Latest News from Cloud Computing Journal

Big Data: How Companies Transform Challenges into Business Opportunities

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 05:45:00 EST

Did you know that ninety percent of the data in the world has been created in the last two years? Every day, we create 2.5 quintillion (or 2.518) bytes of data, according to IBM. As corporations across all industries globally are struggling with how to retain, aggregate and analyze this mounting volume of what the industry refers to as Big Data, it also provides a unique opportunity for innovative startups that recognize the business prospects Big Data presents. Big Data is not just unlocking new information but new sources of economic and business value. Interactivity is driving Big Data, with people and machines both consuming and creating it. Digital companies focused on becoming good at aggregating and analyzing the data created by the end users of their product, who then provide their customers with solid insights taken from that data are at a distinct competitive advantage over others in the marketplace.

Cloud Computing Procurement: As Easy as Remembering RFP

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 05:45:00 EST

When it comes to procurement, any technology or service should be evaluated with a good set of criteria. Executive decisions should not be weighted solely on a single selection criterion such as price. This applies to any cloud computing service as well. The twelve criteria listed below (see Chart 1) forces executives to take a broader review of the many elements of the total cloud computing service, and not just price. Each criteria starts with an R, F, or P which makes it easy to remember the total framework for the Yardstick for Technology Procurement (RFP).

The Business Value of Cloud Computing

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 05:30:00 EST

Cloud computing has caught the attention of business leaders around the world in every industry because of its enormous transformative potential. Visionary companies know that the value of the cloud is far greater than the current focus solely on technology and operating costs: when combined with a collaborative approach to designing processes, cloud computing will change how we do business.

Cloud Expo New York: Cloud Computing and Healthcare

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 05:15:00 EST

What are the legal implications and consequences of cloud computing in the healthcare and high-tech sectors? What are the potential legal protections and solutions from the point of view of providers, suppliers and consumers? In his session at the 10th International Cloud Expo, Paul Rubell, a Partner at Meltzer Lippe, will discuss the federal mandates that will encourage “meaningful use” of EHR technology by 2015, and what those mandates will require executives to understand about cloud computing and solutions for implementing cloud computing across large companies, corporations and not-for-profits in advance of federal mandates.

Cloud Computing Goes Far Beyond Virtualization

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 05:00:00 EST

Virtualization vs. private cloud has confused many IT pros. Are they the same? Or different? In what way and how? We have already virtualized most of my computing resources, is a private cloud still relevant to us? This 2-part series is to answer these quesstions. Lately, many IT shops have introduced virtualization into existing computing environmentw. Consolidating servers, mimicking production environment, virtualizing test networks, securing resources with honey pots, adding disaster recovery options, etc. are just a few applications of employing virtualization. Some also run highly virtualized IT with automation provided by system management solutions. I imagine many IT pros recognize the benefits of virtualization including better utilization of servers, associated savings by reducing the physical footprint, etc. Now we are moving into a cloud era, the question then becomes "Is virtualization the same with a private cloud?" or "We are already running a highly virtualized computing today, do we still need a private cloud?" The answers to these questions should always start with "What business problems are you trying to address?" Then assess if a private cloud solution can fundamentally solve the problem, or perhaps virtualization is sufficient. This is of course assuming there is a clear understanding of what is virtualization and what is a private cloud. This point is that virtualization and cloud computing are not the same. They address IT challenges in different dimensions and operated in different scopes with different levels of impact on a business.

Big Data Expo New York Speaker Profile: David Lucas – GCE

Sun, 12 Feb 2012 13:30:00 EST

With Big Data Expo 2012 New York (co-located with 10th Cloud Expo) just four months away, what better time to start introducing you in greater detail to the distinguished individuals in our incredible Speaker Faculty for the technical and strategy sessions at the conference... We have technical and strategy sessions for you every day from June 11 through June 14 dealing with every nook and cranny of Cloud Computing and Big Data, but what of those who are presenting? Who are they, where do they work, what else have they written and/or said about the Cloud that is transforming the world of Enterprise IT, side by side with the exploding use of enterprise Big Data – processed in the Cloud – to drive value for businesses...?

AMD Sales Chief Out

Sun, 12 Feb 2012 13:00:00 EST

AMD said late Tuesday that its chief sales officer Emilio Ghilardi had left the company and that CEO and president Rory Read is going to do his job while a replacement is sought. AMD didn’t say why Ghilardi left but it’s assumed Read wants his own people. Read is relatively new to the company so the sales experience will be good for him. He knows how to do it judging from his record at Lenovo although it does leave him with a full plate. Ghilardi joined AMD from HP to run EMEA in 2008 and was named sales chief the next year. Read last week told Wall Street that AMD is switching to a new “ambidextrous” strategy that includes other people’s technologies and IP to deliver differentiated products such as a tablet.

Cloud Expo New York Speaker Profile: Chris MacGown – Piston Cloud Computing

Sun, 12 Feb 2012 12:00:00 EST

Cloud Expo New York Speaker Profile: Sinclair Schuller – Apprenda

Sun, 12 Feb 2012 08:30:00 EST

Big Data Expo New York Speaker Profile: Eric Baldeschwieler – Hortonworks

Sun, 12 Feb 2012 08:00:00 EST

Cloud Expo New York Speaker Profile: Andreas Sundquist – DNAnexus

Sun, 12 Feb 2012 07:45:00 EST

Cloud Expo New York Speaker Profile: Bernard Golden – HyperStratus

Sun, 12 Feb 2012 07:45:00 EST

Cloud Expo New York Speaker Profile: Mark Hinkle – Citrix Systems

Sun, 12 Feb 2012 07:30:00 EST

Apache Hadoop: Now, Next, and Beyond at Cloud Expo New York

Sun, 12 Feb 2012 07:15:00 EST

In 2011, Apache Hadoop received tremendous attention for helping organizations cost-effectively capitalize on their big data. Hadoop is now disrupting the business of analyzing data. In his session at the 10th International Cloud Expo, Eric Baldeschwieler, Co-Founder & CEO of Hortonworks, will look at the current state of the Hadoop project, lessons learned by deploying it at scale, and the roadmap for its future. Big Data Track attendees will learn about the exciting developments that have happened recently with the Apache Hadoop project, what is has already accomplished (including real-world examples), and what it is going to make possible in the future.

PaaS Best Practices Vendor Profile – CloudBees

Sun, 12 Feb 2012 05:45:00 EST

Founded by Sacha Labourey CloudBees is an example of the type of cutting edge innovator at the ‘PaaS’ layer of the Cloud stack – Platform as a Service. They are one of our keynote presenters on our upcoming webinar Agile Cloud – PaaS and DevOps Best Practices. A review of what CloudBees offers is a … Continue reading »

Does Germany Now Oppose ACTA?

Sat, 11 Feb 2012 08:45:00 EST

It's looking like the politicians of the world are waking up and realizing that pirates are pirates and non-pirates are not pirates. Pirates would be those homicidal, old-style drunken English guys with eye patches and wooden legs, and those modern, drug-hazed Somalians who ransom and sometimes kill people. Non-pirates would be people who visit YouTube. The latest development is the reported decision by the German government not to sign ACTA – the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement – a global version of the noxious, proposed SOPA and PIPA legislation in the US. Our friends in Canada as well as the Obama Administration have already signed on. ACTA would create a new, independent body with responsibility for prosecuting manufacturers and purveyors of counterfeit goods, generic drugs that are verboten in commercial quantities, and trademark and copyright counterfeiting. As with SOPA, the legislation proposes to criminalize what has traditionally subject to civil litigation. And like SOPA, the ACTA would wield a blunt instrument that equates fake Armani and Gucci with generic blood-pressure medicine and downloaded video clips and songs. In Europe, activists and politicians have taken to wearing those Guy Fawkes masks associated with the Anonymous black-hat hacker movement. It seems ironic that opposing a Hollywood power grab and massive rewrite of centuries of copyright law and is considered revolutionary. In any case, there are rumblings from many in Europe who had previously signed onto ACTA. One Slovenian politician, who apparently reads proposed legislation as closely as do most American politicians, said she “did not pay enough attention” to what she was signing, according to a report by the Washington Post. One could surmise she is hardly alone among her Euro-peers. Germany is the central, driving force behind all that Europe does, so one can imagine some dominoes falling if the German government does, in fact, now actively oppose ACTA. We just saw numerous US politicians cave in the face of loud opposition – what Rupert Murdoch has tweeted as “terrorism” but many interpret as “exercising rights in a democracy.” Now the other shoe appears to be dropping on the far side of the pond.

Cloud Computing and Platform-Based Vulnerabilities

Sat, 11 Feb 2012 05:00:00 EST

What do these two vulnerabilities have in common? Apache Killer. Post of Doom. Right, they’re platform-based vulnerabilities. Meaning they are vulnerabilities peculiar to the web or application server platform upon which applications are deployed. Mitigations for such vulnerabilities generally point to changes in configuration of the platform – limit post size, header value sizes, turn off some value in the associated configuration. But they also have something else in common – risk. And not just risk in general, but risk to cloud providers whose primary value is in offering not just a virtual server but an entire, pre-integrated and pre-configured application deployment stack. Think LAMP, as an example, and providers like Microsoft (Azure) and VMware (CloudFoundry), more commonly adopting the moniker of PaaS. It’s an operational dream to have a virtual server pre-configured and ready to go with the exact application deployment stack needed and offers a great deal of value in terms of efficiency and overall operational investment, but it is – or should be – a security professional’s nightmare. It’s not unlike the recent recall of Chevy Volts – a defect in the platform needs to be mitigated. The only way to do it, for car owners, is to effectively shut down their ability to drive while a patch is applied. It’s disruptive, it’s expensive (you still have to get to work, after all), and it’s frustrating for the consumer. For the provider, it’s bad PR and negatively impacts the brand. Neither of which is appealing.

Bandwidth Is the Oxygen of the Internet

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 22:12:00 EST

Bandwidth is the oxygen of the Internet. The countries, companies, and individuals who have a lot of it breathe free and prosper. A lack of it literally slows down the progress of nations as they try to catch their metaphorical breath. My research over the past 18 months has uncovered a number of developing countries who are deploying bandwidth at very fast speeds relative to their economic development. Now I'm gathering some statistics about access to said bandwidth. My original idea is that a low-income country with the same average bandwidth speed as a high-income country is doing more with what it has, ie, doing a better job in pumping oxygen into its economy. As an example, Poland's average speed of 8.6Mbps is more impressive than New Zealand's average speed of 8.7Mbps. That numerous countries in Central and Eastern Europe have much faster speeds than the United States is a more dramatic example. I've written before about the various nations that lead in my rankings, by region and by income level. Now it's time to season in some information about access. I'm helped in this respect by an EU report called Eurostats that provides a lot of useful information. A section of the report measures broadband access in 2010 (the most recent year available) and the growth in broadband access between 2008-10. It covers all EU nations except the UK, and adds Turkey and a couple of others into the mix. The report finds Sweden, Norway, and Denmark at the top of the heap, with 80+ percent broadband access, followed closely by Finland and Germany. One can imagine it's easier to deploy bandwidth to a Scandinavia's small, generally urbanized populations of 5 to 9 million people than to most places. Even so, my research has found Sweden in particular to be a regional and global leader overall in its level of IT deployment. Trailing the group are Romania and Bulgaria, with broadband-access percentages in the 20s. Yet Bulgaria and Romania have done well in my research, due to their still-low per-person incomes, especially compared to their Western European neighbors. The key factor is that I'm measuring “torque” or dynamism, so my formulas tend to be weighted towards those nations that are changing most dramatically. Turkey is included in the Eurostats analysis, too, and was found to have broadband access of about 35 percent. Most everyone else fell somewhere between 40 and 60 percent. I'll be spending some time sequestered in Ye Olde Laboratory formulating how to weigh this data from Eurostats, and will report my new results sometime in March. Meanwhile, tweet me up if you want to discuss.

Who's Managing Your PaaS Apps?

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 09:00:00 EST

PaaS v2.0 should be more open than the current implementations, and cultivate tools communities. But the focus on open development stacks is ignoring the second aspect of PaaS - the management of live applications after they are built. PaaS providers need to allow for communication of SLA and business process requirements by consumers, and cloud management tools can help. We are also seeing the realization of the application-centric approach to cloud management. That takes me to the part that no one is really talking about when it comes to PaaS - the management aspect. Up to this point, we have more often talked about the development side (pre-production). But, PaaS then hosts the application created. How will organizations dictate the SLAs to be in place when the application is live for others to consume (i.e. scale-up, scale-down, etc.)? How will they relay their DR requirements, or moreover how will PaaS providers allow for different RTO/RPO strategies?

Don't Punt - Winning the Cloud Marketing Battle

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 09:00:00 EST

Coach Kevin Kelley has figured it out, don't punt. Since 2007, he's won three Arkansas State Championships and over 90% of his games, and he's never punted. Every day, sales and marketing teams in Cloud organizations, that could easily move the trial or experience to the front of the marketing and sales cycle, hang on to conventional wisdom, hiding or gating the actual product experience. Whether this is because of fear of failure or simple rejection of the new, or concern over investor or CEO second guessing, those in the old product mindset are punting away opportunity every day.

Getting Ready for Big Data

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 07:30:00 EST

IT departments and data centers are used to seeing demand for resources surge. In recent years, this has been especially evident in the area of data storage. No matter what you want to call it – “data explosion,” or something else – you can’t deny the fact that organizations simply have a greater need for capacity today than ever before. Add in emerging technologies such as real-time predictive intelligent solutions, and you can begin to see how the demand for data is going to continue to explode. Fortunately, technology is moving to keep pace. There is a technology coming down the pipe known as “big data,” and it’s going to change the way that IT and data centers handle all of that excess demand.

The Big Data Era

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 07:30:00 EST

Read a great opinion piece last week in the Wall Street Journal that talks about how we “stand on the cusp of three grand technological transformations with the potential to rival that of the past century.” Read a great opinion piece last week in the Wall Street Journal that talks about how we “stand on the cusp of three grand technological transformations with the potential to rival that of the past century.” If you haven’t read Mark Mills and Julio Ottino: The Coming Tech-led Boom – WSJ.com it compares the potential impact of the rise of big data, smart manufacturing and wireless connectivity to the rise of twentieth century innovations from electricity to the radio:

Why Public Clouds Are More Secure than Private Clouds

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 06:45:00 EST

Conventional wisdom would have you believe that Public Clouds are inherently insecure, and that the only way to meet your organization’s stringent security requirements in the Cloud is to implement your own Private Cloud. Conventional wisdom, you say? Unfortunately, there is precious little wisdom available of any kind when it comes to Cloud Computing, let alone the conventional type! In fact, large software and hardware vendors are largely responsible for the whole “Public Cloud is insecure” canard, introducing fear, uncertainty, and doubt (FUD) into the marketplace. After all, building a Private Cloud means buying a lot of new gear. The last thing the big vendors want is for their customers to move to Public Clouds—unless, of course, they belong to the vendor in question. Don’t be fooled. Public Clouds are typically more secure than Private Clouds, for a number of reasons. Here’s why. In fact, large software and hardware vendors are largely responsible for the whole “Public Cloud is insecure” canard, introducing fear, uncertainty, and doubt (FUD) into the marketplace. After all, building a Private Cloud means buying a lot of new gear. The last thing the big vendors want is for their customers to move to Public Clouds—unless, of course, they belong to the vendor in question. Don’t be fooled. Public Clouds are typically more secure than Private Clouds, for a number of reasons. Here’s why.

Cloud Expo New York Speaker Profile: Dave Asprey – Trend Micro

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 06:45:00 EST

With Cloud Expo 2012 New York (10th Cloud Expo) just four months away, what better time to start introducing you in greater detail to the distinguished individuals in our incredible Speaker Faculty for the technical and strategy sessions at the conference... We have technical and strategy sessions for you every day from June 11 through June 14 dealing with every nook and cranny of Cloud Computing and Big Data, but what of those who are presenting? Who are they, where do they work, what else have they written and/or said about the Cloud that is transforming the world of Enterprise IT, side by side with the exploding use of enterprise Big Data – processed in the Cloud – to drive value for businesses...? We have technical and strategy sessions for you every day from Nov 7 through Nov 10 dealing with every nook and cranny of Cloud Computing, but what of those who are presenting? Who are they, where do they work, what else have they written and/or said about the Cloud that is transforming the world of Enterprise IT?

Virtustream Aims to Shape the Cloud Industry for the Enterprise Client

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 06:30:00 EST

“Combining Enomaly’s cloud exchange, federation and public cloud capabilities with Virtustream’s Micro-VM cloud technology enables customers to efficiently pool data center resources, use hybrid clouds and federate between private, virtual private and public clouds - all assured by SLA guarantees that are models for the industry,” said Bill McNamara, Chief of Corporate Development of Virtustream Inc., as it was announced that Virtustream has completed its previously announced acquisition of Enomaly, Inc., an early innovator in cloud and pioneer in cloud exchanges.

Could Data Centers Become Black Sheep?

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 06:00:00 EST

Could they? Could it be out of Vogue to operate your own data center? Current developments in Corporate Social Responsibility and a maturing data center marketplace are starting to drive these changes. For many, this could be a discussion about the pink elephant in the room.

Cloud Computing Connectors: Beware of Counterfeits

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 06:00:00 EST

If you are a corporate executive contemplating adding some applications in a cloud computing network, be very aware of the vendors as well as your own internal system architects and Chief Technology Officers (CTOs) when they start talking about cost-effective networks, cheaper components and saving you money. What many network pseudo-experts don’t know is that you don’t build cheap networks. There are no “Fire Sales” on quality, especially when it comes to network infrastructures. Like anything else, you get what you pay for when it comes to buying the pieces for your network just like when you buy the parts for your car or materials for your house. There is a growing concern from those in the cabling industry regarding counterfeit and non-compliant components being brought into the country.

Big Data: "An Even Bigger Deal than Cloud," Says Expert

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 05:30:00 EST

"The volume of data we're generating now from machines pales in comparison to the volume of data we'll soon generate from our own bodies," says data security expert Dave Asprey. Writing in a Trend Micro blog, Asprey - who is one of the leaders in the emerging Quantified Self movement - explains his vision of a world in which personal biometrical data is shared via the cloud.

ExtraHop Networks Expands Operations into the EMEA Market

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 05:11:00 EST

ExtraHop Networks, recently named an "APM Innovator" by Gartner Research, announces its entry into the Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) market. Building on an extensive customer base in the USA including Adobe, Concur, Microsoft and other industry leaders, ExtraHop continues to win EMEA customers and is executing a ground-breaking channel partner programme in the EMEA region to further accelerate growth. ExtraHop Networks offers network-based application performance management (APM) solutions that help IT teams fix problems rapidly as well as optimize the performance of IT infrastructure. Specifically the ExtraHop system provides powerful proactive early warning, triaging and troubleshooting combined with mapping and measuring capabilities that surpass those of traditional APM products, which are largely based on legacy monitoring technology.

Big Data in Telecom: The Need for Analytics

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 03:00:00 EST

Networks have become a strategic asset, the life blood of organizations. Once considered a “techy thing,” networks are now mission-critical for every member of the organization – from the IT manager to the marketing VP to the CEO. An increasing number of companies now recognize the impact network quality has on the customer experience and, in turn, on the bottom line. Providing a great customer experience, every time, is vital for limiting churn and building loyalty. This has led many organizations to adopt a strong quality assurance program to test and monitor all contact center services. This is particularly important in environments that must support multi-channel and multi-service applications. The complex configurations needed to enable voice, video and data to share network resources puts a tremendous strain on bandwidth and creates problems that can be very difficult to isolate. And the proliferation of mobile devices has added an entirely new set of issues and customer behaviors.

Cloud Expo New York Speaker Profile: Mårten Mickos – Eucalyptus Systems

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 01:45:00 EST

Facebook: No Way to Run a Railroad

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 20:08:00 EST

I guess it's my turn, and my obligation, to chime in with my opinion about the insane Facebook overvaluation. I don't know anyone at Facebook, or any of the company's financial advisors. But I know about tech bubbles. And I know railroads. A decade ago, a semi-hysterical chorus of Cassandras wailed for about three years before the dot-com bubble popped and led us to the miserable dot-bomb era. They were right. But the disaster wasn't only that the pets.com's and Webvan's of the world went down, it was that they brought everything else down with it. Supposed tech blue chips such as Cisco, Sun, and so many others lost 90 percent of their valuation. The total damage to the markets was $7 trillion of paper worth. The Nasdaq, which accounted for about 20 percent of that, has to this day not recovered even half of what it lost. That's $700 billion gone forever for those keeping score at home. So my fear is that when the Facebook bubble pops – and it will as sure as puppies are cute and rain is wet – it will bring down untold tons of financial infrastructure with it. This we don't need. I've Been Workin'... Which brings me to railroads. I've recently relocated, for the most part, in Illinois, after spending three years in Asia. This is still railroad country. The BNSF (Warren Buffett's fairly recent acquisition) runs train after train around the clock on the local tracks. There are a couple of massive yards in the area. The Burlington Northern Santa Fe is the present-day amalgam of several historic railroads, including the two contained within its name. It operates on 32,000 miles of track (yes, that would circle the Earth and more), has more than 6,000 locomotives, 85,000 freight cars, and 40,000 employees. Its annual revenue is about $18 billion; Buffett's BNSF buyout in 2009 valued it at about $44 billion. His company, Berkshire Hathaway, will continue to invest billions more to keep things in shape. End of Privacy-Based Business? We have no privacy, today. Governments are as intrusive as business. Yet ironically, governments are also intruding on corporate privacy policies, and a big fat target like Facebook is easily hit. I “get” that the power of slicing and dicing the personal details of 850 million people is worth several gold mines, and I “get” that personal data is the coin of the realm today. But I also just get the feeling people are gambling again, nothing more. Put another way, what's going on with Facebook is no way to run a railroad. Not only is this sort of data fluid (ie, it changes a lot and many people aren't entirely truthful), it seems to be at risk for complete destruction at the hands of government regulators throughout the world. As important, we've already seen this sort of semi-tangible Internet company get destroyed by the markets before, many times. Give me 7,000 tons of train roaring down the tracks any day – I'll invest. Facebook? You and your purported $100 billion valuation are making me nervous. OK...now you kids, get off of my lawn.

NSF Releases Cloud Computing Report

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 11:30:00 EST

The National Science Foundation released their report on cloud computing. It can be found here. The intent of this report is to provide information that guides funding programs. The NSF used NIST’s guidance on cloud computing to inform their research and decision making. This report will be instrumental in informing Federal decision makers and cloud investment. It is important to pay attention to such documents as they can help businesses align with Federal government priorities. The NSF has identified the following areas as research areas worthy of financial support from the federal government:

Oracle to Spend $1.9 Billion Buying Taleo

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 10:25:00 EST

Oracle rolled out of bed Thursday morning and said it’s going to buy Taleo and its talent management cloud widgetry for $46 a share or roughly $1.9 billion net of Taleo’s cash and debt. That’s an 18% premium. Not bad for a company that was originally bootstrapped. Taleo (say Ta-LAY-oh) competes with SuccessFactors, which SAP is buying for $3.4 billion, and its stock price fattened up after the SuccessFactors deal was announced in December on speculation it would be taken out by Oracle. Taleo is supposed to handle more SaaS transactions than anybody except Salesforce.com.

Mitigating the Risks of IT Change

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 09:30:00 EST

Global enterprises and growing businesses are harnessing IT to add branch offices, remote sites and enabling mobile users. Simultaneously, they are decreasing the IT administrative footprint, boosting productivity, working with greater efficiency, and improving the bottom line. IT initiatives such as data center consolidation, cloud computing, virtualization, and new application deployments can help meet all of these objectives, but in many cases these projects are major undertakings that consume significant time and resources and are fraught with risk. Planning for these IT changes can be a long and error-prone process, but an accurate and comprehensive understanding of IT infrastructure is a necessity for successful implementations and smoother transitions. To avoid problems and make good decisions, organizations must create high-quality project plans with accurate and detailed information available before, during, and after migration activities. For example, if a business were to move one of its Oracle servers, it would be critical for it to understand all the databases and components that connect to it so that all connections were reestablished after the move. Without precise knowledge of the end-to-end service delivery path, it would be easy to misconfigure the new environment and possibly cause an outage. Some organizations have come to realize that documentation and historical asset inventories are rarely up to date, and the people who built them have invariably moved on, providing an unreliable basis for planning.

Cloud May Mean Different Security for Different Organizations

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 09:30:00 EST

Is cloud a positive or negative when it comes to cyber security? And what of hybrid models that combine public and private cloud activities, how is security impacted in those cases? For some, any move to the cloud -- at least the public cloud -- means a higher risk for security. For others, relying more on a public cloud provider means better security. There’s more of a concentrated and comprehensive focus on security best practices that are perhaps better implemented and monitored centrally in the major public clouds. And so which is it? Is cloud a positive or negative when it comes to cyber security? And what of hybrid models that combine public and private cloud activities, how is security impacted in those cases?

EMC Touts Isilon for Hadoop

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 09:00:00 EST

EMC moved to make Hadoop safe for the Joe Blow big company that wants to figure out what’s in all that unstructured data it’s got. It’s integrated the Hadoop file system into its Isilon scale-out NAS storage and lets the two of them cuddle up with its Hadoop-digesting Greenplum analytics machine. Greenplum also handles structured data so users can run queries across both datasets. EMC says that makes Isilon the very first enterprise-class scale-out NAS system with native Hadoop support, giving Hadoop Big Data enterprise comfortable features like snapshots, replication and backup. The storage Goliath figures it can probably make a packet off the scheme, removing Hadoop’s NameNode single point of failure and making it manageable by mere mortals. The way EMC does things Isilon’s native petabyte-scale OneFS file system actually handles the Big Data, not Hadoop, thanks to Isilon’s native OneFS file system being integrated with Hadoop’s Distributed File System protocol and chewing through the scads of resident in the scale-out repository.

Amazon Trims S3 Prices

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 07:45:00 EST

Amazon has reined in the price of its S3 storage a bit as of February 1. It didn’t give a reason for its largesse other than a vague allusion to economies of scale. Maybe it has something to do with Gartner saying using cloud storage for business intelligence is only cheaper for the first five years. Anyway, under the new schedule 50TB, for instance, will cost 12% less than it did and 500TB will be 13.5% less; headier amounts are unchanged – at least in America. Other regions have their own schedules. AWS GovCloud also has its own pricing. Last week Amazon counted the objects S3 is stored and put the number at 762 billion, up 192% year-over-year.

Artesian Solutions Raises £2Million in Financing

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 07:07:00 EST

Artesian Solutions ("Artesian"), a provider of cloud-based Social CRM and brand surveillance software, today announced that Octopus has invested £2Million to support Artesian's explosive growth as market demand for social CRM solutions continues to climb[1]. Luke Hakes of Octopus will be joining the Artesian Board. Octopus has a strong track record in supporting capital-efficient businesses that have the potential to create, transform or dominate their industry. With nearly £2.5 billion in assets under management, other high profile investments include Zoopla, Graze.com, TouchType and Calastone. Artesian will use the Series A investment to significantly increase its sales and marketing operations in new and existing vertical markets. Additionally the funding will be used to increase investment in engineering, new product development and service delivery to existing customers.

Cloud Expo New York: The Java EE 7 Platform - Developing for the Cloud

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 07:00:00 EST

The focus of Java EE 7 is on the cloud, and specifically it aims to bring Platform-as-a-Service providers and application developers together so that portable applications can be deployed on any cloud infrastructure and reap all its benefits in terms of scalability, elasticity, multitenancy, etc. The existing specifications in the platform such as JPA, Servlets, EJB, and others will be updated to meet these requirements. Java EE 7 continues the ease of development push that characterized prior releases by bringing further simplification to enterprise development. It also adds new, important APIs such as the REST client API in JAX-RS 2.0 and the long awaited Concurrency Utilities for Java EE API. Expression Language 3.0 and Java Message Service 2.0 will undergo an extreme makeover to align with the improvements in the Java language. There are plenty of improvements to several other components. Newer web standards like HTML 5 and Web Sockets will be embraced to build modern web applications.

Cloud Expo New York: Mobilizing Enterprise Applications for the Cloud

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 06:00:00 EST

2011 was a year of rapid adoption for public and private cloud services. Instant and on-demand server provisioning was the driving force behind the massive growth. On top, cloud server templates and script automation simplified application installation for simple and pre-defined application stacks, but have not targeted more complex enterprise application environments. In his session at the 10th International Cloud Expo, John Yung, CEO of Appcara, will discuss how 2012 will be the year for application integration and dependency management technologies to take center stage and accelerate enterprise application workloads into the cloud with single pane-of-glass view and control.

Enterprise 2.0 Cloud Computing – DevOps for Everyone

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 05:30:00 EST

Although it can feel like you’re playing an intense game of Buzzword Bingo, the key way to approach new technologies like Cloud Computing is to marry them up with other hot topics, like social media and big data. Typically these aren’t entirely different domains more so simply different perspectives on to the same system, and so it’s helpful to throw them all in a pot and discuss: DevOps, IaaS, PaaS, web 2.0, enterprise 2.0, .. etc.

Hong Kong Considers Cloud as Economy Slows

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 04:49:00 EST

Hong Kong's economy is muddling along due to a continued lag in exports to the US and the world, and is estimated to grow as little as 1 percent in the coming year. This will result in a projected decline in IT spending of 4.4 percent this year, according to a budget announced this week. Cloud computing is a bright spot for this city – officially a Special Administrative Region (SAR) of China – with a planned cloud platform implementation, more free WiFi, mobile-app development, and a commitment to more IT in business, according to some of the budget's details. The government also wants to focus on building more datacenters over the next two years. The Hong Kong government plans to spend about US$80 million on IT in 2012. But the city overall spends $20 billion annually on IT and telco. Hong Kong does well in my own research, finishing 27th in the world in terms of its annual IT spend, and rising to 11th in the world when the figures are adjusted for bandwidth and the city's lack of corruption. Among “Tier B” developed economies, Hong Kong ranks 4th in my research, trailing only the Czech Republic, South Korea, and Slovakia. (Eastern and Central European nations do very well in this research due to a relative lack of income disparity, one of the few positive legacies of the region's Communist era.) I'll watch to see how aggressively Hong Kong implements its government cloud platform, and how it compares to Singapore's ongoing G-Cloud initiative. Singapore finishes slightly lower than Hong Kong in my research, although it does rank 4th among “Tier A” developed economies, trailing only Sweden, the UK, and Japan.

Cloud Computing Vital to U.S. Economic Growth and Competitiveness: NSF

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 03:45:00 EST

The Arlington, Virginia-based National Science Foundation has just released its "Report on Support for Cloud Computing" - in response to the America Competes Reauthorization Act of 2010, Section 524. It is an absolute must-read for all concerned with current and future research projects in Cloud Computing.

EMC VFCache Respinning SSD and Intelligent Caching (Part 2)

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 16:15:00 EST

EMC vFCache respinning SSD and intelligent caching (Part II)

By Greg Schulz

This is the second of a two part series pertaining to EMC VFCache, you can read the first part here.

In this part of the series, lets look at some common questions along with comments and perspectives.

Common questions, answers, comments and perspectives:

Why would EMC not just go into the same market space and mode as FusionIO, a model that many other vendors seam eager to follow? IMHO many vendors are following or chasing FusionIO thus most are selling in the same way perhaps to the same customers. Some of those vendors can very easily if they were not already also make a quick change to their playbook adding some new moves to reach broader audience. Another smart move here is that by taking a companion or complimentary approach is that EMC can continue selling existing storage systems to customers, keep those investments while also supporting competitors products. In addition, for those customers who are slow to adopt the SSD based techniques, this is a relatively easy and low risk way to gain confidence. Granted the disk drive was declared dead several years (and yes also several decades) ago, however it is and will stay alive for many years due to SSD helping to close the IO storage and performance gap.

Data center and storage IO performance capacity gap (Courtesy of Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press))

Has this been done before? There have been other vendors who have done LUN caching appliances in the past going back over a decade. Likewise there are PCIe RAID cards that support flash SSD as well as DRAM based caching. Even NetApp has had similar products and functionality with their PAM cards.

Does VFCache work with other PCIe SSD cards such as FusionIO? No, VFCache is a combination of software IO intercept and intelligent cache driver along with a PCIe SSD flash card (which could be supplied as EMC has indicated from different manufactures). Thus VFCache to be VFCache requires the EMC IO intercept and intelligent cache software driver.

Does VFCache work with other vendors storage? Yes, Refer to the EMC support matrix, however the product has been architected and designed to install and coexist into a customers existing environment which means supporting different EMC block storage systems as well as those from other vendors. Keep in mind that a main theme of VFCache is to compliment, coexist, enhance and protect customers investments in storage systems to improve their effectiveness and productivity as opposed to replacing them.

Does VFCache introduce a new point of vendor lockin or stickiness? Some will see or place this as a new form of vendor lockin, others assuming that EMC supports different vendors storage systems downstream as well as offer options for different PCIe flash cards and keeps the solution affordable will assert it is no more lockin that other solutions. In fact by supporting third party storage systems as opposed to replacing them, smart sales people and marketeers will place VFCache as being more open and interoperable than some other PCIe flash card vendors approach. Keep in mind that avoiding vendor lockin is a shared responsibility (read more here).

Does VFCache work with NAS? VFCache does not work with NAS (NFS or CIFS) attached storage.

Does VFCache work with databases? Yes, VFCache is well suited for little data (e.g. database) and traditional OLTP or general business application process that may not be covered or supported by other so called big data focused or optimized solutions. Refer to this EMC document (and this document here) for more information.

Does VFCache only work with little data? While VFCache is well suited for little data (e.g. databases, share point, file and web servers, traditional business systems) it also able to work with other forms of unstructured data.

Does VFCache need VMware? No, While VFCache works with VMware vSphere including a vCenter plug in, however it does not need a hypervisor and is practical in a physical machine (PM) as it is in a virtual machine (VM).

Does VFCache work with Microsoft Windows? Yes, Refer to the EMC support matrix for specific server operating systems and hypervisor version support.

Does VFCache work with other unix platforms? Refer to the EMC support matrix for specific server operating systems and hypervisor version support.

How are reads handled with VFCache? The VFCache software (driver if you prefer) intercepts IO requests to LUNs that are being cached performing a quick lookup to see if there is a valid cache entry in the physical VFCache PCIe card. If there is a cache hit the IO is resolved from the closer or local PCIe card cache making for a lower latency or faster response time IO. In the case of a cache miss, the VFCache driver simply passes the IO request onto the normal SCSI or block (e.g. iSCSI, SAS, FC, FCoE) stack for processing by the downstream storage system (or appliance). Note that when the requested data is retrieved from the storage system, the VFCache driver will based on caching algorithms determinations place a copy of the data in the PCIe read cache. Thus the real power of the VFCache is the software implementing the cache lookup and cache management functions to leverage the PCIe card that complements the underlying block storage systems.

How are writes handled with VFCache? Unless put into a write cache mode which is not the default, VFCache software simply passes the IO operation onto the IO stack for downstream processing by the storage system or appliance attached via a block interface (e.g. iSCSI, SAS, FC, FCoE). Note that as part of the caching algorithms, the VFCache software will make determinations of what to keep in cache based on IO activity requests similar to how cache management results in better cache effectiveness in a storage system. Given EMCs long history of working with intelligent cache algorithms, one would expect some of that DNA exists or will be leveraged further in future versions of the software. Ironically this is where other vendors with long cache effectiveness histories such as IBM, HDS and NetApp among others should also be scratching their collective heads saying wow, we can or should be doing that as well (or better).

Can VFCache be used as a write cache? Yes, while its default mode is to be used as a persistent read cache to compliment server and application buffers in DRAM along with enhance effectiveness of downstream storage system (or appliances) caches, VFCache can also be configured as a persistent write cache.

Does VFCache include FAST automated tiering between different storage systems? The first version is only a caching tool, however think about it a bit, where the software sits, what storage systems it can work with, ability to learn and understand IO paths and patterns and you can get an idea of where EMC could evolve it to, similar to what they have done with recoverpoint among other tools.

Evolving data access patterns and life cycles (more retention and reads)

Does VFCache mean all or nothing approach with EMC? While the complete VFCache solution comes from EMC (e.g. PCIe card and software), the solution will work with other block attached storage as well as existing EMC storage systems for investment protection.

Does VFCache support NAS based storage systems? The first release of VFCache only supports block based access, however the server that VFCache is installed in could certainly be functioning as a general purpose NAS (NFS or CIFS) server (see supported operating systems in EMC interoperability notes) in addition to being a database or other other application server.

Does VFCache require that all LUNs be cached? No, you can select which LUNs are cached and which ones are not.

Does VFCache run in an active / active mode? In the first release it is active passive, refer to EMC release notes for details.

Can VFCache be installed in multiple physical servers accessing the same shared storage system? Yes, however refer to EMC release notes on details about active / active vs. active / passive configuration rules for ensuring data integrity.

Who else is doing things like this? There are caching appliance vendors as well as others such as NetApp and IBM who have used SSD flash caching cards in their storage systems or virtualization appliances. However keep in mind that VFCache is placing the caching function closer to the application that is accessing it there by improving on the locality of reference (e.g. storage and IO effectiveness).

Does VFCache work with SSD drives installed in EMC or other storage systems? Check the EMC product support matrix for specific tested and certified solutions, however in general if the SSD drive is installed in a storage system that is supported as a block LUN (e.g. iSCSI, SAS, FC, FCoE) in theory it should be possible to work with VFCache. Emphasis, visit the EMC support matrix.
What type of flash is being used?

What type of nand flash SSD memory is EMC using in the PCIe card? The first release of VFCache is leveraging enterprise class SLC (Single Level Cell) nand flash which has been used in other EMC products for its endurance, long duty cycle to minnimize or eliminate concerns of wear and tear while meeting read and write performance. EMC has indicated that they will also as part of an industry trend leverage MLC along with Enterprise MLC (EMLC) technologies on a go forward basis.

Doesnt nand ssd flash cache wear out? While nand flash SSD can wear out over time due to extensive write use, the VFCache approach mitigates this by being primarily a read cache reducing the number or program / erase cycles (P/E cycles) that occur with write operations as well as initially leveraging longer duty cycle SLC flash. EMC also has several years experience from implementing wear leveling algorithms into the storage systems controllers to increase duty cycle and reduce wear on SLC flash which will play forward as MLC or Enterprise MLC (EMLC) techniques are leveraged. This differs from vendors who are positioning their SLC or MLC based flash PCIe SSD cards for mainly write operations which will cause more P/E cycles to occur at a faster rate reducing the duty or useful life of the device.

How much capacity does the VFCache PCIe card contain? The first release supports a 300GB card and EMC has indicated that added capacity and configuration options are in their plans.

Does this mean disks are dead? Contrary to popular industry folk lore (or wish) the hard disk drive (HDD) has plenty of life left part of which has been increased by being complimented by VFCache.

Various SSD locations, types, packaging and usage scenario options

Can VFCache work in blade servers? The VFCache software is transparent to blade, rack mount, tower or other types of servers. The hardware part of VFCache is a PCIe card which means that the blade server or system will need to be able to accommodate a PCIe card to compliment the PCIe based mezzaine IO card (e.g. iSCSI, SAS, FC, FCOE) used for accessing storage. What this means is that for blade systems or server vendors such as IBM who have a PCIe expansion module for their H series blade systems (it consumes a slot normally used by a server blade), PCIe cache cards like those being initially released by IBM could work, however check with the EMC interoperability matrix, as well as your specific blade server vendor for PCIe expansion capabilities. Given that EMC leverages Cisco UCS for their vBlocks, one would assume that those systems will also see VFCache modules in those systems. NetApp partners with Cisco using UCS in their FlexPods so you see where that could go as well along with potential other server vendors support including Dell, HP, IBM and Oracle among others.

What about benchmarks? EMC has released some technical documents that show performance improvements in Oracle environments such as this here. Hopefully we will see EMC also release other workloads for different applications including Microsoft Exchange Solutions Proven (ESRP) along with SPC similar to what IBM recently did with their systems among others.

How do the first EMC supplied workload simulations compare vs. other PCIe cards? This is tough to gauge as many SSD solutions and in particular PCIe cards are doing apples to oranges comparisons. For example to generate a high IOPs rating for marketing purposes, most SSD solutions are stress performance tested at 512 bytes or 1/2 of a KByte or at least 1/8 of a small 4Kbyte IO. Note that operating systems such as Windows are moving to 4Kbyte page allocation size to align with growing IO sizes with databases moving from the old average of 4Kbytes to 8Kbytes and larger. What is important to consider is what is the average IO size and activity profile (e.g. reads vs. writes, random vs. sequential) for your applications. If your application is doing ultra small 1/2 Kbyte IOs, or even smaller 64 byte IOs (which should be handled by better application or file system caching in DRAM), then the smaller IO size and record setting examples will apply. However if your applications are more mainstream or larger, then those smaller IO size tests should be taken with a grain of salt. Also keep latency in mind that many target or oppourtunity applications for VFCache are response time sensitive or can benefit by the improved productivity they enable.

What is locality of reference? Locality of reference refers to how close data is to where it is being requested or accessed from. The closer the data to the application requesting the faster the response time or quick the work gets done. For example in the figure below L1/L2/L3 on board processor caches are the fastest, yet smallest while closest to the application running on the server. At the other extreme further down the stack, storage becomes large capacity, lower cost, however lower performing.

What does cache effectiveness vs. cache utilization mean? Cache utilization is an indicator of how much the available cache capacity is being used however it does not give an indicator of if the cache is being well used or not. For example, cache could be 100 percent used, however there could be a low hit rate. Thus cache effectiveness is a gauge of how well the available cache is being used to improve performance in terms of more work being done (IOPS or bandwidth) or lower of latency and response time.

Isnt more cache better? More cache is not better, it is how the cache is being used, this is a message that I would be disappointed in HDS if they were not to bring up as a point of messaging (or rebuttal) given their history of emphasis cache effectiveness vs. size or quantity (Hu, that is a hint btw ;).

What is the performance impact of VFCache on the host server? EMC is saying greatest of 5 percent or less CPU consumption which they claim is several times less than the competitions worst scenario, as well as claiming 512MB to 1GB of DRM on the server vs. several times that of their competitors. The difference could be expected to be via more off load functioning including flash translation layer (FTL), wear leveling and other optimization being handled by the PCIe card vs. being handled in the servers memory and using host server CPU cycles.

How does this compare to what NetApp or IBM does? NetApp, IBM and others have done caching with SSD in their storage systems, or leveraging third party PCIe SSD cards from different vendors to be installed in servers to be used as a storage target. Some vendors such as LSI have done caching on the PCIe cards (e.g. CacheCaid which in theory has a similar software caching concept to VFCache) to improve performance and effectiveness across JBOD and SAS devices.

What about stale (old or invalid) reads, how does VFCache handle or protect against those? Stale reads are handled via the VFCache management software tool or driver which leverages caching algorithms to decide what is valid or invalid data.

How much does VFCache cost? Refer to EMC announcement pricing, however EMC has indicated that they will be competitive with the market (supply and demand).

If a server shutdowns or reboots, what happens to the data in the VFCache? Being that the data is in non volatile SLC nand flash memory, information is not lost when the server reboots or loses power in the case of a shutdown, thus it is persistent. While exact details are not know as of this time, it is expected that the VFCache driver and software do some form of cache coherency and validity check to guard against stale reads or discard any other invalid cache entries.

What will EMC do with VFCache in the future and on a larger scale such as an appliance? EMC via its own internal development and via acquisitions has demonstrated ability to use various clustered techniques such as RapidIO for VMAX nodes, InfiniBand for connecting Isilon nodes. Given an industry trend with several startups using PCIe flash cards installed in a server that then functions as a IO storage system, it seems likely given EMCs history and experience with different storage systems, caching, and interconnects that they could do something interesting. Perhaps Oracle Exadata III (Exadata I was HP, Exadata II was Sun/Oracle) could be an EMC based appliance (That is pure speculation btw)?

EMC has already shown how it can use SSD drives as a cache extension in VNX and CLARiiON servers ( FAST CACHE ) in addition to as a target or storage tier combined with Fast for tiering. Given their history with caching algorithms, it would not be surprising to see other instantiations of the technology deployed in complimentary ways.

Finally, EMC is showing that it can use nand flash SSD in different ways, various packaging forms to apply to diverse applications or customer environments. The companion or complimentary approach EMC is currently taking contrasts with some other vendors who are taking an all or nothing, its all SSD as disk is dead approach. Given the large installed base of disk based systems EMC as well as other vendors have in place, not to mention the investment by those customers, it makes sense to allow those customers the option of when, where and how they can leverage SSD technologies to coexist and complement their environments. Thus with VFCache, EMC is using SSD as a cache enabler to discuss the decades old and growing storage IO to capacity performance gap in a force multiplier model that spreads the cost over more TBytes, PBytes or EBytes while increasing the overall benefit, in other words effectiveness and productivity.

Ok, nuff said for now, I think I see some storm clouds rolling in...

Cheers Gs

Greg Schulz - Author Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press, 2011), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press, 2009), and Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier, 2004)

twitter @storageio

Amazon S3’s Exponential Growth

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 13:47:00 EST

In a recent Amazon Web Service Blog, it was quoted that Amazon S3 has reached over 762 Billion objects at the end of 2011. We have been following Amazon S3’s growth closely. As usual, we will plug the numbers in an Excel spread-sheet and see its growth in a chart. As shown in the chart, you can see the numbers fit into an exponential trend line pretty well. Worked out the math, the Amazon S3 objects double every 8 months. If you never used Amazon S3 before, It is OK because you may never need to directly interface Amazon S3. You may be using Amazon S3 indirectly through some online storage services, where quite many are powered by Amazon S3.

API Management – Infrastructure vs SaaS

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 13:15:00 EST

The Enterprise is buzzing with API initiatives these days. APIs not only serve mobile applications, they are increasingly redefining how the enterprise does B2B and integration in general. API management as a category follows different models. On one hand, certain technology vendors offer specialized infrastructure to handle the many aspects of API management. On the other, an increasing number of SaaS vendors offer a service which you subscribe to, providing a pre-installed, hosted, basic API management system. Hybrid models are emerging, but that’s a topic for a future post. Before opting for a pure SaaS-based API management solution offering, consider these below.

HP Provides More Picks and Shovels to Cloud Miners

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 10:00:00 EST

In two separate recent announcements, HP has affirmed its goal of being the neutral supplier of choice for all things cloud. Last week, HP delivered HP Discovery and Dependency Mapping Advanced (DDMA) Content Pack 10, bringing with the ability to better manage cloud instances across the enterprise-public cloud continuum, including deep discovery of virtualized workloads' performance inside of Amazon and VMware vCloud clouds. Then this week, HP on Tuesday further thrust its global market-leading LoadRunner performance testing suite -- via partners -- into development clouds, known as platform as a service (PaaS) providers. This is clearly aimed at the fast-growing mobile development and greenfield SMB development spaces.

An Analysis of a NASA Dbase Hack-and-Dump

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 09:30:00 EST

[Editor's note: this analysis predates any official announcements by NASA] Recently, some news of a NASA hack-and-dump passed my twitter deck. I decided after watching a few of my friends re-tweet the news that it might be worth checking out. At least I’d see if I could perform some password analysis on any dumped credentials, or even test out the new Crucialpoint Cloudera Hadoop password cracker on any leftover hashes. What follows is a step-by-step methodology of how I put together the pieces on the hack, and what I think likely happened based on my experience as a web application hacker/programmer.

ScaleOut Software to Exhibit at Cloud Expo 2012 New York

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 09:15:00 EST

SYS-CON Events announced today that ScaleOut Software, a leading provider of distributed in-memory data grids and data analysis solutions, will exhibit at SYS-CON's 10th International Cloud Expo, which will take place on June 11–14, 2012, at the Javits Center in New York City, New York. ScaleOut Software develops and markets distributed in-memory data grid (IMDG) software for storing, managing, and analyzing data in the cloud, on-premise, and mixed environments. Its flagship product, ScaleOut StateServer®, accelerates application performance with linear scalability and enables automatic data migration to and from the cloud. Integrated map/reduce functionality provides intuitive, powerful data analysis.