The OpenNebula Project is proud to announce the public availability of the OpenNebula Marketplace, an online catalog where individuals and organizations can quickly distribute and deploy virtual appliances ready-to-run on OpenNebula clouds. The new Marketplace is fully integrated with the new OpenNebula 3.6 so any user of an OpenNebula cloud can find and deploy virtual appliances in a single click. The OpenNebula marketplace is also of interest to software developer looking to quickly distribute a new appliance, making it available to all OpenNebula deployments worldwide.
Monthly Archives: June 2012
Implementing Cloud Data Security
A recent SC magazine cloud data security article provided an interesting glimpse to a soon-to-be-released “2012 Global SMB Security Market Assessment” by Access Markets International Partners (AMI). According to AMI, SMBs are projected to increasingly shift their security dollars toward protecting the cloud. Cloud security currently accounts for nearly 17 percent of total spending, or […]
Cloud Service Usage Now Mainstream in UK and Ireland: Report
The increased uptake in cloud service adoption is truly a worldwide phenomenon. New research published by Cisco Systems demonstrates the dramatic shift in attitudes towards cloud services in the UK and Ireland.
The report — entitled “Cisco CloudWatch 2012” — is the second in Cisco’s annual Cloud series and finds IT decision makers in a bullish mood, increasingly placing applications and services from across their business into the cloud and planning for further investment over the coming 12 months.
Furthermore, the message that cloud services can deliver significant cost reduction is now resonating within the IT community — cost saving has become a top driver for adopting cloud applications.
Granted, security remains the number one concern when migrating services and applications to the cloud. But that concern is noticeably less pronounced than in last year’s report.
The use of public cloud is up 11 percent, although private cloud still dominates.
Key findings of the market study include:
- IT decision makers say that cloud is now on their agenda — a resounding 90 percent up from just 52 percent in 2011.
- Of this number, 31 percent consider cloud as being critical and underpinning much of the organizations’ activity (this was just 7 percent in 2011).
- Of those organizations where cloud is on the agenda, 85 percent are planning further investment in the next twelve months.
- In CloudWatch 2011, reducing cost ranked fifth in a list of most important things when considering cloud — in today’s report it ranks as the number one priority.
- 20 percent reduction in concerns over security (52 percent in 2012 compared to 72 percent in 2011).
- 54 percent of respondents currently use private cloud (up from 34 percent in 2011) and public cloud usage is up from 18 percent in 2011 to 29 percent in 2012
Cisco commissioned independent research amongst IT decision makers across a broad range of vertical sectors including retail, finance, healthcare, public sector and service provider.
The results clearly show that cloud has moved from hype to reality, with cloud now seen as a mainstream element of IT strategy.
“This new report validates a shift that many of us in the IT industry have been witnessing first hand over the last 6-12 months. Cloud usage has now gone mainstream. After several years of ‘hype’ across the IT industry, it now seems that cloud is maturing and organizations across a broad range of sectors are realizing the benefits of moving to a cloud model, said Ian Foddering, Chief Technology Officer and Technical Director, Cisco UK and Ireland.
Foddering continues, “Against this backdrop it’s encouraging to see progressive companies realize the potential of cloud to revolutionize their respective industries. All these signs point towards a well-established market where the previously blurred boundaries of cloud computing are clearing. IT decision makers now more educated about the distinctions between cloud and managed services and more willing to invest.”
A View of Cloud Storage from Cloud Expo 2012 New York
As part of our presence at Cloud Expo in New York two weeks ago, we conducted a survey at our booth (in return from some quite popular storage hogs). More than 100 attendees participated and the results were rather enlightening.
Three Ways That Cloud Computing Benefits Business Process and Structure
Most small business owners understand cloud computing as a tool. A pay-as-you-go, web based tool. Not more, not less. And they’re pretty much right. Thing is, tools matter. They carry distinct advantages and disadvantages, which are sometimes subtle, long term, and structural. Cloud computing is no exception: besides the usual advantages, cloud based tools help […]
Public or private cloud, that is the question…or is it?
You realise the overarching benefits of the cloud, but you are a bit wary regarding the security of any data stored and transacted in these virtualised environments.
But the cost-saving benefits, user preference and resource delegation of the cloud are such that not integrating some processes, applications and data is counter-productive to your overall IT strategy.
So you decide that a private cloud is a more secure route that its public counterpart. But are you really any more secure?
The quick answer is no. But not for the reason you might think.
A private cloud is infrastructure operated solely for a single organisation. The only difference is that your data is segregated from any other organisation. And if that brings you any semblance of peace, then it’s a good investment.
It all depends on your business need. It offers greater control, but means you shoulder all the overhead, updating …
CloudTimes Named “Media Sponsor” of Cloud Expo Silicon Valley
SYS-CON Events announced today that CloudTimes has been named “Media Sponsor” of SYS-CON’s 11th International Cloud Expo, which will take place on November 5–8, 2012, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, CA.
CloudTimes is a leading technology media property, dedicated to providing in-depth research and breaking news on Cloud Computing and related topics. Apart from its well-known news section, CloudTimes hosts the largest research database on the web, featuring free whitepapers, webinars and articles from leading IT companies.
Cloud Expo 2012 Silicon Valley, November 5–8, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, CA, will feature technical sessions from a rock star conference faculty and the leading Cloud industry players in the world.
Google Copies Amazon
Google has copied Amazon and wheeled out an EC2 Infrastructure-as-a-Service imitator at the Google I/O developer conference in San Francisco Thursday proving the scuttlebutt on the money.
It’s called Compute Engine and Google will rent out the spare stripped-down servers (Linux virtual machines) in its data centers to run third-party apps, putting its skills and gargantuan scale up for sale.
It claims it’s “50% more power per dollar” than Amazon, which recently trimmed its prices.
Google already has the platform-as-a-service App Engine and the S3-like Google Cloud Storage but the money is in IaaS. It’s said Amazon Web Services may do $2 billion this year.
Tips on Evaluating Security in the Cloud
I’ve received a lot of questions lately about security in the Cloud and what CTOs should be considering when they are evaluating it. Here’s my advice, treat the Cloud like an extension of your corporate or production network, don’t treat it or hold it to a lower standard assuming that your cloud provider knows more than you.
If you have requirements that you can’t get in your Cloud solution make sure that not getting those requirements constitutes an acceptable risk or tradeoff. In evaluating a Cloud provider here are some critical questions to ask.
Mitigating the Data Management in the Cloud Conundrum
As more and more companies rely on data as the foundation for accurate strategic decision making and use it to underpin the development and evolution of their core products and service offerings, the value of data to most companies is understandably on the rise. Yet, despite an awareness that a deterioration in data quality will almost certainly result in a degradation of business processes, many organizations still do not put enough time and effort into ensuring that all data is as timely, accurate and consistent as possible.
The growing use of the cloud is now threatening to add further complexity to the management of data quality – and even fewer organizations are taking this into proper account. According to a recent report by Ventana Research, only 15 percent of organizations have completed a quality initiative for their cloud data, and that number drops to five percent for master data management. So, it comes as no surprise that less than a quarter of organizations trust their cloud data, while just under 50% trust data from on-premise applications.