We recently wrote about TechAmerica and their activities related to Big Data in the Public Sector. A Big Data Task Force in TechAmerica’s public sector group has kicked off a collaborative activity in a Big Data Task Force.
There has been a new development in domain. The foundation arm of TechAmerica, which is the group focused on studies and assessments and educational outreach, has established a Big Data Commission. This group is closely aligned with the current public sector task force, and will result in more strategic inputs to the federal community. In my opinion this is a very positive development.

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We recently wrote about TechAmerica and their activities related to Big Data in the Public Sector. A Big Data Task Force in TechAmerica’s public sector group has kicked off a collaborative activity in a Big Data Task Force.
There has been a new development in domain. The foundation arm of TechAmerica, which is the group focused on studies and assessments and educational outreach, has established a Big Data Commission. This group is closely aligned with the current public sector task force, and will result in more strategic inputs to the federal community. In my opinion this is a very positive development.

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I am the track chair of the CloudExpo Bootcamp this year at Jacob Javits Center in NYC from June 11-14. You can check the agenda here.

As an invitee of the track chair, you can register for free (with the bootcamp option) at www.cloudcomputingexpo.com with «robustcloud» as the promotion code.

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Once you get all that cool cloud stuff into your enterprise, you have to manage it. This is no doubt the thinking behind EMC’s acquisition of Watch4Net, a 12-year-old Montreal-based company that provides “enterprise and carrier-class” performance management software.
EMC made a spate of announcements at its own show last week (some which I reported here). The Watch4net buy continues that push, even if it seems to be a relatively small acquisition (cash-based and said by EMC not to have material impact on its fiscal year earnings).
Two big bullet points accent this buy: a need for availability management, to determine if components are functioning; and performance management, “to track any system or component degradation, plot trending, and (to) intervene as needed,” according to EMC.
The company says Watch4Net will complement its existing IT Operations Intelligence Suite. The company also notes that Watch4Net has worked closely with EMC over the past seven years, and is “already tightly integrated” with the suite.
Jay Mastaj, Senior Vice President and General Manager, spoke for EMC about the acquisition, noting that “regardless of where customers are along their journey to cloud computing, insight into every aspect of IT performance and the ability to manage it without growing staff and with increasing granularity, are no longer optional.”

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According to Dividend.com, “Oracle Corporation on Thursday caught some continued bullish support from analysts at Nomura Securities. The firm backed its “Buy” rating on ORCL as well as its $32 price target, which suggests a 22% upside to the stock’s Wednesday closing price of $26.17.”
Oracle is a Platinum Plus Sponsor of Cloud Expo 2012 New York, June 11–14, at the Javits Center in New York City, and will be showcasing Oracle’s Cloud Management solutions on the Expo Floor. Oracle will also be presenting a Lunchtime Keynote, a General Session, and several breakout sessions.

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As a Silver Sponsor of Cloud Expo New York, GoGrid is offering special passes to SYS-CON’s 10th International Cloud Expo, which will take place on June 11–14, 2012, at the Javits Center in New York City, New York.
GoGrid is the #1 pure-play Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) provider specializing in Public Cloud and Private Cloud Infrastructure solutions. Currently powering thousands of customers globally, GoGrid makes complex infrastructure easy by enabling businesses to revolutionize their IT environments with the Cloud. In just minutes, GoGrid customers can deploy and begin managing applications and workloads on our proven, secure and reliable public cloud platform. With GoGrid’s Public Cloud and Hosted Private Cloud offerings, sysadmins, developers, and IT professionals create, deploy, and control cloud environments and complex virtual and physical server networks with full administrative control; with GoGrid’s Hosted Private Cloud customers utilize a private, hosted and managed, single-tenant environment with zero capital expenditure.

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SYS-CON Events announced today that Panzura, a leading provider of global cloud storage solutions, will exhibit at SYS-CON’s 10th International Cloud Expo, which will take place on June 11–14, 2012, at the Javits Center in New York City, New York.
Panzura optimizes enterprise data storage management and distribution in the cloud, making cloud storage simple and secure. Panzura’s revolutionary global cloud storage solution seamlessly combines the flexibility, performance and productivity benefits of distributed storage with the manageability, security and cost benefits of centralized storage, overcoming fundamental “administrator vs. user” and “budget vs. performance” conflicts. With Panzura, data location no longer affects usage.

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You’re ready to transition some or all of your IT workloads over to the cloud. Don’t compromise! Architect a solution that can be deployed in minutes while having the ability to scale, in real-time, based on demand. How? Through hosted private clouds, which offer users the ability to easily take advantage of on-demand, easily scalable infrastructure with control and consumptive billing through dedicated resources.
In their session at the 10th International Cloud Expo, Duke Skarda, CTO of SoftLayer, and Marc Jones, VP of Product Innovation for SoftLayer, will discuss the opportunities and benefits of hosted private clouds.

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How can organizations use enterprise/private cloud capabilities and Big Data analytics to improve information-sharing?
In his session at the 10th International Cloud Expo, Ira A. (Gus) Hunt, Chief Technology Officer for the Chief Information Officer in the CIA, will discuss how the Intelligence Community has been using enterprise/private cloud capabilities and Big Data analytics to improve information-sharing across the entire community.
Ira A. (Gus) Hunt currently serves as the Chief Technology Officer for the Chief Information Officer in CIA. In this capacity he is responsible for setting the strategic technology direction to enable CIA’s missions, actively engage across the IC to share and communicate IT solutions, and drive solutions for the rapid insertion and adoption of new capabilities to keep pace with technology change in the commercial sector

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The longer you put off providing features and services offered in the cloud, the worse off you’ll be, according to an article in Network Computing.
The post by Define the Cloud’s Joe Onisick offers a stark take on falling behind cloud adoption:
«Every day that goes by that IT isn’t meeting the features and services offered in the cloud, users are moving there on their own. No office collaboration environment? They’re on Google Docs. No file-sharing option? They’re using Dropbox. No solid backup or recovery options for their laptops? Carbonite is handling it. Now your data is outside your corporate walls, outside your control and outside of compliance.»
Every day that users turn to an unsanctioned IT service, it becomes harder to get them back. You can’t close Pandora’s box once it’s opened, Onisick said. His advice on getting a handle on the situation: Don’t stall on new services and the benefits of the cloud. Build the services in-house, and standardize on public cloud offerings.

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