There’s been a lot of hullaboo in the last few years about the current cycle of disruption in IT: Public Cloud, Private Cloud, SDN, DevOps, Everything-as-a-Service… the list goes on and on and every vertical, every field, and every niche is feeling the churn. Every day there is no shortage of opinions “for” and “against” something in tech that is emerging, in decline, or re-emerging. There is one aspect to all of it though that is largely ignored: “The Short ‘t’.”
Salesforce and the banking industry align as both bet on mobility
For bankers, mobility has become key. Customer-facing mobile banking applications are increasing the flow of traffic through digital channels, which is eroding traffic in bank branches. But it does not stop there: the mobile-enablement of services to increase the productivity of banking employees and drive sales effectiveness in remote locations is also on the rise.
The digital channel revolution is having a significant impact on banking via physical channels, and mobile apps for banking employees will play a pivotal role in this. More and more, branch-based employees move around with their tablets and smartphones to assist customers, while mortgage brokers, financial advisors, and corporate bankers increasingly conduct duties and work with clients outside branches.
In cases like these, remote access to corporate systems is essential. Salesforce has now launched Salesforce1, a “CRM+ platform” (or, as Salesforce calls it, a “Customer Platform”) for developers and software vendors focused on mobile app …
Akamai to Acquire Prolexic
Akamai Technologies, Inc. and Prolexic Technologies, Inc. announced on Monday that the two companies have signed a definitive agreement for Akamai to acquire Prolexic, a provider of cloud-based security solutions for protecting data centers and enterprise IP applications from distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks.
Faced with an ever-changing threat landscape, organizations require comprehensive security solutions that address many different protection scenarios. These include securing mission-critical Web properties and applications from attack, as well as protecting the full suite of enterprise IP applications – including email, file transfers, and VPN – across a data center.
Embracing the New Enterprise IT: The Public Cloud
Cloud this and cloud that are on the lips of every IT professional. Beyond being an overhyped buzzword, cloud computing is a technology that’s innovating the way that many businesses, from startups to enterprises, handle their IT needs. Whether it’s specific applications or a complete infrastructure, cloud technology continues to transform the IT landscape.
Businesses have a few different cloud options to choose from: Public cloud services are run through third-party providers, whereas the private cloud is controlled directly by the business itself and distributes computing resources within the company. It’s also possible to use a combination of both. The public cloud provides a cost advantage and an overhead advantage to businesses, since you don’t have to pay for equipment cost or maintenance. However, the disadvantage is that you don’t have direct access to the hardware or software. It’s hosted offsite at the cloud service’s facility, which can raise some security concerns.
Let’s Be Frenemies: Playing Nice in the Cloud
I first heard the word “frenemy” a few years ago from my teenage daughter describing one of her classmates. She really liked this girl, but there were things about her she didn’t quite trust – like she couldn’t be counted on as someone who “had her back.” Off to the Urban Dictionary I went, as was the new norm if I wanted to more fully relate to my teenagers. Thanks to my daughter, today I’ve found a great use for this word that can help others come to terms with certain fast-paced technology. For me, the Cloud is like my daughter’s nice, but not-so-trustworthy friend. The cloud is our frenemy.
The cloud is our frenemy because we struggle with the stability of the relationship. Consumers have never felt so powerful since the advent of smartphones and tools that enable them to download, upload and share music, videos, and photos. When this phenomenon first caught on, most consumers didn’t even realize they were using the cloud – or what was behind the technology. They just knew they were more productive and more fulfilled.
CloudCow Named “Media Sponsor” of Cloud Expo 2014 NY & Silicon Valley
SYS-CON Events announced today that CloudCow has been named “Media Sponsor” of SYS-CON’s 14th International Cloud Expo®, which will take place on June 10–12, 2014, at the Javits Center in New York City, New York, and the 15th International Cloud Expo®, which will take place on November 4–6, 2014, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, CA.
Established in 2011, CloudCow is an online publication dedicated to the next generation data center environment. It is recognized as one of the leading authorities in cloud computing information.
CloudCow is a comprehensive resource for cloud computing news, analysis and information. The online publication provides IT professionals and executives with access to the latest information needed to make cloud computing and IT business decisions within their respective organizations.
When Does Internet of Things Become Internet of Agents? | Part 2
In my last blog, I discussed how the Internet of Things is really developing into what can more accurately be called the Internet of Agents. These connections and multi-agent systems are resulting in an increasing number of highly applicable, value-added bundled and branded services. The latest Gartner forecast for Internet of Things predicts that by 2020 there will be $309 billion in incremental revenue opportunity for IoT suppliers, mostly in services.
The Internet brings us 21st century online versions of other traditional services: agents that can deliver cars as a service, clothes as a service and takeaway food as a service. The Internet of Agents tells you where you can catch a bus for wherever you want to go, and how long it will be before the bus arrives at your stop. It also tells you which local hardware store stocks the product you’re looking for. If you choose, you can track “things” that belong to you. You can track your car or your laptop or your mobile device if it goes missing. Your children, your pets, your significant other (yes, people are now “things” too). You know where a package in transit is and when it’s scheduled to be delivered to your doorstep. All of these agent-driven services bring together traditional people-based services, connectedness, location awareness and physical devices or tools.
Is Internet of Things Really Internet of Agents? | Part 1
Machine-to-machine (M2M) technology and the resulting Internet of Things are leading us inexorably toward everything-as-a-service (XaaS). As more things get connected, the range of service opportunities expands. And as those services are presented online, they become available for use, re-use and re-purposing.
At first thought, the idea of more connected devices suggests simply that there will be more devices around, and as such, more products for manufacturers to make and sell. That’s true, but as I suggested in an earlier blog, even the manufacturers will realize that there is actually more value in services related to those connected things than in the things themselves.
SecurityStockWatch.com “Media Sponsor” of Cloud Expo NY & Silicon Valley
SYS-CON Events announced today that SecurityStockWatch.com has been named “Media Sponsor” of SYS-CON’s 14th International Cloud Expo®, which will take place on June 10–12, 2014, at the Javits Center in New York City, New York, and the 15th International Cloud Expo®, which will take place on November 4–6, 2014, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, CA.
SecurityStockWatch.com is the #1 security solutions portal for “Secure ID Solutions” and “Fraud Prevention Solutions.” We invite you to visit Google to verify our top rankings first hand. Our B2B and B2Gov channel reaches your target markets and based on our demographics and traffic, we can assure your company of an excellent business development opportunity. What is YOUR cloud computing solution?
OpenNebula Enhances Its Amazon API Implementation
OpenNebula has enhanced the Amazon EC2 and EBS API implementation exposed by the econe-server. The econe-server is a component on top of the OpenNebula core that translates Amazon API calls into OpenNebula actions, therefore a user will be able to interact with an OpenNebula cloud using any of the available EC2 clients or tool such as euca2ools, ElasticFox to interact with the econe-server.
Now instance types are based on OpenNebula templates instead of files. Users can create different base templates from Sunstone or the CLI and then make them available as instance types for users interacting with OpenNebula through the EC2 interface. These templates will be merged with the information provided by the user (i.e., AMI, user data, keypairs…) when a new instance is created. This allows us to use restricted attributes inside the templates or set permissions like any other OpenNebula resource. The describe functions have also been improved , for example users can query any of the resource pools providing a list of IDs, and now the describe-instances response includes instances that have been terminated recently.
Now instance types are based on OpenNebula templates instead of files. Users can create different base templates from Sunstone or the CLI and then make them available as instance types for users interacting with OpenNebula through the EC2 interface. These templates will be merged with the information provided by the user (i.e., AMI, user data, keypairs…) when a new instance is created. This allows us to use restricted attributes inside the templates or set permissions like any other OpenNebula resource. The describe functions have also been improved , for example users can query any of the resource pools providing a list of IDs, and now the describe-instances response includes instances that have been terminated recently.