CLOUD COMPUTING: AN INTRODUCTION

Cloud computing is where computing resources are accessed from the Internet or "cloud" rather than a local desktop or organizational data centre. Cloud computing is a rapidly growing trend and is highly interlinked with the development of Web 2.0. This said, it needs to be appreciated from the outset that conceptually at least cloud computing and Web 2.0 are quite distinct. Specifically, the key concept of Web 2.0 is making new forms of online connection between people, services and applications, whilst the key concept of cloud computing is the detachment of computing resources from any even notional location.

In addition to the below, you may find useful my Explaining Cloud Computing video, as well as this Cloud Computing Cheat Sheet from Silicon.com. BT also have some useful resources here, whilst InformationWeek have this excellent section on cloud computing. You may also like to read my new book A Brief Guide to Cloud Computing.

APPLICATIONS IN THE CLOUD

It can at first be difficult to understand just what is so different about cloud computing. It has, after all, been common practice to access remote computing resources across a network for many years -- be these resources websites out on the Internet, or applications and files stored in a corporate data centre. The easiest way to start delving into the cloud computing paradigm shift is therefore perhaps simply to take a look at what new developments are now becoming available. We'll then return to the deeper concept.

The first key development signalling the popular growth of cloud computing is the development of software as a service or "SaaS". As explored in both the Web 2.0 and software sections, this is where computer applications are accessed directly over the Internet, rather than being installed on local desktops or data centre servers. Commercial software as a service offerings currently include online project management tools from Clarizen, as well as customer relationship management (CRM) and human resource applications available from Salesforce, Employease and Zoho. Other notable cloud application providers include Netsuite, Workday and The IT Farm.

A number of cloud office applications are now available for tasks including word processing and making databases, spreadsheets and presentations. These include Google Docs, Blist, SlideRocket and a wide variety of excellent tools from Zoho, and allow anybody to create or upload documents into the cloud. Documents created with these applications can subsequently be recalled and worked on from any kind of computing device with an Internet connection. They can also be collaboratively shared.

All of the aforementioned online office applications are currently free. However, more sophisticated offerings are also available and are starting to enter mainstream corporate use. For example, the "Premiere Edition" of Google Apps (which includes a supported version of Google Docs along with e-mail and collaborative video sharing tools) is increasingly being rolled out in the place of traditional Microsoft software. For example, as reported by Silicon.com, following a successful trial in 2008 the Telegraph Media Group moved all of its 1,400 employees to Google Apps, and in doing so expected to cut its software costs by 80 per cent over three years in addition to facilitating new means of collaborate document authorship.

In 2009, the slow crawl towards cloud computing and in particular Google Apps / Google Docs started to become more of a stampede. Just some of the recent adopters include Jaguar Land Rover (with 15,000 staff), Rentokil Initial (with 35,000 staff), local government in Washington DC (with 38,000 staff) and Los Angeles (with 30,000 staff), and a whole host of UK Universities (covering hundreds of thousands of staff and student user).

HARDWARE IN THE CLOUD

In addition to software as a service, cloud computing also includes the development of "hardware as a service" or "HaaS". As detailed in the hardware section, this is where computer processing capacity is purchased over the web. Amazon, for example, now offer a web service called Elastic Compute Cloud or EC2. This allows users to purchase computer processing power online from Amazon, and on the basis on the processor cores, storage and data transfer they require in each "instance". Google has also launched a similar service called App Engine, and which permits developers to run web applications on Google's infrastructure. Microsoft is also developing a service called Azure as best explained in this white paper.

Hardware as a service can offer may advantages. Amazon, for example, highlight how EC2 is elastic - because it allows users to increase or decrease their requirements within minutes, flexible - because users can choose the specification of each individual instance of computing power, inexpensive - as no dedicated capital investment is required, and reliable - as EC2 makes use of Amazon's proven data centres and network infrastructure.

In addition to Amazon's EC2 offering, other current suppliers of hardware as a service include GoGrid and 3tera, both of which allow companies to replace their computing infrastructure with virtual servers hosted within their online cloud.

TOWARDS UTILITY COMPUTING

In his book The Big Switch, Nicholas Carr compares the growth of cloud computing to the development of the electricity network around a century ago. Before that time businesses had to generate their own power and therefore had to choose their location based on the available means of generation, such as moving water to drive a wheel or a supply of coal. However, with the availability of a reliable electricity grid to which they could connect, firms were increasingly freed from such constraints to focus on the other aspects of their business.

In exactly the same manner we are today just about entering an age in which both individuals and organizations will be able to dispense with a large home computer or corporate data centre, and instead connect far leaner computing devices to cloud computing resources that will fuel their information processing requirements. It is therefore hardly surprising that cloud computing is also being referred to as "grid computing" or "utility computing". In parallel, many new, low-cost ultramobile computers -- such as the Eee PC and Acer Aspire One -- are starting to be termed "computing appliances" due to the way in which they are intended to be used out-of the-box with no user software installation to access the emerging cloud of utility computing services. Thin client computing desktop devices designed to access their applications and even operating systems online are also becoming increasingly common as individuals and organizations embrace computing in the cloud. (For more information on these kinds of devices see lower power hardware).

The replacement of a traditional desktop PC and internal company server IT infrastructure with thin clients that access applications from a third party cloud computing resource is a growing trend for several reasons. Not least it can offer significant cost savings, freedom from constant upgrade cycles (which become the cloud provider's problem), as well as the opportunity to engage in far greener computing.

To cite a practical example, ThinDesk.com is offering small and medium-sized companies in Canada the opportunity to move to a thin client / cloud infrastructure and claims that customers can experience up to 40% cost savings, coupled with increased reliability and productivity. Carbon footprint and energy reduction savings of up to 80% can also potentially be achieved with a ThinDesk solution.

SECURITY CONCERNS

In theory and already in some current practice, cloud computing frees both individuals and organizations from the cost and hassle of installing, maintaining and constantly upgrading software applications on their desktops and/or in their data centres. It also allows companies to focus on their core competencies, rather than investing in centralized computing facilities that have to be maintained and upgraded and that may not be utilized at an optimum capacity. This said, the many critics of cloud computing point to the fact that users become totally reliant on a high quality Internet connection, and that externalizing one's data, applications and hardware out in the notional cloud creates a reliance on external suppliers with potentially related business continuity, data protection and security risks.

The aforementioned concerns do of course have to be carefully considered. This said, our reliance on the Internet is now so great that even if applications are locally installed then the disruption caused by an Internet outage is already highly significant. In a sense, a solid Internet connection has now become as requisite a utility service for business and personal activities as a constantly available phone network and electricity supply. And all that cloud computing is therefore doing is making us even more explicitly aware of this.

The same can be argued with respect to security concerns. Granted, using cloud computing makes individuals and organizations dependent on their cloud resource suppliers, with their data only as safe as their secure Internet connections. However, once again these are things on which we already implicitly rely. Anybody or any company who makes web searches or sends e-mail, let alone who purchases items or does their banking online, is already trusting both the quality of available online security, as well as companies such as Google and Amazon and their Internet Service Provider with their data. We should also not forget that storing data locally can also create data protection problems of its own, with lost or stolen laptops, USB keys or hard disks potentially proving disastrous as many recent events in the UK public sector have so aptly demonstrated.

Alongside the time it will take some for a mindset shift, the computing industry is also investing in overcoming the potential pitfalls that may be associated with cloud computing. For example, as recently reported by HP, along with Intel and Yahoo! it is investing considerable resources in a global cloud computing test bed to help research and overcome potential problems.

CLOUD COMPUTING: THE PARADIGM SHIFT

Somebody recently informed me that cloud computing sounds like a return to an age of centralized computing wherein dumb terminals are totally dependent on a centralized mainframe. To some extent there is more than a little truth in this. However, there are also important differences to the previous mainframe era. For a start, cloud computing is levelling the playing field by bringing the potential benefits of remote and highly professional computing resources to all sizes of business. Any company and indeed anybody can now connect to software or hardware as an online utility, with fewer companies having to invest in a large-scale computing infrastructure.

As the above hopefully highlights, cloud computing significantly differs from the previous dumb-terminal/mainframe era in that users do not become reliant on a single, specific, centralized computing resource that their organization has to invest in and maintain. Rather, they become reliant on a far looser external web of resources which they will always to an extent be free to "mash" as their needs dictate. In other words, a competent use of the cloud by either an individual or an organization ought always to involve a loose rather than a tight-coupling of computing resources. Reliance on individual SaaS or HaaS vendors ought therefore to be minimised in the same way that nobody obtaining power from a national electricity grid is dependent on the continuous functioning of an single, specific power plant.

In comparison to previous computing eras and paradigms, cloud computing potentially also offers many advantages. Not least, over the coming decade fewer individual users will be tied to a particular device when they want to access their data and applications. Collaborative working will also become far more common, with the benefits of using an online word processor or spreadsheet far outweighing the potential drawbacks in most circumstances. As explored in the green computing section, cloud computing is also likely to be far more environmentally friendly than many currently mainstream computing practices.

In tandem with Web 2.0, cloud computing may change the landscape of the computing industry. Amazon, Google, IBM and others are already embracing a cloud computing revolution. Indeed, Google's CEO Eric Schmidt recenty stated that cloud computing is bigger than the PC revolution. Traditional industry giants like Microsoft will therefore face an increasingly tough challenge if they try to continue to sell us software to install on local hardware.