Authored By Harish R:
“Necessity is the mother of all inventions.” This is very true for the greatest technological innovations and revolutions ever happened in the world. A prominent example that I can quote is the invention of telephone. The need for a telephone for customers on-the-go created the mobile phone. A similar connection is what I find between another two greatest creations, computers and cloud computing. Yes, you got it right, cloud computing is more or less like a computer on-the-go. There is a great level of similarity between mobile phones and cloud computing. Read on to find out how. Before I go on to explain what cloud computing is, I feel it is proper to know its need first. In today's world, almost every individual has access to a computer and also an email ID. Let us try comparing both. A computer and email have their own applications which they solve well.
However, one striking difference is that a person can access his email from any computer connected to the internet. He cannot access the files stored on his personal computer from anywhere else usually. This was a huge concern for the business people who where constantly on the move. Thus, a laptop was created. You can carry all your files around but along with it comes your entire computer on which it is stored. This is acceptable for some people but for many others, they wanted the kind of freedom that email offered. Carry nothing with you, still everything is with you always. That sparked the creation of cloud computing.
Cloud computing is a concept of accessing all your applications like your email from any internet enabled computer. So you login to the service provider's website and you are given a host of applications which you can use. When you are done, simply logout and all the files get stored on the service provider's servers. When you login from some where else, you get to access the same files again. Pretty much like the email service. The applications that are given to you range from office suites like word processors and spread sheets to even games. Several companies started their own cloud services catering to various needs and with several tariff plans. One of the most popular yet free cloud service is Google Docs. Try it if you are interested, its amazing. When the mobile phone was first invented, it was aimed at the individual business user. Later on the mobile phone service providers understood that in the corporate world, the subordinates needed to communicate very frequently with the superiors when they are on a field work. These companies introduced something called CUGs without any modification to the existing technology.
A similar business innovation happened in cloud computing as well. Startups which needed to invest in high end computers and software licences did not have so much capital. So they resorted to cloud computing. The cloud service providers would provide high computing power to these companies and charge a fee for it. The best thing about cloud computing for both the service providers and the clients is that billing can be made to the granular level of every instruction executed. Hence several start-ups were born, thanks to cloud computing! In the case of a company that runs on a cloud, the initial set up cost is less but the operating cost is more. Which means that they do not need to invest large capital for high end computers and licenses but they had to pay more money for the bandwidth and cloud service. Whether this is a boon or bane is something that varies from organization to organization.
A good thing is that if software is needed only to generate reports once a year or so, then cloud computing is the best solution. Several types of cloud services were also born like the private cloud, public cloud and hybrid cloud. Things like two or three companies jointly start a cloud with the required hardware and they would use it for their own companies also happen. This is called community cloud. It is not entirely safe to keep all the company's data in their in-house servers. But how can these external service providers be trusted with their sensitive data? These service providers do take a lor of pride in providing 100% data privacy to its clients. No public large scale damage has been done so far by breaching a cloud service but still the privacy concerns will be there always. That strives the service providers to provide better security everytime I guess. The next technological revolution is happening and it is wise to get on board. Several applications are getting developed for the cloud and it would be wise for the developers to equip themselves accordingly to get on to the bandwagon. There is one thing which I find limiting in cloud computing and that is the requirement of huge bandwidth. If a breakthrough can be made in this segment, then I am sure that cloud computing would probably reach beyond horizons. It can reach out to the countless poor school children in the remotest parts of the globe to be educated well and influence the lives of countless others. This is just my idea. I do not know if it can be possible with the present technology. Of course, every technology when it was innovated was impossible at the time the idea was born. Until my next post, take care!
Subscribe to this comment's feed
Tweets that mention Reader's Quotient - Cloud Computing -- Topsy.com
said:
 |
... [...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by The Tech Gang, Mihir Jha. Mihir Jha said: Cloud Computing: Authored By Harish R: “Necessity is the mother of all inventions… http://goo.gl/fb/WqPgk 2-min read [...] |
Subhee
said:
|
... interesting concept. 1 suggestionyou can go a bit deeper into the topic to give a little more details |
