How is ‘the cloud’ affecting business?

Cloud computing is already nothing new but as usual, with technical terms, it is taking some time to be understood and used in mainstream business.

In this post, I aim to clear up some of the misconceptions about what cloud computing is, and isn’t, and hopefully provide some useful pointers for how it could be deployed in your business.

What is Cloud Computing?

Cloud computing is a revolutionary concept because it can dramatically reduce the IT costs of businesses whilst sharply increasing their efficiency. Perhaps the greatest benefit it brings is that of infinate scalability. When you buy IT services through the Cloud, you only pay for what you use, from a single byte of storage, or a single user software license, to hundreds of terabytes and thousands of users.

It means therefore that IT costs can become variable instead of fixed.

It is especially appealing to small businesses because it means they don’t have to make disproportionately large investments in technology at start up.

Basically, there are three ways in which ‘the cloud’ is implemented and of use to us through the Internet.

1. Infrastructure as a Service (IAAS)

This is the provision of a networked computer infrastructure over the web. So, instead of buying locally stored network server hardware and peer-to-peer access, for example, you can now pay a monthly fee for a remote host which is infinitely scalable, and which only you and your organisation, have access to.

2. Platform as a Service (PAAS)

The object of PAAS is to enable a complete development platform to be provided over the web. It is especially useful therefore to workgroups and teams who are sharing, and working on, data files concurrently.

Otherwise known as ‘cloudware’, PAAS is an alternative to companies who use workflow facilities for building software or web applications, or collaborative projects just as architechture. It also includes highly scalable hosting solutions (as an alternative to a dedicated server, for example).

3. Software as a Service (SAAS)

The days of downloading and installing software, or buying it in a box and installing from disk, are coming to an end.

SAAS is perhaps one of the fastest-growing industries in the cloud, and already there are hundreds of applications which can be run efficiently through your web browser instead of locally.

Google docs, for example, now provide a real (free) alternative to Microsoft Office. There are other software services available too, for graphic design, brainstorming and flowcharts, help-desk, appointment and event management… and the list is growing all the time.

One of the main advantages of SAAS to the software provider is that new updates can be made seamlessly, without the need for the customer to install patches or upgrades. Everything required to run the software is held remotely and so minimal processing power is required on the local machine.

Following is a list of recommended SAAS resources:

Email list management:  Aweber

Online survey design and management:  Survey Gizmo

Brainstorming/Mindmapping: MindMiester

Helpdesk management: Zendesk

Email + Office-like apps: Google

Graphics: Aviary

Diagrams/Flowcharts: Gliffy

The next chapter for the Internet is coming

The Internet has evolved from a military information machine (1987), to an academic resource (1991), to the information superhighway (1995), to a commercial publishing platform (1998), to a flop (2000), to an interactive connection engine (2005).

So what’s next? What comes after the so-called Web 2.0 era?

Whatever it is, it seems likely that the biggest player in the game, Google, will have something to do with it. And my guess is that Chrome will too, Google’s latest innovation.

Chrome currently is a mere web browser. It does the same job as Internet Explorer (Microsoft) and Firefox (Mozilla), or for that matter, Safari on a Mac. The purpose of a browser is to bring the Internet to you, on whatever device you use, be it a computer, a PDA, an iphone… without a browser, a computer is a stand-alone device with no global interactivity and without the web.

So Google’s plan is to change all that. With Chrome OS, it aims to turn the model on its head. i.e. instead of running a browser on Windows, the browser *is* Windows. The browser itself is the operating system and all the programs we currently use on our local machines, like word processors, spreadsheets and email clients, are actually run far away on webservers.

If you have an account with Google’s mail service – Gmail – you might already be familiar with the Documents feature. With this, you can accomplish almost everything MS Word and MS Excel do without paying for them, all through your web browser. And if your web browser happens to be Google Chrome, then you might experience a slightly faster service using these tools than with other browsers.

With the backdrop of these services behind us, its not difficult to see where things might lead. New lightweight computers – netbooks – are already on the market. At the moment they are loaded with Microsoft Windows, like virtually every other PC which is sold. But in the future, it looks likely they, and other light-weight devices, will come pre-loaded with Chrome OS. When this happens, we will all be using remote applications and storage to generate and save our files.

And when that happens, a new level of interaction and search will become available. One which makes the current method of Internet search almost, but not entirely, obsolete.

Imagine, for example, what the implications would be if whenever you saved a document you could choose whether to make it public to your associates, to senior management, to your friends or to the whole world. And when you save it, that’s it. Its done. You don’t have to FTP it to a website, or publish it as a blog post or attach it to an email.

And when you have saved a document like that, it becomes immediately searchable, but only to the group you made it available to.

The broader implications of this are huge. Especially when you consider all the new devices which are bound to come through for viewing the Internet with. When local processing power isn’t necessary, we could begin using a device like the current ebook readers from Sony and Amazon to do all our work on. They, at least, have a big enough screen. Alternatively, we may find technology leans towards paper-like screens which are foldable yet still touch-sensitive and equipped with high-speed wireless access to the Internet.

There will always be corporate websites. But in this new Internet generation, they will need to be a lot more interactive than they are now. The traditional website-as-a-brochure method will simply not be enough for companies to compete, and for organisations to work, efficiently.

But there are still some crucial outcomes required for all this to become reality:

1. Can Google really get away with it, or will its monopoly be too much for the world to swallow?

2. Will security issues prevent it catching on?

3. Will people be ready enough for it?

4. Will bandwidth speeds be fast enough?

5. Will the broadband network cover enough of the population?

In my next post, I will aim to answer each of these. If you have any more, please post them in a comment below.

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