The ‘cloud’ has become a buzz word, but it is really only a metaphor for the internet. Distributed computing over a network and offering software or platforms as a service has been around for decades. In the 1950s there was time sharing’on mainframes. In the 1960s companies such as Tymshare, National CSS, Dial Data, and BBN offered hosting. In the 1970s RJE (Remote Job Entry) was offered by both IBM and DEC. In the 1990s Telcos offered VPNs, and in the 2000s Amazon Web Services, Euc
alyptus, OpenNebula, IBM SmartCloud, and Oracle Cloud all joined the bandwagon.
The advantages of the cloud include the following:
Sharing – economies of scale
Dynamically reallocated by demand
OPEX vs CAPEX
Applications set up faster
Improved manageability/less maintenance
Agility, API, device and location independence, virtualisation (migration), peak load capacity, utilisation and efficiency, reliability, security.
A new language has now evolved which I have coined “The AAS’es”.
Saas – Software as a service
Paas – Platform as a service
Iaas – Infrastructure as a service
Haas – Hardware as a service
Eaas – Everything as a service
As with most things there are also disadvantages:
Reliability
Availability
Security
Complexity
Costs
Regulations and legal issues
Performance
Migration
Privacy
The jury is still out on the cloud, but is seems to be gaining steam. A TechInsights Report last year stated, “Cloud implementations generally meet or exceed expectations across major service models”.
The future ?
Gartner says that cloud computing has reached a maturity that leads it into a productive phase and adds that most of the main issues are resolved, while cautioning that not all problems have been solved.
The future is a little foggy, but for many retailers who are notorious for watching the pennies, the most appealing aspect is being able to fund their IT solution as an operating expense over a period of time rather than a one off capital expense.
Stuart Bennie is a retail consultant at Impact Retailing and can be contacted at stuart@impactretailing.com.au or 0414 631 702.
