Laurent Lachal, Senior Analyst, Software – IT Solutions

In February 2013, Amazon Web Services (AWS) launched the beta version of AWS OpsWorks, a configuration and deployment service for AWS public cloud-based applications and their related resources. While AWS usually creates its services from scratch, OpsWorks is based on third-party technology, namely the open source Chef-based SaaS offering, Scalarium, developed by Peritor, a small Germany-based IT service provider that AWS acquired in 2012.

OpsWorks reflects the increasingly important role of cloud computing-driven infrastructure-as-code/DevOps practices. It is a good, albeit rather limited to date, step forward that will help some AWS customers and partners to remain in control of their AWS public cloud-based solutions.

On the other hand, it is not nearly as threatening to some of AWS’s partners that many claim. In a recent report entitled Amazon Web Services’ OpsWorks: Boosting Cloud Automation, Ovum provides a detailed analysis of its …

Abstract – MaaSTM (Model as a Service) sets a new concept to order and classify data modeling design and deployment to the Cloud. MaaS changes the way to move data to the Cloud because allows to define data taxonomy, size and contents. Starting from data model design, MaaS might guide the DaaS (Database as a Service) lifecycle, providing data granularity and duty rules: as a consequence, MaaS implements the new concept of Small Data.

In fact, Small Data answers to the need of controlling “on-premise” data dimension and granularity. Anyway, Small Data is not data volume limitation. Small Data affords data modeling full configuration and provides 2 main advantages: data model scale and data ownership that provide assigned data deployment and, finally, data deletion in the Cloud.

Introduction
The inheritance coming from the past imposes to manage big data as a consequence of multiple integration and aggregation of data systems …

Alert Logic’s latest cloud security report has summarised that cloud security providers (CSPs) are “inherently no less secure than enterprise data centres”, and that cloud security threats continue to follow a consistent pattern.

In its State of Cloud Security Report, subtitled “Targeted Attacks and Opportunistic Hacks”, the network security provider observed over 45,000 security incidents and found that some things don’t change; Web application attacks are the biggest threat for IT infrastructures.

The top three incident classes, for cloud hosting providers, were Web application attacks (52%), followed by brute force (30%) and vulnerability scans (27%). This compares interestingly with enterprise data centres, which saw malware and brute force as the number one incident class (49%).

Perhaps unsurprisingly, brute force accounted for the most frequent type of assault, given brute force hackers try a wide variety of combinations in order to get in.

Regardless, the overall conclusion was …

Gartner’s been gazing at its crystal ball again, and has forecast that service-led solutions – software as a service (SaaS), infrastructure as a service (IaaS), platform as a service (PaaS) and so forth – will displace more traditional sourcing methods by 2015.

The analyst house stresses that IT companies need to “bridge legacy offerings and new services”, again pointing a future to the cloud for service providers.

And cloud services appear to be growing at a much quicker rate than other elements of the IT services market. Hardware and software support will grow slowly compared to IaaS and BPaaS (business process as a service), which will grow 13.1% and 47.3% in 2013 respectively according to Gartner.

There are three recommendations Gartner has for service providers this year; stopping undifferentiated marketing messages, emphasising business value to ‘transform clients’ existing operations’; improving service delivery by reinventing the service portfolio; and determining …

By Geoff Smith, Sr. Solutions Architect

It is inarguable that change is sweeping the IT industry.  Over the last five years a number of new technologies that provide huge technological advantages (and create management headaches) have been developed.  We have attempted to leverage these advances to the benefit of our organizations, while at the same time struggling with how to incorporate them into our established IT management methodologies. 

Do we need to throw out our mature management protocols in order to partake in the advantages provided by these new technologies, or can we modify our core management approaches and leverage similar advances in management methodologies to provide a more extensible platform that enables adoption of advanced computing architectures?

Cloud computing is one such advance.  One barrier to adopting cloud as a part of an IT strategy is how we will manage the resources it provides us.  Technically, cloud services are …

According to the latest report published by Strategy Analytics, Apple is moving ahead of competitors Dropbox, Google and Amazon in the battle for cloud storage supremacy.

Over a quarter (27%) of Americans polled said they had used iCloud, compared with 17% for Dropbox, with Amazon Cloud Drive (15%) and Google Drive (10%) trailing behind.

Interestingly, over half of respondents (55%) had never used a cloud storage service, but 33% had first used one within the past week.

The report noted the key battleground in the cloud storage wars was music, with nine in 10 users storing music, although movie content has the potential to become a huge player in the space.

“The growth of video streaming and the desire to access content via a growing range of devices will see services such as the Hollywood-backed digital movie initiative Ultraviolet – currently used by 4% of Americans – increase market share,” noted Strategy …

For three in four IT security professionals, bring your own device (BYOD) is one of the “greatest inhibitors to effective cloud security”.

That’s the result from a new report by AccelOps. Talking to 176 IT security personnel, the results put BYOD ahead of data control and data loss – traditional topics for cloud security worriers – as the main security threat.

Other cloud security pain points according to the research included enforcing security policies, compliance reporting and employee training; yet given data breaches and data loss were the top two security threats released by the Cloud Security Alliance (CSA) last month, this may be something of a surprise.

Research in January from ISC2 explicitly linked cloud computing and personal device policies, with the key takeaway being that companies who support BYOD make their employees happier, whilst at the same time they need to top up their cloud security knowledge. The same …

Adam Holtby, Analyst, IT Service Management, Ovum

Gamification (the use of game-thinking and game mechanics in non-game contexts) continues to gain interest among enterprises and the public sector. Regardless of whether you approve of the buzzword itself, there is little doubt that the practices gamification embodies and promotes can be beneficial to a wide array of organizations in achieving overarching business strategies and tactical objectives. To reach a nirvana state with any gamification initiative, organizations need to consider the key factors discussed below.

It must benefit the business

Gamification can help enhance customer engagement and manage employee behaviors and productivity levels, but there must be clear understanding of how such an initiative will directly benefit the business. Ideally, a mapping of the value that any gamified activity, process, or technology will deliver in better supporting business goals and desired outcomes will be developed as part of the planning stage. It …

Thanks to hybrid cloud solutions…

Hurricanes in Vermont. Earthquakes in Washington, D.C. Tornadoes in Missouri. Natural disasters seem to be all over the news lately. Would your firm be able to recover in a reasonable amount of time and resume operations?

Many risks exist – even for firms far away from earthquake fault lines, tornado alleys and hurricane zones. Consider the risk of water damage.

Every law firm is at risk from broken pipes, too much rain or even a sink overflowing on the floor above you. There’s nothing to stop a flood. As some experts point out, “Water always wins.”

Most law firms understand the importance of such a plan, but actually implementing one can be extremely challenging. Cost and logistics have been major barriers for many firms. Firms need to rent space at an off-site data center to secure data. They must purchase servers for the off-site …

By Justin Fielder, Easynet Chief Technology Officer

If I was to suggest businesses move IT services to the cloud to improve security, there’s a strong possibility I would be laughed out of town. Despite businesses clearly seeing the benefits of migrating to the cloud, research shows that, for 61% of European CIOs, security is still the biggest concern when considering such a move.

For many network professionals, there is a clear comfort factor which derives from having a virtual boundary fence built around their network, within which sits corporate data and applications. 45% of IT professionals surveyed by CIO.com in the US said their biggest cloud security concern is a lack of perimeter defences and/or control of the corporate network.

When we drill down further into the inhibitors to cloud migration, the concerns very specifically relate to the storage of data and its privacy. Historically CIOs have …