A lesson for those who think the cloud is great

[NickFitz]

That's exactly how it's sold. Could anyone work out from the Azure TV ads what "the cloud" actually is?

I have Carbonite for online backup. If I delete a file, I can go and get it back from the backup. That's kind of the point. DropBox will allow me to recover deleted files as well - for a while anyway I think. Are those not cloud services?

But if somebody got control of your Carbonite account, you wouldn't be able to. That's pretty much what happened in this case.

If Dropbox maintain copies of deleted files for a while, that's a feature they've implemented as part of their service, not a feature of cloud platforms per se.

[NickFitz]

What do you think those cloud platforms run on? white fluffy nothingness?

Linux, for the most part

[NickFitz]

And if the likes of AWS don't make it a bit more idiot proof (e.g. by taking care of backup for you), then you'll still need IT people who can correctly setup and administrate AWS.

That's it exactly. AWS is providing infrastructure as a service: then companies like Dropbox build products that make use of that infrastructure. Amazon haven't shown any interest in providing consumer-level services, in the same way that Tarmac haven't started making cars.

In this case, somebody managed to take control of their IT admin systems, and thus could do anything they wanted. This may have been as simple as cracking a weak password used for their Amazon account. They done goofed.

[suityou01]

But the company whose misfortune is the subject of the thread used AWS, so Azure is

Aww shurrup

[tomtomagain]

What do you think those cloud platforms run on? white fluffy nothingness?

Actually if you look at the Microsoft cloud services you will see that they offer a "Compute" option.

There is no operating system.

The OS is history. It is an irrelevant abstraction layer and will be consigned to the dustbin of history.

[tomtomagain]

I work in software.

I work in providing an answer to a business problem.

[Snake Plissken]

Essentially I have access to the same quality infrastructure ( or better ) than a FTSE 100 company ..... on a pay-as-you-go basis.

And if you haven't done so already. Sign-up for a Office 365 trial. For a few pounds a month it gives you, email, document sharing, instant messaging, file sharing and the office suite of applications. Again this is what 90% of people working in companies use.

And it is a long, long way from matching the on-premises equivalent in terms of functionality. Running Office 365 in the browser is an immense technical achievement - I like O365/SharePoint Online myself - but some of us still remember entire websites running in Flash and whatever happened to that...

Migrating companies to the cloud is surely going to become a big area of IT in the next few years.

I tell you who it is a big area for right now. Courier companies.

Because reliably transferring several TB of data can only be done by copying it all onto disks and sending it to the data centre by FedEx. That is, of course, assuming the data centre is in the country. If not, then the whole thing is moot anyway.

[tomtomagain]

But is it just the computing industry going round the same old circle: move everything to the server, move everything to the desktop, move everything to the server...

In sense, yes it is the old centralise-decentralise cycle. But this time the centralisation is on a massive scale and spanning thousands of organisations.

Each time the cycle turns a load of skills are made redundant, but a load more are created.

I don't see cloud as a threat. It's a massive opportunity. This is 1995 all over again.

For example: How many companies run change management? Have CM systems in place, run change boards? Lots. But how many companies would list "Change Management" as a core reason for why they exist? None of them.

However they all have CM systems, with the their own business processes, servers, software licenses and people to feed and water the infrastructure .... Why wouldn't a rational companies sign up to a Change Management system delivered as a service by an organisation that specialised in it?

And you can say that about almost all business processes that are not core to a specific organisation from accounting to project management. From Room Booking to Risk Management, from flight scheduling to file sharing.

I truly believe that we are at the cusp on the next big wave of IT change and that it is going to have a transformational effect on companies, internal IT departments and outsourcing body shops. And that it will be far greater than the changes we have seen over the last 10 years.

[tomtomagain]

And it is a long, long way from matching the on-premises equivalent in terms of functionality. .

Yes but the guys building the on-prem are also the guys building the off-prem.

And they are poring far more resources into cloud than they are with their on-prem versions of their products.

Microsoft are desperate for it to work. They've lost control of the smartphone/tablet market place. Windows as a client is likely to plateau at best. So they've got to go "all-in" on the cloud and become the defacto standard for running the services/websites that support apps.

Give it a few more years and it will catch up.

[Snake Plissken]

Yes but the guys building the on-prem are also the guys building the off-prem.

And they are poring far more resources into cloud than they are with their on-prem versions of their products.

Microsoft are desperate for it to work. They've lost control of the smartphone/tablet market place. Windows as a client is likely to plateau at best. So they've got to go "all-in" on the cloud and become the defacto standard for running the services/websites that support apps.

Give it a few more years and it will catch up.

Yes, they are desperate for it to work. Like they were with Vista, Windows Phone, Zune, Kin, Surface and all those other game changing bits and pieces. Certain things cannot work. What to do about data going cross-border is a huge problem for the cloud. Do you think legal documents, which can potentially be accessed by some site administrator in Nob End, Nebraska, are going to be allowed?

This is 1995 all over again.

Indeed. Remind me how Netscape, Dreamweaver, Shockwave, Flash, Real Player, ICQ, AOL and Compuserve are doing again?