Cloud computing, like near and far

I do not know which wise man to the good hands, created a "cloud computing" the word. It's so level, as the clouds are changing in the sky, and cloud computing seems to be just as elusive. Recent articles on cloud computing have been evolving, and everyone is defining cloud computing, but no one has ever been able to give an accurate definition of cloud computing.

What is cloud computing?

Because of the number of vendors currently offering cloud computing services, the cloud models provided by each are not the same, some are virtualized into a data center to serve the users of the entire network by virtualizing hardware such as servers, storage, and others through browsers. Hence the complexity of the definition of cloud computing, and I think cloud computing is more apt to be called cloud mode or cloud service.

The author is not an expert in the field, the industry's controversial vocabulary can not give a clear definition. Here's what the seniors say. "The basic principle of cloud computing is that by distributing computing across a large number of distributed computers, rather than on a local computer or a remote server, enterprise data centers run more like the Internet. This allows the enterprise to switch resources to the required applications and to access the computer and storage systems as needed. "It doesn't seem new, but it needs to be savored." The essence of cloud computing is to have the resources and computing in the off-site equipment, and its own terminal equipment only need a display device and operating equipment. For example, we just need a monitor and a mouse to work properly. Maybe it's easy to understand what cloud computing is.

Cloud Computing Benefits

The definition of cloud computing is no longer important, and what is important is what benefits it can bring.

The biggest advantage of cloud computing is that we provide almost unlimited resources, at the end of the network, the aggregation of the world's extensive resources, as long as there is a network, we can enjoy the world every corner of the resources. This is the result of our own terminals that cannot be achieved anyway.

2nd, cloud Computing improves security, data is stored in data centers maintained by professional firms, and we no longer need to be overwhelmed by virus intrusion and system insecurity. Would there be no more network administrator in the office?

3rd, there is no need to change the equipment frequently, because cloud computing has low requirements for terminal devices. After cloud computing matures, it sounds good to share data and applications between different devices.
Problems with cloud computing

1 , access rights are held in the hands of others

The cloud-computing model is to store data entirely in the devices of vendors that provide cloud services, which means that the cloud service provider, rather than yourself, has the highest access to your data, which is a challenge to the security of information.

2 , Compliance

In the era of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, companies have a responsibility to enforce stringent data monitoring and archiving levels. Even if a company contracts with an external cloud services provider, the rules still require the company to be held responsible. The cloud computing service provider should submit audit and security certificates to ensure that the other party is able to fulfill the agreed commitments.

3 , data location

Using the cloud computing model, your data will be placed all over the world, possibly in Beijing, New York or London, and possibly at the same time in these three places, you must ensure that the cloud service providers, they are willing to give a contract commitment to comply with some of the relevant privacy laws?

4 , data isolation

Of course, cloud providers use SSL to protect data in transit, but when your company's data is on a storage device, it may share a "virtual safe" with data from other companies. Is your company's data properly segregated from other people's data?

Providers may boast about how powerful and secure their encryption technology is. You will hear how long the key length is and which esoteric encryption algorithm to use. However, if your data can be read by the provider, then you can think that the data will be read by others.

5 , Availability

In theory, if you're using a cloud-computing service provider, there's no need to worry about your data disappearing-it's easy to use redundancy to replicate your data to many places so that you can sit still if the system crashes.

But will your employees be able to access the data needed to get the job done at any time? What if the virtual pipeline is blocked? What if the provider's own internal failure causes you to not be able to access your key data?

6 , disaster recovery

Hope the worst never happens, and no major catastrophe will happen to you, your provider or the world. But your provider must be prepared for this. But is your provider capable of a full recovery? How long does it take to complete a full recovery?

7 , survey support

It has never been easy to conduct an in-house legal investigation, as it would require an inventory of a large number of documents that might be dispersed in both physical and virtual locations. If you're using a cloud-computing service provider, it's even more difficult to do this: many customers ' data may be put together in a series of data centers that are constantly changing locations.

8 , survivability

Has your cloud service provider been acquired? or worse, is it going to go bankrupt? If so, how long will it take the other person to return the data to you and use the format so that you can import it into another provider's infrastructure?

9 , risk reduction support

Your employees will experience a learning process when they start using external providers. How easy is the interface provided by this provider? Does the provider help your manager set up a monitoring policy? What measures have been taken to prevent malware and phishing?

Cloud computing is far from us

While businesses are constantly promoting the benefits of cloud computing, cloud computing is still a big limitation in the definition of cloud computing and cloud service patterns, and cloud computing is not currently available for critical applications that require accurate data, Hewlett-Packard Chief technology officer Russ Daniels warns that cloud computing is not fit to run enterprise applications such as SAP in its current state, mainly because of poor data accuracy and the need to redesign too many applications to support cloud computing.

The economic crisis has affected almost all industries, the IT industry is no exception, a report by IDC says the global economic crisis is dawning on cloud computing, and IDC says "cloud mode provides companies with a more economical way to get it and use it, especially in a recession." This is very important for small and medium-sized enterprises, and SMEs are also officially the main objective of any economic recovery plan. "I think this prediction is too optimistic, at present, the application model of cloud computing is relatively single and immature, and the service mode of each manufacturer is not the same, there is no industry standard, these are hindering the development of cloud computing, and cloud computing business model is also in the groping stage, the enterprise adopts cloud computing has too many worries, And SMEs now do not have the urgent need to adopt cloud computing.

I think this is the sermon phase of cloud computing, the concept of cloud computing is popular in the cloud computing before the process, the author predicts that the cloud should at least wait until after this round of financial turmoil to quell the large-scale development!