What is Cloud Computing !!!!

[Momin]

Cloud computing is the provision of dynamically scalable and often virtualised resources as a service over the Internet. Users need not have knowledge of, expertise in, or control over the technology infrastructure in the "cloud" that supports them. Cloud computing services often provide common business applications online that are accessed from a web browser, while the software and data are stored on the servers.

The term cloud is used as a metaphor for the Internet, based on how the Internet is depicted in computer network diagrams and is an abstraction of the underlying infrastructure it conceals.

A technical definition is "a computing capability that provides an abstraction between the computing resource and its underlying technical architecture (e.g., servers, storage, networks), enabling convenient, on-demand network access to a shared pool of configurable computing resources that can be rapidly provisioned and released with minimal management effort or service provider interaction." This definition states that clouds have five essential characteristics: on-demand self-service, broad network access, resource pooling, rapid elasticity, and measured service.

Overview
Comparisons
Cloud computing can be confused with:
Grid computing—"a form of distributed computing whereby a 'super and virtual computer' is composed of a cluster of networked, loosely coupled computers acting in concert to perform very large tasks";
Utility computing—the "packaging of computing resources, such as computation and storage, as a metered service similar to a traditional public utility, such as electricity";
and
Autonomic computing—"computer systems capable of self-management".
Indeed, many cloud computing deployments as of 2009[update] depend on grids, have autonomic characteristics, and bill like utilities—but cloud computing tends to expand what is provided by grids and utilities. Some successful cloud architectures have little or no centralized infrastructure or billing systems whatsoever, including peer-to-peer networks such as BitTorrent and Skype, and volunteer computing such as SETI@home.

Furthermore, many analysts are keen to stress the evolutionary, incremental pathway between grid technology and cloud computing, tracing roots back to application service providers (ASPs) in the 1990s and the parallels to SaaS, often referred to as applications on the cloud. Some believe the true difference between these terms is marketing and branding; that the technology evolution was incremental and the marketing evolution discrete.

Characteristics
Cloud computing customers do not generally own the physical infrastructure serving as host to the software platform in question. Instead, they avoid capital expenditure by renting usage from a third-party provider. They consume resources as a service and pay only for resources that they use. Many cloud-computing offerings employ the utility computing model, which is analogous to how traditional utility services (such as electricity) are consumed, while others bill on a subscription basis. Sharing "perishable and intangible" computing power among multiple tenants can improve utilization rates, as servers are not unnecessarily left idle (which can reduce costs significantly while increasing the speed of application development). A side effect of this approach is that overall computer usage rises dramatically, as customers do not have to engineer for peak load limits. Additionally, "increased high-speed bandwidth" makes it possible to receive the same response times from centralized infrastructure at other sites.

Economics
Diagram showing economics of cloud computing versus traditional IT, including capital expenditure (CapEx) and operational expenditure (OpEx)Cloud computing users can avoid capital expenditure (CapEx) on hardware, software, and services when they pay a provider only for what they use. Consumption is usually billed on a utility (e.g. resources consumed, like electricity) or subscription (e.g. time based, like a newspaper) basis with little or no upfront cost. A few cloud providers are now beginning to offer the service for a flat monthly fee as opposed to on a utility billing basis. Other benefits of this time sharing style approach are low barriers to entry, shared infrastructure and costs, low management overhead, and immediate access to a broad range of applications. Users can generally terminate the contract at any time (thereby avoiding return on investment risk and uncertainty) and the services are often covered by service level agreements (SLAs) with financial penalties.

According to Nicholas Carr, the strategic importance of information technology is diminishing as it becomes standardized and less expensive. He argues that the cloud computing paradigm shift is similar to the displacement of electricity generators by electricity grids early in the 20th century.

Although companies might be able to save on upfront capital expenditures, they might not save much and might actually pay more for operating expenses. In situations where the capital expense would be relatively small, or where the organization has more flexibility in their capital budget than their operating budget, the cloud model might not make great fiscal sense. Other factors impacting the scale of any potential cost savings include the efficiency of a company’s data center as compared to the cloud vendor’s, the company's existing operating costs, the level of adoption of cloud computing, and the type of functionality being hosted in the cloud.

Architecture
The majority of cloud computing infrastructure, as of 2009[update], consists of reliable services delivered through data centers and built on servers with different levels of virtualization technologies. The services are accessible anywhere that provides access to networking infrastructure. Clouds often appear as single points of access for all consumers' computing needs. Commercial offerings are generally expected to meet quality of service (QoS) requirements of customers and typically offer SLAs.[19] Open standards are critical to the growth of cloud computing, and open source software has provided the foundation for many cloud computing implementations.

History
The Cloud is a term that borrows from telephony. Up to the 1990s, data circuits (including those that carried Internet traffic) were hard-wired between destinations. Subsequently, long-haul telephone companies began offering Virtual Private Network (VPN) service for data communications. Telephone companies were able to offer VPN based services with the same guaranteed bandwidth as fixed circuits at a lower cost because they could switch traffic to balance utilization as they saw fit, thus utilizing their overall network bandwidth more effectively. As a result of this arrangement, it was impossible to determine in advance precisely which paths the traffic would be routed over. The term "telecom cloud" was used to describe this type of networking, and cloud computing is conceptually somewhat similar.

The underlying concept of cloud computing dates back to 1960, when John McCarthy opined that "computation may someday be organized as a public utility"; indeed it shares characteristics with service bureaus that date back to the 1960s. Ramnath K. Chellappa defined it as a computing paradigm where the boundaries of computing will be determined by economic rationale rather than technical limits. The term cloud had already come into commercial use in the early 1990s to refer to large Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) networks. By the turn of the 21st century, the term "cloud computing" began to appear more widely, although most of the focus at that time was limited to SaaS.

In 1999, Salesforce.com was established by Marc Benioff, Parker Harris, and their associates. They applied many technologies developed by companies such as Google and Yahoo! to business applications. They also provided the concept of "On demand" and SaaS with their real business and successful customers. The key for SaaS is that it is customizable by customers with limited technical support required. Business users have enthusiastically welcomed the resulting flexibility and speed.

In the early 2000s, Microsoft extended the concept of SaaS through the development of web services. IBM detailed these concepts in 2001 in the Autonomic Computing Manifesto, which described advanced automation techniques such as self-monitoring, self-healing, self-configuring, and self-optimizing in the management of complex IT systems with heterogeneous storage, servers, applications, networks, security mechanisms, and other system elements that can be virtualized across an enterprise.

Amazon played a key role in the development of cloud computing by modernizing their data centers after the dot-com bubble which, like most computer networks, were using as little as 10% of their capacity at any one time just to leave room for occasional spikes. Having found that the new cloud architecture resulted in significant internal efficiency improvements whereby, small, fast-moving "two-pizza teams" could add new features faster and easier, Amazon started providing access to their systems through Amazon Web Services on a utility computing basis in 2005.

In 2007, Google, IBM, and a number of universities embarked on a large scale cloud computing research project. By mid-2008, Gartner saw an opportunity for cloud computing "to shape the relationship among consumers of IT services, those who use IT services and those who sell them", and observed that "organisations are switching from company-owned hardware and software assets to per-use service-based models" so that the "projected shift to cloud computing ... will result in dramatic growth in IT products in some areas and in significant reductions in other areas."

Political issues
The Cloud spans many borders and "may be the ultimate form of globalization." As such, it becomes subject to complex geopolitical issues, and providers are pressed to satisfy myriad regulatory environments in order to deliver service to a global market. This dates back to the early days of the Internet, when libertarian thinkers felt that "cyberspace was a distinct place calling for laws and legal institutions of its own".

Despite efforts (such as US-EU Safe Harbor) to harmonize the legal environment, as of 2009, providers such as Amazon Web Services cater to major markets (typically the United States and the European Union) by deploying local infrastructure and allowing customers to select "availability zones." Nonetheless, concerns persist about security and privacy from individual through governmental levels (e.g., the USA PATRIOT Act, the use of national security letters, and the Electronic Communications Privacy Act's Stored Communications Act.

Legal issues
In March 2007, Dell applied to trademark the term "cloud computing" (U.S. Trademark 77,139,082) in the United States. The "Notice of Allowance" the company received in July 2008 was cancelled in August, resulting in a formal rejection of the trademark application less than a week later.

In September 2008, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) issued a "Notice of Allowance" to CGactive LLC (U.S. Trademark 77,355,287) for "CloudOS". As defined under this notice, a cloud operating system is a generic operating system that "manage[s] the relationship between software inside the computer and on the Web", such as Microsoft Azure.

In November 2007, the Free Software Foundation released the Affero General Public License, a version of GPLv3 intended to close a perceived legal loophole associated with Free software designed to be run over a network, particularly SaaS. An application service provider is required to release any changes they make to Affero GPL open source code.

Control issues
The founder and president of the Free Software Foundation Richard Stallman has warned people that cloud computing will force people to buy into locked, proprietary systems that will cost more and more over time.

Key characteristics

• Agility improves with users able to rapidly and inexpensively re-provision technological infrastructure resources. The cost of overall computing is unchanged, however, and the providers will merely absorb up-front costs and spread costs over a longer period.
• Cost is claimed to be greatly reduced and capital expenditure is converted to operational expenditure. This ostensibly lowers barriers to entry, as infrastructure is typically provided by a third-party and does not need to be purchased for one-time or infrequent intensive computing tasks. Pricing on a utility computing basis is fine-grained with usage-based options and fewer IT skills are required for implementation (in-house). Some would argue that given the low cost of computing resources, that the IT burden merely shifts the cost from in-house to outsourced providers. Furthermore, any cost reduction benefit must be weighed against a corresponding loss of control, access and security risks.
• Device and location independence enable users to access systems using a web browser regardless of their location or what device they are using (e.g., PC, mobile). As infrastructure is off-site (typically provided by a third-party) and accessed via the Internet, users can connect from anywhere.
• Multi-tenancy enables sharing of resources and costs across a large pool of users thus allowing for:
  • Centralization of infrastructure in locations with lower costs (such as real estate, electricity, etc.)
  • Peak-load capacity increases (users need not engineer for highest possible load-levels)
  • Utilization and efficiency improvements for systems that are often only 10–20% utilized.
• Reliability improves through the use of multiple redundant sites, which makes cloud computing suitable for business continuity and disaster recovery. Nonetheless, many major cloud computing services have suffered outages, and IT and business managers can at times do little when they are affected.
• Scalability via dynamic ("on-demand") provisioning of resources on a fine-grained, self-service basis near real-time, without users having to engineer for peak loads. Performance is monitored, and consistent and loosely-coupled architectures are constructed using web services as the system interface.
• Security typically improves due to centralization of data, increased security-focused resources, etc., but concerns can persist about loss of control over certain sensitive data, and the lack of security for stored kernels. Security is often as good as or better than under traditional systems, in part because providers are able to devote resources to solving security issues that many customers cannot afford. Providers typically log accesses, but accessing the audit logs themselves can be difficult or impossible.
• Sustainability comes about through improved resource utilization, more efficient systems, and carbon neutrality. Nonetheless, computers and associated infrastructure are major consumers of energy.

Layers
Clients
A cloud client consists of computer hardware and/or computer software which relies on cloud computing for application delivery, or which is specifically designed for delivery of cloud services and which, in either case, is essentially useless without it. For example:

• Mobile (Android, iPhone, Windows Mobile)
• Thin client (CherryPal, Zonbu, gOS-based systems)
• Thick client / Web browser (Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, WebKit)

Application
A cloud application leverages cloud computing in software architecture, often eliminating the need to install and run the application on the customer's own computer, thus alleviating the burden of software maintenance, ongoing operation, and support. For example:

• Peer-to-peer / volunteer computing (BOINC, Skype)
• Web applications (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube)
• Security as a service (MessageLabs, Purewire, ScanSafe, Zscaler)
• Software as a service (Google Apps, Salesforce, SpringCM)
• Software plus services (Microsoft Online Services)
• Storage [Distributed]
• Content distribution (BitTorrent, Amazon CloudFront)
• Synchronisation (Live Mesh)

Platform
A cloud platform (PaaS) delivers a computing platform and/or solution stack as a service, generally consuming cloud infrastructure and supporting cloud applications. It facilitates deployment of applications without the cost and complexity of buying and managing the underlying hardware and software layers. For example:

• Services
  1) Identity (OAuth, OpenID)
  2) Payments (Amazon Flexible Payments Service, Google Checkout, PayPal)
  3) Search (Alexa, Google Custom Search, Yahoo! BOSS)
  4) Real-world (Amazon Mechanical Turk)
• Solution stacks
  1) Java (Google App Engine)
  2) PHP (Rackspace Cloud Sites)
  3) Python Django (Google App Engine)
  4) Ruby on Rails (Heroku)
  5) .NET (Azure Services Platform, Rackspace Cloud Sites)
  6) Proprietary (Force.com, WorkXpress, Wolf Frameworks)
• Storage [Structured]
  1) Databases (Amazon SimpleDB, BigTable)
  2) File storage (Amazon S3, Nirvanix, Rackspace Cloud Files)
  3) Queues (Amazon SQS)

Infrastructure
Cloud infrastructure (IaaS) is the delivery of computer infrastructure, typically a platform virtualization environment, as a service. For example:

• Compute (Amazon CloudWatch, RightScale)
  1) Physical machines (Softlayer)
  2) Virtual machines (Amazon EC2, GoGrid, Rackspace Cloud Servers, Terremark Enterprise Cloud)
  3) OS-level virtualisation
• Network (Amazon VPC)
• Storage [Raw] (Amazon EBS)

Servers
The servers layer consists of computer hardware and/or computer software products which are specifically and soley designed for the delivery of cloud services. For example:

• Fabric computing (Cisco UCS)

Architecture
Cloud architecture, the systems architecture of the software systems involved in the delivery of cloud computing, comprises hardware and software designed by a cloud architect who typically works for a cloud integrator. It typically involves multiple cloud components communicating with each other over application programming interfaces, usually web services.

This closely resembles the Unix philosophy of having multiple programs each doing one thing well and working together over universal interfaces. Complexity is controlled and the resulting systems are more manageable than their monolithic counterparts.

Cloud architecture extends to the client, where web browsers and/or software applications access cloud applications.

Cloud storage architecture is loosely coupled, where metadata operations are centralized enabling the data nodes to scale into the hundreds, each independently delivering data to applications or users.

Types

Public cloud
Public cloud or external cloud describes cloud computing in the traditional mainstream sense, whereby resources are dynamically provisioned on a fine-grained, self-service basis over the Internet, via web applications/web services, from an off-site third-party provider who shares resources and bills on a fine-grained utility computing basis.

Hybrid cloud
A hybrid cloud environment consisting of multiple internal and/or external providers "will be typical for most enterprises".

Private cloud
Private cloud and internal cloud are neologisms that some vendors have recently used to describe offerings that emulate cloud computing on private networks. These (typically virtualisation automation) products claim to "deliver some benefits of cloud computing without the pitfalls", capitalising on data security, corporate governance, and reliability concerns. They have been criticized on the basis that users "still have to buy, build, and manage them" and as such do not benefit from lower up-front capital costs and less hands-on management, essentially "lacking the economic model that makes cloud computing such an intriguing concept".

While an analyst predicted in 2008 that private cloud networks would be the future of corporate IT, there is some uncertainty whether they are a reality even within the same firm. Analysts also claim that within five years a "huge percentage" of small and medium enterprises will get most of their computing resources from external cloud computing providers as they "will not have economies of scale to make it worth staying in the IT business" or be able to afford private clouds. Analysts have reported on Platform's view that private clouds are a stepping stone to external clouds, particularly for the financial services, and that future datacenters will look like internal clouds.

The term has also been used in the logical rather than physical sense, for example in reference to platform as a service offerings, though such offerings including Microsoft's Azure Services Platform are not available for on-premises deployment.

[Momin]

An application service provider (ASP) is a business that provides computer-based services to customers over a network. Software offered using an ASP model is also sometimes called On-demand software or software as a service (SaaS). The most limited sense of this business is that of providing access to a particular application program (such as customer relationship management) using a standard protocol such as HTTP.

The need for ASPs has evolved from the increasing costs of specialized software that have far exceeded the price range of small to medium sized businesses. As well, the growing complexities of software have led to huge costs in distributing the software to end-users. Through ASPs, the complexities and costs of such software can be cut down. In addition, the issues of upgrading have been eliminated from the end-firm by placing the onus on the ASP to maintain up-to-date services, 24 x 7 technical support, physical and electronic security and in-built support for business continuity and flexible working.

The importance of this marketplace is reflected by its size. As of early 2003, estimates of the United States market range from 1.5 to 4 billion dollars. Clients for ASP services include businesses, government organizations, non-profits, and membership organizations.

Provider types
There are several forms of ASP business. These are:

A specialist or functional ASP delivers a single application, such as credit card payment processing or timesheet services;
A vertical market ASP delivers a solution package for a specific customer type, such as a dental practice;
An enterprise ASP delivers broad spectrum solutions;
A local ASP delivers small business services within a limited area.
Some analysts identify a volume ASP as a fifth type. This is basically a specialist ASP that offers a low cost packaged solution via their own website. PayPal was an instance of this type, and their volume was one way to lower the unit cost of each transaction.

In addition to these types, some large multi-line companies (such as IBM), use ASP concepts as a particular business model that supports some specific customers.

The ASP model
The application software resides on the vendor's system and is accessed by users through a web browser using HTML or by special purpose client software provided by the vendor. Custom client software can also interface to these systems through XML APIs. These APIs can also be used where integration with in-house systems is required.

Common features associated with ASPs include:

• ASP fully owns and operates the software application(s)
• ASP owns, operates and maintains the servers that support the software
• ASP makes information available to customers via the Internet or a "thin client"
• ASP bills on a "per-use" basis or on a monthly/annual fee

The advantages to this approach include:

• Software integration issues are eliminated from the client site
• Software costs for the application are spread over a number of clients
• Vendors can build more application experience than the in-house staff
• Key software systems are kept up to date, available, and managed for performance by experts
• Improved reliability, availability, scalability and security of internal IT systems
• A provider's service level agreement guarantees a certain level of service
• Access to product and technology experts dedicated to available products
• Reduction of internal IT costs to a predictable monthly fee.
• Redeploying IT staff and tools to focus on strategic technology projects that impact the enterprise's bottom line

Some inherent disadvantages include:

• The client must generally accept the application as provided since ASPs can only afford a customized solution for the largest clients
• The client may rely on the provider to provide a critical business function, thus limiting their control of that function and instead relying on the provider
• Changes in the ASP market may result in changes in the type or level of service available to clients
• Integration with the client's non-ASP systems may be problematic

Evaluating an Application Service Provider security when moving to an ASP infrastructure can come at a high cost, as such a firm must assess the level of risk associated with the ASP itself. Failure to properly account for such risk can lead to:

• Loss of control of corporate data
• Loss of control of corporate image
• Insufficient ASP security to counter risks
• Exposure of corporate data to other ASP customers
• Compromise of corporate data

Some other risks include failure to account for the financial future of the ASP in general, i.e. how stable a company is and if it has the resources to continue business into the foreseeable future. For these reasons Cisco Systems has developed a comprehensive evaluation guideline. This guideline includes evaluating the scope of the ASP's service, the security of the program and the ASP's maturity with regard to security awareness. Finally the guidelines indicate the importance of performing audits on the ASP with respect to:[list][*]Port/Network service [*]Application vulnerability [*]ASP Personnel
Physical visits to the ASP to assess the formality of the organization will provide invaluable insight into the awareness of the firm.

History
In terms of their common goal of enabling customers to outsource specific computer applications so they can focus on their core competencies, ASPs may be regarded as the indirect descendants of the service bureaus of the 1960s and 1970s. In turn, those bureaus were trying to fulfill the vision of computing as a utility, which was first proposed by John McCarthy in a speech at MIT in 1961.

[Momin]

The Cloud Computing Manifesto is a manifesto containing a "public declaration of principles and intentions" for cloud computing providers and vendors, annotated as "a call to action for the worldwide cloud community" and "dedicated belief that the cloud should be open". It follows the earlier development of the Cloud Computing Bill of Rights which addresses similar issues from the users' point of view.

The document was developed "by way of an open community consensus process" in response to a request by Microsoft that "any 'manifesto' should be created, from its inception, through an open mechanism like a Wiki, for public debate and comment, all available through a Creative Commons license". Accordingly it is hosted on a MediaWiki wiki and licensed under the CC-BY-SA 3.0 license.

The original, controversial version of the document called the Open Cloud Manifesto was sharply criticised by Microsoft who "spoke out vehemently against it" for being developed in secret by a "shadowy group of IT industry companies", raising questions about conflicts of interest and resulting in extensive media coverage over the following days. A pre-announcement commits to the official publication of this document on March 30, 2009 (in spite of calls to publish it earlier), at which time the identities of the signatories ("several of the largest technology companies and organizations" led by IBM along with OMG and believed also to include Cisco, HP, and Sun Microsystems) is said to be revealed. Amazon, Google, Microsoft and Salesforce.com are among those known to have rejected the document by declining to be signatories. The document was leaked by Geva Perry in a blog post on 27 March 2009 and confirmed to be authentic shortly afterwards.

The authors of both public and private documents have agreed to "work to bring together the best points of each effort".

Controversy
The Open Cloud Manifesto version, developed in private by a secret consortium of companies, was prematurely revealed by Microsoft's Senior Director of Developer Platform Product Management, Steve Martin on 26 March 2009. They claim that they were "privately shown a copy of the document, warned that it was a secret, and told that it must be signed 'as is,' without modifications or additional input", a point which is disputed by Reuven Cohen (originally believed to be the document's author). Some commentators found it ironic that Microsoft should speak out in support of open standards while others felt that their criticism was justified, comparing it to the "long, ugly war over WS-I". The call for open cloud standards was later echoed by Brandon Watson, Microsoft's Director of Cloud Services Ecosystem.

Principles
The following principles are defined by the document:

• User centric systems enrich the lives of individuals, education, communication, collaboration, business, entertainment and society as a whole; the end user is the primary stakeholder in cloud computing.
• Philanthropic initiatives can greatly increase the well-being of mankind; they should be enabled or enhanced by cloud computing where possible.
• Openness of standards, systems and software empowers and protects users; existing standards should be adopted where possible for the benefit of all stakeholders.
• Transparency fosters trust and accountability; decisions should be open to public collaboration and scrutiny and never be made "behind closed doors".
• Interoperability ensures effectiveness of cloud computing as a public resource; systems must be interoperable over a minimal set of community defined standards and vendor lock-in must be avoided.
• Representation of all stakeholders is essential; interoperability and standards efforts should not be dominated by vendor(s).
• Discrimination against any party for any reason is unacceptable; barriers to entry must be minimised.
• Evolution is an ongoing process in an immature market; standards may take some time to develop and coalesce but activities should be coordinated and collaborative.
• Balance of commercial and consumer interests is paramount; if in doubt consumer interests prevail.
• Security is fundamental, not optional

[Farhan]

lolzz Its very informative, mujhy uni main aik dafa isi topic pe itna khawar huna para tha .. pehly kerty to meri assignment main full marks aty na =(

[Momin]

arey to tum ne pehley mujh se pooch lena tha na you know I am in the field of data storage so I could have informed you then as well
although cloud computing is a reletaviely new technology and is still evolving

[Momin]

Gartner Says Cloud Computing Will Be As Influential As E-business

Special Report Examines the Realities and Risks of Cloud Computing
STAMFORD, Conn., June 26, 2008 —

Cloud computing heralds an evolution of business that is no less influential than e-business, according to Gartner Inc. Gartner maintains that the very confusion and contradiction that surrounds the term "cloud computing" signifies its potential to change the status quo in the IT market.
Gartner defines cloud computing as a style of computing where massively scalable IT-related capabilities are provided “as a service” using Internet technologies to multiple external customers.
“During the past 15 years, a continuing trend toward IT industrialization has grown in popularity as IT services delivered via hardware, software and people are becoming repeatable and usable by a wide range of customers and service providers,” said Daryl Plummer, managing vice president and Gartner Fellow. “This is due, in part to the commoditization and standardization of technologies, in part to virtualization and the rise of service-oriented software architectures, and most importantly, to the dramatic growth in popularity of the Internet.”
Mr. Plummer said that taken together, these three major trends constitute the basis of a discontinuity that will create a new opportunity to shape the relationship between those who use IT services and those who sell them. Essentially it will mean that users of IT-related services will be able to focus on what the service provides them rather than how the services are implemented or hosted. Gartner maintains that although names for this type of operation have come into vogue at different times — utility computing, software as a service (SaaS) and application service providers — none has garnered widespread acceptance as the central theme for how IT-related services can be delivered globally.
The types of IT services that can be provided through a cloud are wide-reaching. Compute facilities provide computational services so that users can use central processing unit (CPU) cycles without buying computers. Storage services provide a way to store data and documents without having to continually grow farms of storage networks and servers. SaaS companies offer CRM services through their multitenant shared facilities so clients can manage their customers without buying software. These represent only the beginning of options for delivering all kinds of complex capabilities to both businesses and individuals.
“The focus has moved up from the infrastructure implementations and onto the services that allow for access to the capabilities provided,” said David Mitchell Smith, vice president and Gartner Fellow. “Although many companies will argue how the cloud services are implemented, the ultimate measure of success will be how the services are consumed and whether that leads to new business opportunities.”
Gartner predicts that the impact of cloud computing on IT vendors will be huge. Established vendors have a great presence in traditional software markets, and as new Web 2.0 and cloud business models evolve and expand outside of consumer markets, a great deal could change. “The vendors are at very different levels of maturity,” said David Cearley, vice president and Gartner Fellow. “The consumer-focused vendors are the most mature in delivering what Gartner calls a ‘cloud/Web platform’ from technology and community perspectives, but the business-focused vendors have rich business services and, at times, are very adept at selling business services.”
Branding is a powerful and revenue-generating asset for potential vendors. Gartner analysts cited Wal-Mart as an example of a company that has two brands — one with consumers for its low prices and one in the business world for its supply chain expertise, its core competency, which it capitalizes on to support its consumer-facing brand.
“Companies invest billions of dollars in building up their core competencies, much of which goes into IT,” Mr. Smith said. “If companies could lease their core competencies to other companies then they would capitalize on both brands, driving revenue both in the consumer-facing market and the business service market in the way that Amazon has done with technology.”
Gartner maintains that cloud computing is very much an evolving concept that will take many years to fully mature. It also underlined the fact that the cloud-computing model is not simply the next generation of the Internet.
“When organizations cross the threshold between the Internet as a communications channel and the deliberate delivery of service over the Internet, then we truly start to head for an economy based on consumption of everything from storage to computation to video to finance deduction management,” said Mr. Plummer.
Additional information is available in the Gartner report "Cloud Computing Confusion Leads to Opportunity." The report is available on Gartner’s Web site at http://www.gartner.com/DisplayDocument?doc_cd=159034&ref=g_sitelink&ref=g _SiteLink. This document is part of the special report on Cloud Computing. A full listing of the reports is available on Gartner's Web site at http://www.gartner.com/it/products/research/cloud_computing/cloud_computing.jsp.
Gartner analysts will further discuss cloud computing trends at the Gartner Web Innovation Summit: Profiting from Web 2.0, SaaS and Cloud Computing taking place September 15-17 in Los Angeles. The event is focused on the next generation of Web technologies, including Web 2.0 and cloud computing and will cover future trends and innovations, best practices, vendor and product selections, tutorials, and tactical decision frameworks. For complete event details, please visit the Gartner Web Innovation Summit Web site athttp://www.gartner.com/it/page.jsp?id=648611. Members of the media can register by contacting Christy Pettey atchristy.pettey@gartner.com.

Source:Gartner Says Cloud Computing Will Be As Influential As E-business

[Momin]

What cloud computing really means

The next big trend sounds nebulous, but it's not so fuzzy when you view the value proposition from the perspective of IT professionals


Cloud computing is all the rage. "It's become the phrase du jour," says Gartner senior analyst Ben Pring, echoing many of his peers. The problem is that (as with Web 2.0) everyone seems to have a different definition.
As a metaphor for the Internet, "the cloud" is a familiar cliché, but when combined with "computing," the meaning gets bigger and fuzzier. Some analysts and vendors define cloud computing narrowly as an updated version of utility computing: basically virtual servers available over the Internet. Others go very broad, arguing anything you consume outside the firewall is "in the cloud," including conventional outsourcing.
[ Learn how early adopters of cloud computing have used the technology and the lessons they have learned. | See how Amazon, Google, and other cloud platforms stack up in the InfoWorld Test Center's comparison. ]
Cloud computing comes into focus only when you think about what IT always needs: a way to increase capacity or add capabilities on the fly without investing in new infrastructure, training new personnel, or licensing new software. Cloud computing encompasses any subscription-based or pay-per-use service that, in real time over the Internet, extends IT's existing capabilities.
Cloud computing is at an early stage, with a motley crew of providers large and small delivering a slew of cloud-based services, from full-blown applications to storage services to spam filtering. Yes, utility-style infrastructure providers are part of the mix, but so are SaaS (software as a service) providers such as Salesforce.com. Today, for the most part, IT must plug into cloud-based services individually, but cloud computing aggregators and integrators are already emerging.
InfoWorld talked to dozens of vendors, analysts, and IT customers to tease out the various components of cloud computing. Based on those discussions, here's a rough breakdown of what cloud computing is all about:
1. SaaS
This type of cloud computing delivers a single application through the browser to thousands of customers using a multitenant architecture. On the customer side, it means no upfront investment in servers or software licensing; on the provider side, with just one app to maintain, costs are low compared to conventional hosting. Salesforce.com is by far the best-known example among enterprise applications, but SaaS is also common for HR apps and has even worked its way up the food chain to ERP, with players such as Workday. And who could have predicted the sudden rise of SaaS "desktop" applications, such as Google Apps and Zoho Office?

2. Utility computing
The idea is not new, but this form of cloud computing is getting new life from Amazon.com, Sun, IBM, and others who now offer storage and virtual servers that IT can access on demand. Early enterprise adopters mainly use utility computing for supplemental, non-mission-critical needs, but one day, they may replace parts of the datacenter. Other providers offer solutions that help IT create virtual datacenters from commodity servers, such as 3Tera's AppLogic and Cohesive Flexible Technologies' Elastic Server on Demand. Liquid Computing's LiquidQ offers similar capabilities, enabling IT to stitch together memory, I/O, storage, and computational capacity as a virtualized resource pool available over the network.
3. Web services in the cloud
Closely related to SaaS, Web service providers offer APIs that enable developers to exploit functionality over the Internet, rather than delivering full-blown applications. They range from providers offering discrete business services -- such as Strike Iron and Xignite -- to the full range of APIs offered by Google Maps, ADP payroll processing, the U.S. Postal Service, Bloomberg, and even conventional credit card processing services.
4. Platform as a service
Another SaaS variation, this form of cloud computing delivers development environments as a service. You build your own applications that run on the provider's infrastructure and are delivered to your users via the Internet from the provider's servers. Like Legos, these services are constrained by the vendor's design and capabilities, so you don't get complete freedom, but you do get predictability and pre-integration. Prime examples include Salesforce.com's Force.com, Coghead and the new Google App Engine. For extremely lightweight development, cloud-based mashup platforms abound, such as Yahoo Pipes or Dapper.net.
[ Get the complete view of the cloud in our special report. ]
5. MSP (managed service providers)
One of the oldest forms of cloud computing, a managed service is basically an application exposed to IT rather than to end-users, such as a virus scanning service for e-mail or an application monitoring service (which Mercury, among others, provides). Managed security services delivered by SecureWorks, IBM, and Verizon fall into this category, as do such cloud-based anti-spam services as Postini, recently acquired by Google. Other offerings include desktop management services, such as those offered by CenterBeam or Everdream.
6. Service commerce platforms
A hybrid of SaaS and MSP, this cloud computing service offers a service hub that users interact with. They're most common in trading environments, such as expense management systems that allow users to order travel or secretarial services from a common platform that then coordinates the service delivery and pricing within the specifications set by the user. Think of it as an automated service bureau. Well-known examples include Rearden Commerce and Ariba.

7. Internet integration
The integration of cloud-based services is in its early days. OpSource, which mainly concerns itself with serving SaaS providers, recently introduced the OpSource Services Bus, which employs in-the-cloud integration technology from a little startup called Boomi. SaaS provider Workday recently acquired another player in this space, CapeClear, an ESB (enterprise service bus) provider that was edging toward b-to-b integration. Way ahead of its time, Grand Central -- which wanted to be a universal "bus in the cloud" to connect SaaS providers and provide integrated solutions to customers -- flamed out in 2005.
Today, with such cloud-based interconnection seldom in evidence, cloud computing might be more accurately described as "sky computing," with many isolated clouds of services which IT customers must plug into individually. On the other hand, as virtualization and SOA permeate the enterprise, the idea of loosely coupled services running on an agile, scalable infrastructure should eventually make every enterprise a node in the cloud. It's a long-running trend with a far-out horizon. But among big metatrends, cloud computing is the hardest one to argue with in the long term.

Source: What cloud computing really means | Cloud Computing - InfoWorld

[Momin]

Distinguishing Cloud Computing from Utility Computing

Cloud computing" is increasingly becoming one of those buzz words of the moment, and as tends to happen with buzz words (or phrases, in this case), it can be confusing to understand exactly what everything is and how the various technologies differ from one another. 3Tera Inc is a company that focuses on utility computing, and I recently got some interesting responses from 3Tera Chairman and CEO Barry X Lynn on how utility computing compares to cloud computing.
For those of us who aren't totally up to speed on the difference, can you summarize the difference between utility computing and cloud computing (in 75 words or less)?
Lynn: That would be analogous to trying to talk about the differences between electricity and a generator. So, I prefer talking about how one relates to the other, rather than the differences.
Cloud computing enables users and developers to utilize services without knowledge of, expertise with, nor control over the technology infrastructure that supports them. It is, almost literally, operating the service in a cloud. That's a good thing, because many companies lack the ability or desire to work with infrastructure. Utility computing, conversely, provides on-demand infrastructure with the ability to control, scale, and configure that infrastructure. At 3tera, we believe that a utility is necessary in order to build a reliable cloud.
How are cloud and utility computing different from Software as a Service?
Lynn: Again, I think it's best to define these things, rather than say how they differ. Software as a Service (SaaS) is, simply, a software enabled service that is offered on the web, on month to month subscription or on a pay per use basis, rather than having to purchase or license the software. Technically, SaaS does not have to be offered in a cloud, but given the nature of the SaaS business model, it's hard to conceive that running it in an environment other than a functional utility or cloud, makes much business sense in most cases.
Are cloud and utility computing closely related to virtualization technology? How do the two mix?
Lynn: Today, it is hard to understand how effective utility and cloud computing can be offered without using virtualization. However, there are many forms of virtualization used in utility computing, from virtual machines, to virtual storage and network virtualization and these still comprise just a few of many required technologies.
As an enterprise, you do not have to be a virtualization user already in order to benefit from cloud and utility computing.
But the true utility computing model is based on virtualization, because this is the way to get all the benefits that come with the utility, including scalability, ease of use, and affordable pricing.
What should people know about trends in cloud computing, utility computing, and virtualization as Web 2.0 (or Web 3.0, depending on whom you talk to) becomes more and more of a factor in the enterprise?
Lynn: SaaS and Web 2.0 offerings are becoming more and more prominent in enterprises, but they are probably the least predictable systems businesses run with regard to volume, resource needs, performance, etc.
Smart enterprises are starting to run these applications in clouds and utilities that scale up and down dynamically, securely linking them to their data centers. As acceptance and confidence in the utility grows, they will start moving things currently in their data centers to the utility as well.
Anything else you would like to add?
Lynn: A lot of companies give lip service to utility computing, but they only offer a small piece of what makes up a true utility.
To use another analogy, if you as an individual pick up a telephone, you get the same dial tone and ability to make calls as General Motors. You just pay less because you use it less.
If you, as a small business, plug something into the wall, you get the same 110 volts 60 Hz alternating current as Microsoft gets. You just pay less because you use less.
Largely, though, that is not true of computing and IT today. Not many businesses can afford to have access and build IT infrastructure that is available to the Fortune 500 companies. A real utility computing platform can change this. It should enable you to affordably have access to, and use of, the same world-class information technology as any Fortune 500 company. You would just pay less, because you use less. Of course, if you use a lot, even enterprise amounts, it's still a great deal. It's all about scalability up and down. Pay for what you need and use. Why would anyone ever pay more than that? You get to deploy applications instantly with infrastructure that grows and shrinks with your business needs."
That's what 3Tera does!

Source: http://www.ebizq.net/blogs/saasweek/2008/03/distinguishing_cloud_computing/

[Momin]

The Internet Cloud

By Jessie Holliday Scanlon and Brad Wieners
07.09.1999
Categories

• Wire

Cartoonists have gotten plenty of mileage out of the information superhighway, it's true. But when it comes to drawing the Internet, the icon of choice - from the MIT Media Lab to trade-show floors, from Intel (INTC)'s marketing blitzes to the PowerPoint slides of Robertson Stephens analysts - is a cloud.
Mostly, they slip past unnoticed. But once you wonder "Why a cloud?" each new flowchart doodle begs the question. Pay attention, and suddenly spotting the Internet cloud is like spying "11:11" on LCD clocks - the more you notice it, the more often it occurs, and you can't tell if it's because you're noticing, or if the clouds really are multiplying. And, in any case, the more you see it, the more difficult it is not to suppose it has meaning. Is the cloud trying to tell us something? And if so, what?
For one thing, clouds are easy to draw. There's no doubt about this. If you've ever tried mapping cyberspace in a hurry - in front of a prospective business partner or client, say - you know the cloud's advantage. Plus, there's another, subtle advantage to the cloud: You can use it to obscure what you don't know. Also, clouds are, after all, rainmakers - optimistic symbols of cash waiting to flow. Given the rise of engineer-CEOs, you can't be blamed for assuming that the cloud reflects a whiteboard vision of heaven on earth. Just as Jehovah guided the Israelites as a pillar of cloud, perhaps to technophiles who have occasion to sketch it, the Net is a holy condensation of bits or, for that matter, a holy terror.
"The physicist John Wheeler has famously declared that the world as seen through the lens of quantum mechanics is like 'a great smokey dragon,'" notes Margaret Wertheim, author of The Pearly Gates of Cyberspace: A History of Space from Dante to the Internet. "Instead of having clear boundaries and contours, reality seems to dissolve into a hazy fuzz. In a sense, something similar goes on with the reality of the Net. It too is like a great ill-defined fuzz with no clear boundaries and distinctions. Where does the Net end? Where does it start?"
Indeed, the great cloud of unknowing has many disciples, among them Jon Lebkowsky, a Well veteran and online community director for WholeFoods.com. Behind our graphic user interfaces, says the Big Lebowsky, lurks "a dark unreality where the volume of interconnections is beyond the imaginable. Your average Dilbert cloaks this chaos of signal and noise with the kind of cloud the Littlest Angel used to hover round, thinking to encapsulate the vast, active, living, intelligent system on the head of a pin."
Like a cloud, the Net can't be pinned down - it's alive, unpredictable, and, as innumerable startups learn, can prove a funnel cloud or even a Bengali typhoon. "When the Internet is depicted as cumulus humilis, it's dead wrong," says John Chambers, the CEO of networking giant Cisco Systems (CSCO). "It's much more altostratus - intense, rapid - and a failure to give it proper respect can result in disaster."
Ask the founders of the Net about the cloud, and it quickly becomes apparent that the Net cloud is as old as the Net itself.
"We always drew networks as amoeba-like things because they had no fixed topology and typically covered varying geographic areas," says Vint Cerf, cocreator of TCP/IP, the language of networked computers. In short, no one needs to know the exact route their data will take to get from point to point. Everything is fine as long as it comes out of the cloud at the correct address.
"As this Internet was being conceived, diagrams would be drawn to illustrate some design idea," testifies Net architect Bob Taylor. "Some used cloudlike sketches to represent the Internet itself while focusing on other things, like servers or gateways. Variations of these early diagrams ultimately made their way into the literature."
Novelist William Gibson, who coined the word "cyberspace" in his classic novel Neuromancer, first encountered the Net-as-cloud metaphor while preparing for his first video teleconference. He asked the tech guys how the signals would travel across the Net. It's not going across the Net, they told him. It's going through "the cloud" - through the totality of all the phone links in the world.
"Clouds are numinous," Gibson says. "But the cloud's main usefulness lies in its vagueness, like cyberspace - a word which is also useful for its vagueness. Or perhaps," he adds, "people are thinking of thought balloons in comics."

Source: http://www.thestandard.com/article/0%2C1902%2C5466%2C00.html?page=0%2C1

[Farhan]

arey to tum ne pehley mujh se pooch lena tha na you know I am in the field of data storage so I could have informed you then as well
although cloud computing is a reletaviely new technology and is still evolving

lolzz or is baat ka mujhy pehly kisi farishtny ne batana tha kia =P

[Momin]

hud ho gai, tumhain dilchaspi hi nahin ke nadeem bhai ke barey mian jaano to mera kiya kasoor hai

[xeon]

ahan cloud computing, I am working on the Microsoft Business Productivity Online Suite(BPOS) technology now

[Momin]

abey kabhi koi informative thread hi bana diya kar apni field se related
aur cloud computing per meri drift kafi weak hai, merey kuch conepts clear nahin hain, come on add kero achi achi information