Rapid deployment capability is table stakes when we are talking about a PaaS solution. Every vendor touts it, and to be frank, every user simply expects it to be there. While I think it is interesting to talk about rapid deployment and perhaps compare speed of one solution to that of another, I think it is infinitely more interesting to talk about the mechanics of deployment for a particular solution. That is, I think the more interesting and important question is ‘What deployment style does a particular solution take?’
At a very high, black and white level, I think two primary deployment styles permeate the landscape of PaaS today: contained and referential. I want to compare each approach, but before that, let me use a few words to describe each style.
Archivo mensual: mayo 2012
Going Rogue: Do the Advantages Outweigh the Risks?
Are all rogue IT projects bad things? Could this type of activity be beneficial? If rogue IT projects could be beneficial, should they be supported or even encouraged?
Recently, I took part in a live Twitter chat hosted by the Cloud Commons blog (thanks again for the invite!) that was focused on Rogue IT. After hearing from, and engaging with, some major thought leaders in the space, I decided to write a blog summarizing my thoughts on the topic.
What does “Rogue IT” mean anyway?
I think that there are rogue IT users and there are rogue IT projects. There’s the individual user scheduling meetings with an “unauthorized” iPad. There’s also a sales department, without the knowledge of corporate IT, developing an iPhone app to process orders for your yet-to-be-developed product. Let us focus on the latter – rogue IT projects. Without a doubt, rogue IT projects have been, and will continue to be, an issue for corporate IT departments. A quick web search will return articles on “rogue IT” dating back around 10 years. However, as technology decreases in cost and increases in functionality, the issue of rouge IT projects seems to be moving up on the list of concerns.
What does rogue IT have to do with cloud computing?
Cloud Computing opens up a market for IT Services. With Cloud Computing, organizations have the ability to source IT services to the provider that can deliver the service most efficiently. Sounds a lot like specialization and division of labor, doesn’t it? (We’ll stay away from The Wealth of Nations, for now.) Suffice to say that Rogue IT may be an indication that corporate IT departments need to compete with outside providers of IT services. Stated plainly, the rise of Cloud Computing is encouraging firms to enter the market for IT services. Customers, even inside a large organization, have choices (other than corporate IT) on how to acquire the IT services that they need. Maybe corporate IT is not able to deliver a new IT service in time for that new sales campaign. Or, corporate IT simply refuses to develop a new system requested by a customer. That customer, in control of their own budget, may turn to an alternative service offering “from the cloud.”
What are the advantages of rogue IT? Do they outweigh the risks?
Rogue IT is a trend that will continue as the very nature of work changes (e.g. long history of trends to a service-based economy means more and more knowledge workers). Rogue IT can lead to some benefits… BYOD or “bring your own device” for example. BYOD can drive down end-user support costs and improve efficiency. BYOD will someday also mean “bring your own DESK” and allow you to choose to work when and where it is most convienent for you to do so (as long as you’re impacting the bottom line, of course). Another major benefit is increased pace of innovation. As usual, major benefits are difficult to measure. Take the example of the Lockheed Martin “Skunkworks” that produced some breakthroughs in stealth military technology –would the organization have produced such things if they had been encumbered by corporate policies and standards?
Should CIOs embrace rogue IT or should it be resisted?
CIOs should embrace this as the new reality of IT becoming a partner with the business, not simply aligning to it. Further, CIOs can gain some visibility into what is going on with regard to “rogue IT” devices and systems. With some visibility, the corporate IT departments can develop meaningful offerings and meet the demands of their customers.
Corporate IT departments should also bring some education as to what is acceptable and what is not acceptable: iPad at work- ok, but protect it with a password. Using Google Docs to store your company’s financial records…there might be a better place for that.
Two approaches for corporate IT:
– “Embrace and extend:” Allow rogue IT, learn from the experiences of users, adopt the best systems/devices/technologies, and put them under development
- IT department gets to work with their customers and develop new technologies
– “Judge and Jury:” Have IT develop and enforce technology standards
- IT is more/less an administrative group, always the bad guy, uses justification by keeping the company and its information safe (rightly so)
CIOs should also consider when rogue IT is being used. Outside services, quick development, and sidestepping of corporate IT policies may be beneficial for projects in conceptual or development phases. You can find the transcript from the Cloud Commons twitter chat here: http://bit.ly/JNovHT
Rishidot Research Announces DeployCon 2012
Rishidot Research LLC, the next-gen analyst firm, on Thursday announced DeployCon 2012, the first conference focused exclusively on Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) for enterprise. According to market research firm IDC, the worldwide public PaaS market is expected to grow from $2.2 billion in 2010 to $9.1 billion by 2015.
As this service-driven model of cloud computing matures and enterprises accelerate adoption, the focus shifts towards PaaS. Even though PaaS has been comfortably embraced by individual developers and startups in large numbers for a few years, enterprises today are evolving their opinion and implementation of PaaS in their IT strategy. DeployCon 2012, the enterprise PaaS Summit, aims to bridge the gap.
Going Rogue: Do the Advantages Outweigh the Risks?
Are all rogue IT projects bad things? Could this type of activity be beneficial? If rogue IT projects could be beneficial, should they be supported or even encouraged?
Recently, I took part in a live Twitter chat hosted by the Cloud Commons blog (thanks again for the invite!) that was focused on Rogue IT. After hearing from, and engaging with, some major thought leaders in the space, I decided to write a blog summarizing my thoughts on the topic.
What does “Rogue IT” mean anyway?
I think that there are rogue IT users and there are rogue IT projects. There’s the individual user scheduling meetings with an “unauthorized” iPad. There’s also a sales department, without the knowledge of corporate IT, developing an iPhone app to process orders for your yet-to-be-developed product. Let us focus on the latter – rogue IT projects. Without a doubt, rogue IT projects have been …
GT Nexus Launches Cloud Tools
Cloud supply chain platform provider GT Nexus on Thursday announced the general market availability of Cloud Tools, a multi-enterprise trade network administration solution. Cloud Tools allows authorized participants to independently manage their interactions with other companies on the GT Nexus cloud platform.
For years, companies have struggled to support global supply chains with scalable information systems. The traditional approach of bilateral electronic data interchange (EDI) between ERP systems has fallen short of delivering a global supply chain monitoring system capable of giving companies the information they need to run their trade networks. GT Nexus provides a shared, multi-tenant, multi-enterprise platform as well as collaborative inter-enterprise applications on which thousands of companies operate using harmonized processes and standards. These applications are synchronized with customers’ ERP and other back-office systems.
Insight Recognized as an HP Cloud Center of Excellence
Insight Enterprises, Inc. (NASDAQ: NSIT), atechnology provider of hardware, software and service solutions, today announced its U.S. operating division has unveiled its HP Cloud Center of Excellence in its Bloomingdale, Ill., facility. Insight is a Premier HP Partner, and its HP Cloud Center of Excellence provides clients convenient access and an interactive learning environment with live demonstrations and briefings for HP Cloud Solutions.
The Insight HP Cloud Center of Excellence includes systems with complete and integrated solutions for building and managing services across private, public, and hybrid cloud environments. The center is fully equipped with HP software, servers, storage, and networking products allowing clients to see how HP cloud solutions seamlessly work together.
Who Is Using OpenStack?
Two years ago, Rackspace joined a global collaboration of developers and cloud computing technologists to create an open source cloud computing platform that can be used with both private and public cloud formats. Now the code for the program, OpenStack, is freely available and is being used by a number of corporations, service providers, researchers, data centers, and others.
Based on the growing numbers of companies turning to OpenStack, the original developers were obviously onto an idea proven popular. But why have companies turned to it?
“We chose OpenStack because we want to help enterprise IT deploy and manage applications on OpenStack clouds. Scalr builds enterprise open source Cloud Management software designed to allow IT administrators to set quotas, budget alerts, and access control to their users, and introduce automation and agility tooling,” said Sebastian Stadil, CEO of Scalr, a cloud management company. “We have customers building massive hybrid clouds that want to be able to extend into OpenStack data centers.”
Smarter Computing and IT Consolidation with IBM’s Enterprise Linux Server
Data centers today are stretched to the limits with fast-paced business demands. On top of that, integrating and managing IT infrastructures can pose major challenges. Organizations need a new solution that consolidates servers and workloads without breaking the bank—and Linux, together with IBM Enterprise Linux Server offers exactly that.
In this informative webcast you’ll gain Jean’s perspective on how you can overcome your IT challenges by optimizing workloads and lowering costs with an enterprise-wide Linux strategy, and gain “the flexibility of many and the efficiency of one.”
Cloud Expo New York: How Secure Are You?
Nearly every enterprise is evaluating cloud computing solutions either today or in the near term. Many have already made the leap, and many more are getting close to putting that first toe in the water. But there are key considerations that should be made, questions to be asked, and designs to consider before you can feel secure with your provider.
In his session at the 10th International Cloud Expo, David Gulick, Product Manager, Hosting Product Management at Savvis, will help give you food for thought when having these conversations both internally and externally with service providers.
Cloud Computing Growing on the Businesses Priority Front
A survey of small and mid-size businesses found an interest in harnessing technology to improve business efficiency.
Midsize businesses are turning to IT investments to grow their businesses and the larger the organization, the more likely it is to cite technology as having the greatest potential to increase productivity, according to a new survey of midmarket companies by Deloitte.
The study shows cloud computing emerging as an investment priority. When asked what types of investments companies were likely to make in technology, 40 of the respondents cited cloud computing. That’s close to automation of business processes (46 percent) and data analytics (41 percent), according to eWEEK.
«Interestingly, there seems to be a greater recognition of the benefits of cloud computing,» the report stated. «In our September 2011 survey, it was recognized as a distant fourth as a means to increase productivity. In this survey, it nearly equaled data analytics and business intelligence in terms of likely investments.»