EEMA is pleased to be partnering with Kuppinger Cole on this important and emerging subject and has been asked to produce a tutorial as an introduction to Kuppinger Cole's Thought Leadership Conference There are plenty of definitions of the "cloud". Most of them include aspects like services which are provided via the internet and which are highly scalable. But the discussion about terms like a “private cloud” proves that this is a somewhat insufficient definition. Depending on the definition, "private cloud" services might be dedicated to one customer, or might live entirely within the enterprise. The essence of cloud computing are the services. Services are defined on various levels, from pure computing power up to very specific applications. These services are provided by someone. They have to be well-defined so that they can be provided by different providers and the switch to another provider is supported. This definition goes well beyond today's IT Service Management – although it is highly depdendent on its techniques. It has, for example, to define where (geographically) a service can be hosted, for legal and data protection reasons. Given that a well-defined service which can be run virtually anywhere is the core of cloud computing, are terms like “private cloud” just marketing hype? Will there be only one cloud with different operators, from internal data centres to external cloud providers? Where should the borderline be between “private” and “public” and what happens when users want to move between the two? The real value of cloud computing is that services can be consumed from different providers and those providers can be changed – sometimes easily, sometimes with some difficulty. They might internal or external providers - it shouldn't matter as long as cloud requirements are fulfilled in an open, standards based way. There are many issues surrounding cloud services and the related standards today. If a specific service is to be consumed in the EU and has to be hosted in the EU, how do we avoid that the data is sent from Paris to Berlin via New York? A lot of work has to be done around standards, data protection, service descriptions and management tools to make the Cloud vision real. Despite the shortcomings we observe today, the cloud will become a reality and IT will be run and managed differently from today. There are far too many advantages in cloud computing for it to go away again. The following are the issues that will be addressed in this Introduction and Tutorial - What is the history of Cloud Computing?
- Why move to a Cloud model?
- What is the difference between outsourcing, traditional Internet based Services, Software as a Service and the Cloud?
- How does the Open Cloud Manifesto fit in?
- What are the characteristics of the alternative Cloud models?
- What sort of offerings are available today?
- Who are the key players?
- What are Private Clouds and Hybrid Clouds?
- How is Identity managed in the Cloud?
- Can I federate identify between Cloud services?
- Can I federate identify between the enterprise and the Cloud?
- What are the Challenges to using Cloud Computing?
This meeting is invaluable for delegates who wish to learn and increase their knowledgebase. It is aimed at all stakeholders who have an influence on policy and the impact on commercial and business applications and services.
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