Cloud computing is about to rise

To the best of our knowledge cloud computing is a brand new business model whose core is still data center related and uses hardware that consists of thousands of industry standard servers mainly powered by Intel or AMD Production processors and other hardware vendors. Individuals and businesses get the computing power over high-speed Internet, avoiding unnecessary investment.

In short, cloud computing will turn the future of the Internet into a supercomputing paradise. "The rationale behind cloud computing is that the enterprise data center will run much like the Internet by distributing computing across a large number of distributed computers rather than on local computers or remote servers, allowing businesses to switch resources to needed Application, access to computers and storage systems on demand. "Willy Chiu, IBM vice president of on-demand solutions for high-performance solutions, told reporters at the IBM Innovation Forum in Shanghai in mid-November.

This is a revolutionary move. For example, this is like a shift from the old single-generator model to a centralized power-supply model. It means that computing power can also be circulated as a commodity, just like gas and water, easy to access and inexpensive. The big difference is that it is transmitted over the Internet.

This technical competition attracted many participants. Including Sun, IBM, Microsoft, Google, Amazon and other information giants have followed. "Cloud computing is on the rise," said Dan Reed, a Microsoft supercomputer researcher. "The driving force behind the rise of cloud computing is the development of high-speed Internet connections, the cheaper and more powerful chips and the growth of hard drives and data centers."

Internet companies are pioneers in this area, Google's search engine can be regarded as the early cloud computing products. The user's search request is sent over the Internet to Google's large server cluster, and then returned to the user's desktop. Amazon.com recently opened up a service called "Elastic Computer Cloud" to developers that lets smaller software companies buy Amazon data centers as they need.

IT giants glimpsed more business opportunities. In 2006, Sun introduced the "Black Box" program based on cloud computing theory. According to its plan, future datacenters will not be confined to crowded, stuffy machines, but moveable containers - loaded with 10 tons of properly housed servers as a moveable data center. It can serve large companies with tens of thousands of employees, as well as small and medium-sized businesses. As for the best placement of such a data center, it is recommended that the field is on the outskirts of the country, preferably near the power station, thus achieving the lowest cost.

Blue giant IBM also cast a heavy heart, and named it "Blue Cloud" plan. Not long ago, IBM and Google reached a cooperation, the two companies will each contribute 20 million to 25 million US dollars, for computer science research professors and students to provide the necessary computer hardware and software and related services. Willian M.Zeilter, senior vice president of systems and technology at IBM, said: "To me, it feels like the face of Linux in 2000." Currently, the company has deployed more than 200 developers in the business On the research.

"In a sense, cloud computing is a natural progression of grid computing models," said IDC analyst Frank Gens. So, who is able to win this race around the cloud computing it?