Microsoft had always maintained backwards compatibility with most of their products. Compatibility has been one of the main reasons Windows has seen such great success, specifically backwards compatibility to systems such as MS-DOS. Even today you can get to a DOS prompt (command prompt) from Windows 7, this hasn’t changed for years and from a functionality point of view this is a bonus.

The announcement of the new Windows Phone 8 (and previously Windows RT on which Windows Phone 8 is based) flew in the face of tradition for Microsoft, it “broke” the compatibility of the applications and their ability to run on the new platform. This has been a typically non-Microsoft way to act but something that the industry isn’t totally unfamiliar with.

Apple have, on more than one occasion, launched a platform that is incompatible with anything that had come before. I refer to the release …

By Sue Poremba

The cloud business has grown and matured over the past years to levels that were unimaginable at its inception. Modern cloud providers have data centers spread across the world, or at least in key regions. This allows them to offer high-speed access to data in the cloud regardless of region and also helps them keep data duplicates on different continents.

This proliferation of the cloud has also meant the availability of free or inexpensive cloud storage options –- a boon for small companies working with a tight IT budget. However, it may also mean utilizing a variety of services, spreading data between a number of providers with different options and different terms of services.

So, does it matter if your company’s documents, intellectual property, and other corporate data are stored in various locations or should everything be consolidated to one server?

“It is up to every company …

There are so many cloud storage services vying for your business that it can be seriously tough to decide on which is best. DropBox is the poster child and flush with an infusion of $250m in venture capital. Good on flexibility and functionality but not so much on pricing. DropBox for Teams provides 1000 GB of storage, version history, admin tools and customer support starting at $795 per year for five users.

Small businesses with basic needs may get away with using Google or Microsoft. Google Drive offers five GB free, 25 GB for $2.49 per month and goes all the way up to 16 TB for $799.99 per month. The pricing is competitive and you have limited version history, the ability to share and edit files and the option to have discussions.

The problem is Google would like you to use all their services. It’s perfect …

The United States Government Accountability Office (GAO) has found that, while the US ‘Cloud First’ enterprise project is making tangible progress, there are seven cloud lessons for the public sector.

The report, subtitled “progress made but future cloud computing efforts should be better planned”, charts the progress of Cloud First – a federal policy which exhorts agencies to find a cloud-based IT solution whenever logistically possible.

Things appear to have moved forward since 2010, when the GAO previously warned about the difficulties associated with federal cloud management.

Back in May 2010, the accountability office found that the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) in the White House hadn’t even developed a cloud strategy.

But it appears there is still work to be done.

Research as recently as October 2011 found that 22 out of 24 major federal agencies were either “concerned or very concerned” about security risks in the cloud …

With some of the recent breaches of restaurant chains, I’ve got to think that many of them were related to poor remote access practices. I say this because in all of my years of consulting, I have found that very weak controls around the remote access is a lot more common than one would think.

Even today you will commonly find things like POS Servers directly accessible on the Internet via VNC, RDP, or pcAnywhere. I have even seen SQL databases that contain credit card data made directly accessible over the Internet.

Sometimes the organization itself is to blame. Usually because they just don’t know any better. For many, this has been the standard way to connect with their restaurants or stores remotely. They may lack the skills needed to setup secure remote access.  Other times, and this is also very common, a vendor or service provider is …

We have to face facts: cloud uptake is on the rise.

Indeed, deployments are set to double by 2015, and up to 200,000 UK jobs will be created by cloud computing technologies between 2011 and 2015.

CIOs therefore have to accept that cloud is here, and here to stay. So what considerations must a CIO make when moving to the cloud, even if he is entirely unwilling to do so?!

Below, I have outlined some tips for any CIO who is either looking to move to the cloud, or indeed, is being pushed into making the move by his CFO or CEO…

Do I understand what cloud is and what it can do for my business?

As cloud computing adoption grows, so does the hype surrounding it. Everyone’s talking about the benefits that can be achieved by moving to the cloud, but does the CIO truly understand what …

With the Olympic Games just around the corner, one wonders whether, in a time where cloud computing is coming on leaps and bounds and gaining popularity by the day, it will be ready to service the Olympics.

Now the Olympics will of course be taking place in London this summer, one of the financial and technological hubs of the world, and during the Olympics a huge computing infrastructure will be required that generates a huge peak of data, so some form of cloud hosting solution, on paper, would be ideal.

Challenges

The London 2012 Olympics kicks off in just 15 days, so it’s fast approaching now and most of the tech work has already been carried out.

It has been revealed that nearly a quarter of the budget of the organising committee is spent on technology with 110,000 pieces of equipment being deployed with around 5,500 technical …

Not all major changes are visible to the naked eye. Standing next to a glacier it is difficult to determine direction (does it grow or shrink across seasons) and watching continents move takes even some stamina for the casual observer. Luckily this is not the case for cloud computing.

Apart from the very noticeable cloud hype (more on the cycle of that soon) there is also very noticeable growth.   At the end of a deep and wide group effort, Gartner published its «Forecast: Public Cloud Services, Worldwide, 2010-2016, 2Q12 Update» accompanied by Market Definitions and Methodology: Public Cloud Services. As I highlighted several years ago in Can the Real Cloud Market Size Please Stand Up? definitions are all important when trying to compare various cloud forecasts and especially cloud forecast categories.

Kim Dotcom has offered to travel to the US of his own volition to face charges over alleged copyright infringements related to his now defunct Megaupload cloud storage service.

Under house arrest in Christchurch, New Zealand since February, the German national, who has previously opposed extradition attempts made by US prosecutors, offered terms to the Department of Justice over Twitter.

«Hey DOJ (Department of Justice), we will go to the US. No need for extradition,» he wrote. «We want bail, funds unfrozen for lawyers & living expenses.»

Along with a three other Megaupload employees, Dotcom faces numerous charges, including money laundering, racketeering, fraud and online copyright theft, centring on the claim that the group made $175m since 2005 through the copying and distribution of pirated content. If found guilty, the group members face up to 20 years behind bars.

Last month CloudTech reported that a New Zealand court had discovered legal …

Recent research from analyst house Gartner has forecast a slight increase in global IT spend from 2011, with public cloud services and telecoms leading the way.

Telecoms continues to have the largest numbers in terms of IT spend, with nearly half of the overall spend ($1.7tn) accounted for in that sector, put down to net connections in emerging markets and multiple connected devices in more mature markets.

The cloud highlights of the research were:

• Overall IT spend is predicted to go up to $3.6tn this year, up 3% from $3.5tn in 2011
• The public enterprise cloud is expected to account for $109bn of global spend by the end of 2012, up $18bn from last year
• By 2016 the enterprise cloud spend will rise to $207bn

This increase, whilst not spectacular, is still good news in line with the bleak economic outlook.

Richard Gordon, Gartner research vice president …