Moving Targets: Developing Cloud Apps on Rapidly Evolving Platforms

Enterprise software developers used to count on a level of stability and control over their environment that no longer exists when migrating to cloud platforms. As much hand-wringing is spent over how and what can be run in the cloud at all, little thought is given to the long-run costs of developing and optimizing applications to run in constantly-evolving cloud platforms.

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Twitter Is Not a SaaS Monitoring Solution

A few weeks ago I was trying to update some files I have stored on a cloud storage service (that will remain nameless). I had moved my files there a while back as a way to make it easier to access them from my various devices and to avoid losing them during the next inevitable hard drive failure. For the most part I’ve been happy with the service, but on this day, I was unable to access the site.
Not good, as I was rushing to make some changes and send the files to a colleague.
Frustrated by my situation, I asked a co-worker to see if he was also having problems. He was, so we did the next logical thing you would expect. We went to the service provider’s status page to see what they had to say. According to it, the service was healthy and there were no current service or maintenance notices.

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Cloud Expo Silicon Valley: Encryption – Getting Peace of Mind in the Cloud

Security remains a high consideration for adoption of Cloud. Protection of data is at the center of a Cloud security strategy. Where the data is stored, how the data is secured, and who has access to the data? Encryption is one of the key technologies to address these concerns, securing data in the cloud, and to provide peace of mind to cloud adopters.
Like any other technology, no single solution fits all scenarios. Should you use full disk encryption, database encryption technologies or an encryption gateway? Is there a need to encrypt backup data? You have to address these and many other questions while planning for an encryption solution. There are many considerations related to transparency, usability, and ease of management. There are also issues related to who owns, manages and has access to encryption keys. On top of that, a solution that works well in an IaaS cloud may not work well in an SaaS environment.

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IT Still Controls Most Cloud Usage: Cisco Survey

Cisco, like everybody else in IT, believes that cloud computing is central to the Internet of Things (the belief that everything with an on/off switch will eventually be wired or wirelessly connected and controlled by someone – or some thing – somewhere in the world). This isn’t a difficult concept to understand.
Naturally, all of this plays directly into the products and services that Cisco makes – all those switches, routers, random connectors, intelligent network software and so on – that link devices to systems to people and back again, according to an article on eWEEK.
Cisco estimated in an extensive research report, «The Impact of Cloud on IT Consumption Models,» that connections among people, processes, data and things will surge from 10 billion today to 50 billion by 2020.

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WebRTC Summit | Interoperable WebRTC and Why It Is Important

There are many potential applications for WebRTC and for many interoperability is not a requirement. However, this does not mean that there is not a need for interoperability, particularly at the signaling level, for other applications.
Many people have dismissed interoperability as a consideration when using WebRTC – often due to the fact that their favored use cases do not require it (and in some cases are even hampered by it).
In his session at WebRTC Summit, Peter Dunkley, Technical Director at Crocodile RCS, will look at the other side and discuss the case for interoperability and explain how WebRTC can be used to enhance and extend existing services in a way provides benefits to service providers and their customers. He will conclude with a look at some of the open-source options available today for building interoperable WebRTC applications.

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Roll With the Times and Grow Your Business

If you are in your 40’s you were born into a world which is now long gone. Your first date was set up via a landline phone – maybe even a rotary dial! The first music you listened to was from a tape cassette or a vinyl record; flying was not like taking a bus; e-mails were unknown and… well, you get the picture.

Then along came mobile telephony and the internet and they changed the world forever. Today our lifestyle, information and hobbies, as well as work, can be found in one single device which is permanently connected to the internet – and of course it is also in our pocket most of the time.

Cloud Expo | Platform Gravity: New Paradigm for Cloud-Based Enterprises

With the explosion of SaaS and reduced costs of changing applications, organizations have more freedom to choose between products and are no longer bound by the platform stickiness of traditional enterprise software. A new analogy – «platform gravity» – better describes today’s enterprise application market.
As apps vie for customers in the face of diminishing client lock-in, pricing, features, and ecosystems exclusively govern application traction – forcing vendors to innovate faster, listen better, and refocus efforts on users.
In his session at the 13th International Cloud Expo®, Patrick White, CEO at Synata, will discuss best practices for selecting and deploying applications in this world of endless choice and explore how developers can thrive in this new environment.

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The search for hybrid cloud: The journey continues

Hybrid cloud is an awesome concept for the world of enterprise IT and beyond. But a question remains as to whether hybrid clouds are truly being created in the current state of business IT infrastructure deployments.

One true definition?

Most businesses have their own data center and then they have cloud. Very few have really created a true hybrid yet that achieves the promised functionality.

So if businesses aren’t currently completely achieving hybrid deployments, what is it? The truest definition of a hybrid cloud entails having the ability to easily move and put back workloads between dedicated and outsourced/cloud environments – seamlessly.

So what’s the hold up?

Broadly, true hybrid cloud faces a few major challenges.

First, depending on the cloud provider you use, your business will experience more or less ability to integrate outside platforms and tools. For instance, you can’t really hybridize cloud at AWS …

Enterprise Mobility and Network Centric Management Strategies

Some of the most technologically advanced organizations in the world today are utilizing strategies based on the concept of the Network Centric Organization. These strategies, methodologies and concepts are important for just about any organization that is geographically dispersed and requires the organization and management of remote and mobile workforces and assets.
The concept of the «network centric» organization relates to the fact that people, objects, events, activities, assets, inventories, locations, fleets, equipment, tools, etc, are all connected to the Internet (aka network), monitored, and most often visible on a map. All of these connected components are providing data in real-time that can be used to manage operations. This collected data is wirelessly sent to a central server where it forms a real time and unified view of operations that can be used for analysis, forecasting, resource allocation, planning and real time decision-making.

The concept of the «network centric» organization relates to the fact that people, objects, events, activities, assets, inventories, locations, fleets, equipment, tools, etc, are all connected to the Internet (aka network), monitored, and most often visible on a map. All of these connected components are providing data in real-time that can be used to manage operations. This collected data is wirelessly sent to a central server where it forms a real time and unified view of operations that can be used for analysis, forecasting, resource allocation, planning and real time decision-making.

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Cloud Expo: Delivering Database as a Service with Oracle Database 12c

IT leaders are turning to the cloud to increase agility and reduce costs. During this session, learn how Oracle offers a complete Database as a Service (DBaaS) solution that delivers on a broad range of requirements including simplified database consolidation, mission-critical deployments and extreme scalability.
In his session at the 13th International Cloud Expo®, Willie Hardie, VP Database Product Management at Oracle, will discuss how the new multitenant architecture in Oracle Database 12c lends itself to providing DBaaS, and you’ll gain exposure to a number of customer case studies that demonstrate how delivering DBaaS is providing a superior service while lowering CapEx and OpEx costs.

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