Tag Archives: cloud computing

Cloud Clearing on the Horizon?

Posted on by gregl

Like a scene in a movie, prepare for the clouds to part and the clarity of bright skies to come streaming through. That’s the optimistic outlook for 2012 from StorageIO founder and IT pundit Greg Schulz regarding the state of Cloud computing.

“Granted there will be plenty of more cloud FUD and hype, cloud washing and cleaning going around,” he writes in Data Center Journal. “However, 2012 and beyond will also find organizations realizing where and how to use different types of clouds — public, private, hybrid — to meet various needs, from SaaS and AaaS to PaaS to IaaS and other variations of XaaS.”

“Part of the clarification will be that there are many different types of cloud architectures, products, stacks, solutions, services and products to address various needs,” he continues. “Another part will be discussion of what needs to be added to clouds to make them more viable for both new as well as old or existing applications. This means organizations will determine what they need to do to move their existing applications to some form of a cloud model while understanding how clouds coexist and complement what they are currently doing.”

If you’re wrestling with how a Cloud solution to meet your application requirements, be sure to talk with us at EasyStreet!

Cloud May Ease CEO Technology Angst

Posted on by gregl

When 1,500 CEOs worldwide were asked in late 2010 about technology changes, 80 percent said their environments definitely would become much more complex, and over half admitted their companies were not prepared.

“Unfortunately, the information technology infrastructure at many large companies only makes this challenge more difficult, writes renowned technology observer Andrew McAfee in the Harvard Business Review. “Their technology environments actually impede their ability to sense change and respond quickly. While there is no simple fix for this problem, help is at hand in the form of cloud computing, a new suite of digital tools and approaches.

“Cloud computing is a sharp departure from the status quo,” McAfee goes on. “Today most companies own their software and hardware and keep them ‘on premise’ in data centers and other specialized facilities. With cloud computing, in contrast, companies lease their digital assets, and their employees don’t know the location of the computers, data centers, applications, and databases that they’re using. To advocates of cloud computing, that’s the whole point. Customers don’t have to concern themselves with details; they just rent what they need from the cloud.”

Cloud Myth # 3: Cloud computing is an all-or-nothing proposition

Posted on by Karen Karger

InfoWorld’s David Linthicum has it right — there are many Cloud myths that just won’t go away. His contends that, rather than taking an all-or-nothing approach to Cloud computing, you can instead “move to cloud-based systems, such as storage and compute services, as needed, both intersystem and intrasystem. Moreover, you can move in a fine-grained manner, shifting only certain system components, such as user interface processing or storage, and leaving the remainder on premises.”

We find many of our customers (old and new) are taking advantage of the integrated/hybrid IT solutions EasyStreet can design and build for them. These custom designs can combine a number of components, including Private Cloud, Multi-Tenant Cloud or colocation services, to create the best solution based on that particular customer’s needs. (Yes, the word “solution” is overused, but I can’t think of a better one to use in this case.) With our fast point-to-point or Internet connectivity options, some part of the infrastructure can even be kept on customer premises while the rest resides at EasyStreet. (This is the “fine-grained manner” David was writing about.)

Click here to read all four of David Linthicum’s Cloud computing myths.

Better yet, click here to request a quotation from EasyStreet to design a custom Cloud solution for your business.

Geo-Distant Data Replication Demo a Success!

Posted on by Karen Karger

On November 16, EasyStreet, TierPoint and Dell hosted a breakfast seminar that featured a live Disaster Recovery demonstration. Shown above, EasyStreet’s Solutions Engineer/Enterprise Architect, Trey Pautsch uses VMware ESC 5.0, vCenter 5.0, SRM 5.0 and Dell SRA for the demo. The entire virtualized server and data were successfully replicated at the TierPoint data center in Spokane, WA in a matter of minutes.

EasyStreet and TierPoint have paired Cloud environments to provide their customers with a cost-effective Disaster Recovery solution.  Dell PowerEdge hosts and Dell EqualLogic 6000 iSCSI SANs were used for this demonstration.

Chris Derton, Storage Account Executive from Dell was also on hand to provide an overview of their virtualization, storage and host integration solutions.

Mobile Showing Larger Impact than the Cloud

Posted on by gregl

Smartphones and tablets appear to be having more real-world impact on IT departments than even cloud computing, based on early returns on a survey TechRepublic.com is conducting.

“We realize that these two topics are actually related in some cases,” writes TechRepublic Editor-in-Chief Jason Hiner in a recent post. “Companies are often attracted to the cloud so that employees can access apps and/or data from anywhere and any device, including mobile devices. And, professionals who rely on smartphones or tablets to do their work want easy ways to connect to corporate systems, and the cloud can simplify the process. That said, we’d like to know which one is the tail and which one is the dog.”

Current results from the blog’s heavily IT readership put Mobile in the lead with 72% compared to 28% for cloud computing.

You can take the poll yourself by clicking here.

Pundit About-Faces on the Private Cloud

Posted on by gregl

Eric Knorr, who writes the “Modernizing IT” column for InfoWorld admits he’s been skeptical of the so-called “private cloud,” but now gallantly admits to rethinking the matter.

“I’ve ridiculed the private cloud in the past, for two reasons,” he writes. “First, because all kinds of existing technologies and approaches can be grandfathered into the definition. And second, because it smacks of the mythical ‘lights out’ data center, where you roll out a bunch of automation, lay off your admins, and live happily ever after with vastly reduced costs. Not even the goofiest know-nothing believes that one anymore.

“Yet, despite natural skepticism, the private cloud appears to be taking shape,” he admits.

Solid technologies underlie the private cloud concept — specifically, virtualization — and a private cloud’s identity-based security ensures people can access only the infrastructure and applications they need.

“Without question, the private cloud comes with a large dose of hogwash,” he still believes. “Nonetheless, the model of providing commodity services on top of pooled, well-managed virtual resources has legs, because it has the potential to take a big chunk of cost and menial labor out of the IT equation. The lights in the data center will never go out. The drive for greater efficiency, though, has had a dozen names in the history of IT, and the private cloud just happens to be the latest one.”

Great Western Malting Migrates its IT Infrastructure from Texas to EasyStreet

Posted on by Karen Karger

If you think your IT challenges are tough, try moving your entire infrastructure over 2,000 miles. In this new case study, Great Western Malting’s Regional IT Manager for North America, Mark Orchard, recounts how EasyStreet helped his company move from a private Cloud in Texas to a private Cloud in EasyStreet’s data center. “We started on a Friday night and ended on a Saturday night, says Mark. “We had a perfect cutover, lost no business data, and the system was available for use come Monday morning.”

Click here to read the case study.

Companies Far Prefer Private Clouds Over Public Ones

Posted on by gregl

Private clouds hold much more appeal for companies than their more public counterparts, according to findings in this year’s survey from the Uptime Institute, which provides certification, research and consulting to the data center industry. The 2011 survey focuses on the opinions of 525 data center executives representing the financial industry, colocation providers and governmental agencies in North America.

“Use of what is commonly referred to as the cloud, the public cloud (or Internet), within the next year is part of the tentative plans of only 5 percent of surveyed companies,” according to the survey. “In other words, although the public cloud is in some sense the ‘face’ of cloud computing, it is not a seriously considered option for the vast majority of companies. This may be due to a variety of factors, including the loss of control of IT resources, questions regarding data location and security, availability considerations and regulatory compliance.”

“A so-called private cloud solution, on the other hand, carries much more weight with companies,” the survey continues. “Of the survey respondents, 42 percent are planning or considering a private cloud deployment, and 27 percent are leaning toward a hybrid implementation that mixes public and private clouds. The private cloud alternative offers many of the benefits of the public cloud, but it leaves control of the IT resources (servers and other hardware) in the hands of the company.”

Scalability and flexibility were cited by 61 percent of respondents as the main appeals of cloud technology, while only 25 percent said cost savings.

Google Apps Now Deployed at One in Five Companies

Posted on by gregl

Talk about mixed messages … statistics show that medium and small companies are the leading adopters of Cloud computing because bigger companies are more reluctant. But when it comes to Google Apps, it’s the bigger companies who are deploying the Cloud-based software far more than start-ups and non-enterprise organizations.

Data compiled recently by White Stratus, a Cloud solution provider with offices in New York, London and Sydney, shows that nearly 20 percent of the more than 2,000 companies they surveyed — all with 240 or more employees — have deployed some form of Google Apps.

Google Apps were most popular with companies in the education sector, where 58 percent were using the programs. Real estate, professional and technical services, and media followed with 23 percent, while the finance and insurance industries saw just over a 19 percent adoption rate.

Of those using Google Apps, 32.8 percent had fully deployed the apps to the entire company, while 47.8 percent were still in a pilot stage with only a segment of the company using the apps on a regular basis.

Colocation and Cloud Seen As Popular Expansion Options

Posted on by gregl

Company-owned data centers are having a tough time keeping up with digital demand, and a growing number of IT managers now consider colocation a solution. Nearly half of all data centers are facing necessary expansion of some sort within two years to meet growth pressures, according to recent surveys.

In a recent Uptime Institute survey, for example, 40 percent of respondents are considering building new data centers, 30 percent will lease colocation space, and 20 percent intend to move their workload to Cloud providers.

(For those interested in a bit of both, EasyStreet can help integrate your choice of services (Private Clouds, dedicated servers, colocation and connectivity) to form the flexible computing infrastructure you need.)

Digital Realty Trust, a data center provider, surveyed 300 large-company IT decision-makers and found 85 percent planning to expand their data centers in 2011. “Expansion includes everything from a physical expansion and leasing of collocation space to cloud computing services,” according to Computerworld. “It represents a four percent increase over the previous year’s survey results.

Afcom, an association of data center managers, found 29 percent of the 360 IT managers it surveyed now involved in data center expansion, while another 21 percent are planning to expand within two years.