of Cloud Computing There are lots of advantages to using cloud computing for international companies. One of the major ones is the flexibility that it offers. Cloud computing means that staff can access the files and data that they need even when they're working remotely and/or outside office hours. As long as they can get on the Internet, staff can access information from home, on the road, from clients' offices or even from a smartphone such as a BlackBerry or iPhone. Staff can also work collaboratively on files and documents, even when they're not physically together. Documents can simultaneously be viewed and edited from multiple locations.

Cloud computing can be very quick and easy to get up and running. Consider, for example, how quickly you can set up a Gmail or Hotmail account and start emailing - it takes minutes and all you need is a computer and the Internet. Downloading and installing software, on the other hand, takes much longer. Cloud computing is often cheaper and less labor-intensive for companies too. There is no need to buy and install expensive software because it's already installed online remotely and you run it from there, not to mention the fact that many cloud computing applications are offered free of charge. The need to pay for extensive disk space is also removed. With cloud computing, you subscribe to the software, rather than buying it outright. This means that you only need to pay for it when you need it, and it also offers flexibility, in that it can be quickly and easily scaled up and down according to demand. This can be particularly advantageous when there are temporary peaks in demand, such as at Christmas or in summer, for example. A major advantage of using cloud computing for many companies is that because it's online, it offers virtually unlimited storage compared to server and hard drive limits. Needing more storage space does not cause issues with server upgrades and equipment - usually all you need to do is increase your monthly fee slightly for more data storage.

CIO, CTO & Developer Resources

In addition, there is no need to take on specialist IT staff, and businesses don't have to worry about maintaining and upgrading software or fixing bugs, as all maintenance is done by the providers. This frees-up in-house IT teams to focus on technical issues specific to the business. Remote maintenance means it's easy for businesses to always have the latest and most powerful version of any particular software. Automatic software updates can be especially useful for legal or financial compliance reasons. For example, consider accounting and bookkeeping software - when tax rates change the system will be automatically and centrally updated. Many international businesses also choose cloud computing because of its green credentials. Microsoft recently claimed that cloud computing can reduce a business's carbon emissions by as much as 30%, as businesses don't need to power an entire server, they only use (and pay for) what they need online. The Pros and Cons There are some potential drawbacks to cloud computing, though, that are worth bearing in mind. One of the reasons many businesses choose cloud computing is because online storage and back-up means their data can't be lost or destroyed, but the flip side is that many are concerned about the security issues associated with storing their data on the web. While some experts argue that cloud computing is more secure than traditional server methods, businesses are still concerned that outsiders (or insiders) could bypass security systems and access confidential data. A survey from IDC found that security was the main worry that businesses have about cloud computing, followed by availability and performance. However, it's worth weighing up the risks and remembering that traditional servers can also be hacked into, hard drives can fail and computers can be lost or stolen. Privacy is another issue which businesses cite as a concern when it comes to cloud computing. Some wonder how much data and what kind of data companies are able to collect about them and their business. Another concern for some companies when it comes to cloud computing is the risk of losing Internet connectivity. The risks associated with this are usually isolated and short-lived, but many companies' workflows are massively disrupted by any Internet downtime. Businesses that implement cloud computing need to take steps to reduce the risk of any Internet interruption or reduced speeds.

However, these risks are comparable with servers or computers being out of action for a period of time, which is just as likely, or perhaps more likely to happen, than the Internet failing. While there are a number of issues for companies to bear in mind, and cloud computing may not be ideal for every business, it can be an extremely cost-effective and beneficial way for large and small international companies to store data and access software - so it's well worth considering and researching in more depth. Because of the scalability of cloud computing, it's easy for firms to start small and try certain applications out to see how it works for them and their business before gradually expanding their use. Published April 14, 2011 Reads 10,003 Copyright 2011 SYS-CON Media, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Syndicated stories and blog feeds, all rights reserved by the author.

More Stories By Christian Arno

Christian Arno is the founder of professional translation agency Lingo24. Launched in 2001, Lingo24 now

Comments (0)
Share your thoughts on this story. Add your comment You must be signed in to add a comment. Sign-in | Register In accordance with our Comment Policy, we encourage comments that are on topic, relevant and to-thepoint. We will remove comments that include profanity, personal attacks, racial slurs, threats of violence, or other inappropriate material that violates our Terms and Conditions, and will block users who make repeated violations. We ask all readers to expect diversity of opinion and to treat one another with dignity and respect.

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By Jeremy Geelan

What better time than now, with just six weeks to go before Cloud Expo Silicon Valley (9th Cloud Expo), to bring you a series in which we introduce you in greater detail to our incredible Speaker Faculty for the technical program at the conference? We have technical and strategy sessions for you dealing with every nook and cranny of Cloud Computing, but what of those who are presenting? Who are they, where do they work, what else have they written and/or said about the Cloud that is transforming... Sep. 30, 2011 05:15 AM EDT Reads: 728
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Three Major Advantages of Cloud Computing Explained in Simple Terms

by J ULIAN MAHO NEY on MAY 11, 2011

Cloud computing is the new buzz-word for todays technophiles. As a matter of fact, multi-national corporations like Oracle and Microsoft and

educational institutions like the Yale and the University of Melbourne have allocated a significant amount of resources towards the development of this new technology. However, all the excitement for this next big thing often leaves the average person asking, Why all the fuss? A large number of articles have already discussed what cloud computing is all about. However, most of existent cloudrelated literature are chock full of jargon and extremely technical language. Thus, in this article, let me explain to you in simple, easy-to-understand terms the three major advantages of this up-and-coming (and very promising) technology. The Status Quo: Todays typical IT network can best be described as a group of computers, each with their own complete sets of software and hardware, each capable of functioning on their own. Moreover, this description holds true for both large companies (a corporate intranet) and individual consumers (the typical home-based network). Unfortunately, this type of setup poses one critical challenge: an inefficient allocation of computing resources. Lets cite a concrete example. Suppose a person needs to use a program that requires a lot of computing power. The best that he can do is to use the most powerful computer in the network, but given the breakneck pace of todays technology, even the most powerful computer may not be enough. Moreover (and obviously), he cannot feasibly combine the computing power of two desktops to run the same program.

Cloud computing solves this problem, and more. [1] Improved resource allocation and performance With cloud computing, however, all computational resources are centralized, so that any end-user can get as much computing power as he needs. This is possible because the personal computer as we know it will be reduced to a device

that sends, receives, and displays data, while the central cloud of powerful computers does all the processing. [2] Reduced hardware costs Cloud computing allows personal computers to perform better even with relatively simple components with minimal processing power. Thus, each computer terminal will come at a drastically reduced cost. Moreover, end-users will seldom need to upgrade computers at all because all the upgrading is done in the cloud. [3] Faster Updates and Maintenance A common problem for many people is the time it takes to perform maintenance or roll out upgrades on a large number of computers in a large number of sites. However, with this new technology, all the information will be saved in a central location. Thus, computer engineers and other IT staff can save a lot of time because they only have to upgrade a small number of units, and everything else in the network follows suit. Cloud computing is a very promising breakthrough in the world of computing. It can dramatically streamline processes that were otherwise too tedious, if not impossible, to do. Whats more, with the potentially lower acquisition and maintenance costs, information technology will become accessible for a larger section of the population.

Often resource constrained, IT departments in companies and government organizations are immersed in workday responsibilities needed to support the business. Cloud computing can help take pressure off IT staff while also helping deliver measurable business benefits. For instance, with cloud computing, organizations can leverage the benefits of a shared IT infrastructure without having to implement and administer it directly. While it took virtualization many years to be widely accepted by businesses, cloud computing is experiencing a much shorter ramp-up period for acceptance. With cloud computing, the battle has already been won, in part, since organizations rely heavily on virtualization. The business benefits are also much clearer than they were initially with virtualization. At the end of the day, cloud computing can help businesses save money on day-to-day operations, making it an easy adoption decision for most organizations. Cloud Advantages Simplified Cost and Consumption Model. Prioritizing activities that align with core business needs and drive tangible business value and top-line revenue are top IT concerns. This focus has driven IT organizations to

reassess the costs of procurement and maintenance of infrastructure and non-core applications. Cloud computing allows companies to better control the capex and opex associated with non-core activities. Enterprise Grade Services and Management. Typically, 70 to 80 percent of IT budgets are devoted to maintenance of existing infrastructure a massive overhead. Cloud computing offloads this burden from the shoulders of companies, freeing core IT resources to focus on initiatives that drive revenue growth. Faster Provisioning of Systems and Applications. Traditional methods to buy and configure hardware and software are time consuming. Cloud computing provides a rapid deployment model that enables applications to grow quickly to match increasing usage requirements. It can accommodate peak times where a company needs to scale up dramatically, such as a holiday season or special event. Right-Size to Address Business Changes. Clouds are elastic. They can contract if necessary to meet changing business needs. With an in-house datacenter, if a company over-provisions, it cant scale back. In a cloud, an organization can quickly and easily right-size its environment if necessary. Ease of Integration. An increasing number of enterprise applications require integration with third-party applications that are often hosted outside the enterprise firewall. The cloud with its configuration flexibility, integrated security, and choice of access mechanisms has a natural advantage to serving as a core platform and integration fabric for these emerging applications. Highly Secure Infrastructure. By taking a system-based not point-based approach, cloud environments can perform security at all levels (applications, middleware, operating system, compute/store/network). This will safely support highly mobile users that need a variety of connection options coming into the cloud from secure and non-secure networks. Compliant Facilities and Processes. Many midsize companies dont have the resources needed to manage audit and certification processes for internal datacenters. Compliance standards cut horizontally like SarbanesOxley and vertically, such as PCI DSS and HIPAA. Cloud facilities and processes that address both areas can help companies address regulatory and compliance processes. Flexible and Resilient with Business Continuity/Disaster Recovery. Managing business continuity and recovery internally requires a dedicated focus so companies typically concentrate only on the most critical applications. Utilizing cloud environments allows organizations to safeguard their full IT infrastructure because the clouds inherent scalability integrates disaster recovery capabilities. This guest post was written by Satish Hemachandran, Director of Product Management atSunGard Availability Services Related posts: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Whats the Difference Between Grid and Cloud Computing Whats the Difference Between Grid and Cloud Computing 5 Advantages Of A Cloud Utility Architecture For Younger, Fast-Growing Companies 10 Expert Predictions For Business Computing and Enterprise IT Trends in 2011 5 Most Explosive IT Trends That Will Forever Change Business Computing in 2011