What is…Cloud Computing?

Cloud computing has actually been around a lot longer than most people realize. It’s just recently been giving this new name, and somewhat a new “face”.

I had not thought of cloud computing as an environmentally friendly alternative. It seems that to save resources on one end, things are stored elsewhere which ultimately results in the need to transfer that data. Isn’t extra energy required to download that data? I always thought cloud computing was more about the convenience of being able to access all your files or programs from anywhere.

The back end of the cloud computing architecture is the cloud itself, comprising various computers, servers and data storage devices.

Cloud computing has its place for sure. I think research groups can find it very useful in particular. But the above mentioned security risks are quite valid too. Your data is being stored on some server unknown to you, after all. But gradually, it should gain people’s confidence as it catches on more.

From what I’ve read and seen cloud computing is still at its infancy, and I’ve seen some pretty cool predictions of what cloud computing will look like and bring in the future, can’t wait for that!

-Jean

The future is certainly in the cloud. As internet speeds grow, it is quite imaginable that certain part of the desktop computing environment also moves to the cloud.

Another thing working for cloud computing is economics of scale. Look at Amazon. If your service starts to gain sufficient momentum, you can afford to offer better and better services that your competition can not match. It has come to a point where Amazon can now afford to offer an EC2 micro-instance for free for a while year.

The future for cloud computing certainly looks promising.