In The Clouds - What is Cloud? What are Cloud Servers?
Posted on 30 July 2010
What is it?
In essence its providing information, software, and other resources on demand, like the electricity grid does.
For example say you have a web project that is going to require a very large amount of concurrent users for a short space of time. Rather than buying in lots of servers and networking them up together, you can get a third party cloud server host to do that for you. Rackspace offer cloud servers rented in hourly slots. This is Ideal for a short term project. A cloud server is a virtual server, therfore can be deployed in minutes with most providers.
Thanks for that... Still have no idea what you're on about
Simply think of it as a server on demand service. You rent what you need and when. With no 'real' server to setup it's all virtual.
Application
Cloud application services or "Software as a Service (SaaS)" deliver software as a service over the internet. This means the software does not need to be installed on your own machine to use it. This simplifies setup and updating as you are not responsible for this. You can rent software over the internet when you use it.
Infrastructure
Cloud infrastructure services or "Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)" delivers computer infrastructure, typically a platform virtualization environment as a service. Rather than purchasing servers, software and network equipment, clients instead buy those resources as a fully outsources service. The service is typically billed on a utility computing basis, in other words by how much you need and use.
Yawn! That's enough technical bore. What does it mean for a SME?
To start the idea of having a utility based style of IT delivery can have a huge cost advantage for the SME.
By not having to fork out the initial costs of a traditional IT infrastructure companies can utilise resources as needed. Their IT infrastructure becomes a service expense (like a gas bill, or phone bill) since there is no hardware to purchase or maintain. The cloud model allows companies to change providers easily if they find their current provider is not working for their needs.
One other disadvantage of traditional IT setups is that users need their software on their machine to do the work. Which means when a user is offsite they need it installing and setting up on their laptop, or phone etc.. With cloud solutions they have potential access to their software from anyway, including their files.
Nearly finished... honest!
Is this the future of IT? Some say so, some say it's just another fad and buzzword that will soon die like many others. But I personally can see the real potential for this and when someone delivers the 'killer app' so will the masses.
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