Storm warning...

Many predict great things for Cloud Computing and the long range forecast certainly looks promising. So will it be blue skies and silver linings all the way, or could a storm be gathering asks Gareth Kershaw?

Well, it's finally happened. After decades trying (and innumerable attempts) the IT industry has at last managed to contrive the virtually perfect circular reference; a concept literally so nebulous that it takes the sector's already breathtaking lack of self-awareness to a whole new level.

Cloud Computing. AKA 'The Cloud'. Honestly, was there ever a fluffier, more self referential, non-specific, non-committal sounding notion? And they wonder why the average person still sees IT as a black art.

Good news though. Because it seems that this time - in a welcome break from tradition - technology has actually managed to coin a phrase that's less complicated in reality. In fact, praise be, Cloud Computing not only appears to makes sense, but it looks to have genuine long-term prospects and an actual, living breathing business case to recommend it. Indeed Gartner, among others, predicts that the Operating System market and its associated revenues could well change beyond all recognition thanks to the 'Cloud'.

OK, so Cloud Computing isn't just another passing buzz phrase, but what is it exactly? Refreshingly, that's also less complicated than it might first appear. For Cloud Computing 2008 see Utility Computing circa 2004. Because the Cloud really isn't a new phenomena so much as a revitalised one - IT divorced from traditional hardware, software, and plumbing installed and delivered as a utility in much the same ways as electricity, water, or gas.

In a cloud computing architecture, or so the theory goes, all the implementation and scalability concerns of the conventional IT deployment are abstracted. This, claim the model's proponents, enables customers to focus more on core business and - with everything operating in a virtualised fashion - all sorts of economies of scale for both provider and user. The difference this time around is that there now appear to be the means, the motive, and the opportunity to make the model really fly.

"It is an evolution of sorts", says Martin Schneider, Director of Product Marketing at SugarCRM. "As broadband Internet connectivity becomes the norm rather than a luxury it is more feasible to connect to powerful processing and application providers outside your firewall than it was even five years ago. So, while the utility model has been in a 'visionary' stage since the 1990s, we are now able to harness the power of that vision given a much more stable and powerful broadband infrastructure..."

Interestingly however, says Gerhard Eschelbeck, CTO at Webroot Software and one of the 25 Most Influential CTO's in 2003, 2004, and 2006 according to InfoWorld, the very buzz that surrounds Cloud Computing may be, well, clouding the issue - detracting from what is actually a key technology paradigm moving forward. "Irrespective of the buzz, cloud computing is a logical next step... whereby computing resources are provided and leveraged as utilities", he explains. Unlike traditional utilities however, the Cloud still has a deal of growing up to do.

"Even the definition of cloud computing is still evolving", says Eschelbeck. "(But) I think the most important aspect is that instead of every organisation building and maintaining its own computing and storage resources, (with Cloud Computing) they're leveraged as outsourced Internet-based services on an as needed basis."

It's early days yet, with just a handful of vendors - Google the most notable among them - currently offering proprietary Cloud platforms. But Eschelbeck sees all this changing as such systems become more and more ubiquitous, popular, and interoperable. Perception and propaganda will likely be further key hurdles.

A glut of misinformation exists on the subject and Craig Nunes, VP of marketing at utility / managed storage player 3PAR, urges businesses to beware cheap imitations. A 'genuine' Cloud will support a couple of key characteristics, he says. First: autonomy - built-in automation that eliminates manual planning and management tasks and allows the platform itself to respond intelligently to application needs. If it requires human interaction to allocate and manage resources, avers Nunes, it's not a cloud; merely a traditional (distributed computing) datacentre.

 The second criterion, he says, is agility. The capacity to respond immediately to spikes in demand and changing workloads. In other words, built-in virtualisation coupled with clustering technologies to allow for rapid changes in growth or service level requirements.

If it requires weeks, days, or even hours to react to new application or user needs, it's not a cloud, just a traditional... you get the picture.

Kelly Smith, MD at managed network services provider Centrinet offers similar counsel. "There are several companies jumping on the cloud bandwagon, just as some did with 'green IT' last year", he cautions. As such, education will be vital in helping businesses understand Cloud-based models and in helping them to "de-couple" the deep-seated relationship between their data and their hardware.

Duncan Ellison at Sarian Systems meanwhile, worries that while the Cloud's benefits are obvious, particularly for small businesses - lower licensing costs; the avoidance of lengthy contracts and proprietary solutions; greater choice - the model "could spell disaster" for those already struggling with online continuity issues.

"More and more businesses depend on ADSL broadband for Internet, email, and in a growing number of cases, voice", he says. "Yet even the most robust fixed-line offerings are not fully able to guarantee against failure. And let's face it - many UK broadband offerings fall well short of this standard in the first place."

"With cloud computing, you take the consequences of failure to the next level. Downtime now means losing applications, data storage, contacts, calendars, and any other key business functions, leaving staff unable to perform even the most basic tasks."

It's a classic case of caveat emptor, says James Blake, Chief Product Evangelist with Mimecast; clearly there will be 'good' and 'bad' cloud computing solutions, as well as right and wrong applications for it. "We're seeing a number of on-premise providers trying to re-purpose their products into 'cloud' offerings. (But) these are built from the same collection of historical on-premises solutions, just accessed over the Internet with a reporting and provisioning overlay."

What you end up with, he says, is an infrastructure with the same integration issues you'd have with a conventional onpremise solution, only with "the lowest-common-denominator of configurability and functionality..." In the end, advocates Smith, it's about asking and answering business questions - "Where can I make my data accessible? Can I avoid paying for
unused capacity?" - rather than the more common: "How fast is the CPU?"

This, the business justification for the Cloud, is a reality check echoed in a "final thought" from Schneider: Whilst Cloud Computing is an important development, it is by no means a fait accompli. "Enterprises of all sizes will (continue to) pick and choose which items in their IT stack get moved out of their control, and which remain", he says. "Choice is an important thing to consider, and the providers offering options for customers will win big in a hybrid world of cloud and premise-based computing environments." One way or another, we should all be watching the skies.



Will the Cloud reign?

Microsoft believes that a Software plus Services model (as opposed to the SaaS approach) - which brings together the best of both worlds by combining Internet services with client and server software - will be important.

The Live Mesh platform alluded to by Ray Ozzie at Mix08 is the ideal example. Enabling devices to interact and synchronise with one another and be managed from a single, remote point, Live Mesh allows users to share content, which is synchronised across the 'mesh' of each of their friends.

Built with the intention of allowing developers to tackle increasingly complex problems no matter what the device or connection, the Live Mesh API is the same for connected devices and those in the Cloud, with developers provided with an open, extendable data model and a flexible application model.

The longer arm of the law

Bucking the business model, and costs, of the traditional law firm, "Legal SME" NetworkLaw has replaced the customary legal structure of equity partners, associates, and support staff with a new model that allows its
staff and consultants to work from any location at any time via an Online Desktop service from Intercept.

"We needed a system that would really empower everyone", says MD Marcus J O'Leary, "enabling them to work from multiple locations with easy access to exactly the same functionality and performance as available in a traditional working environment...

We wanted to create a professional culture of work as an activity, not just an office location."

It selected OnlineDesktop from Intercept - a 'pay-as-you-go' outsourced model that allows employees to access applications and data remotely but securely over the Web. The only data that passes over the communications link is encrypted mouse clicks, keyboard strokes, and screen updates - making for a secure, fast response; obviously a critical business driver for the legal profession.

NetworkLaw's next step - a voice solution - will end its current reliance on an office-based answering service.