Cloudcomputingreview June 2011

Cloud Computing
Analyzing cloud computing news and trends
Review
Industry trends and strategIes
Shopping Around for Cloud Computing Services Calculating the Cost Advantages of Private Cloud
securIty
Ten Key Provisions in Cloud Computing Contracts

BusIness applIcatIons
Content Management Services Take to the Cloud

applIcatIon development
Solidifying SOA and Cloud Computing Links
edItors letter
GettinG YouR BimonthlY Dose of ClouD tRenDs

editors letter shopping for Cloud serviCes
CalCulating private Cloud advantages
Cloud ContraCts
Content ManageMent in the Cloud
Cloud appliCations
additional resourCes
ello, and welcome to the first issue of Cloud Computing Review. This e-zine is for IT leaders who are ready for the cloud but dont have all day to read about it. Every other month, we will publish the five most important articles on cloud computing from across TechTargets 80-plus IT websites. Can cloud computing really save you money, for example? Much has been written about the benefits of cloud, but can you be sure you are saving money in the long run? Our first two articlesShopping Around for Cloud Computing Services and Calculating the Cost Advantages of Private Cloudshed light on the hidden costs of cloud computing. Franoise Gilbert, managing director of the IT Law Group and general counsel at the Cloud Security Alliance, digs into the contract terms and provisions you should pay attention to in Ten Key Provisions in Cloud Computing Contracts. In light of new cloud services, even stodgy old content management systems are getting a dusting off. Find out why the city of Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, moved to a cloud-based content management service despite having an IT staff of 340 people in Content Management Services Take to the Cloud. And for the architects among you, Solidifying SOA and the Cloud Computing Link explains why creating a service-oriented architecture is the best path to cloud computing. I hope you find this e-zine useful. If you have ideas for articles youd like to read or if you have feedback on this issue, email me at jmaitland@techtarget.com.
Jo Maitland Senior Executive Editor Data Center and Virtualization Media Group TechTarget Inc.
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cloud Industry trends and strategIes
shoppinG ARounD foR ClouD ComputinG seRviCes

Take a wrong turn into the cloud and you might pay more than expected. Our expert explains how to accurately compare the price of cloud services and find the best deal.
By DaviD Strom
Cloud ContraCts
Cloud appliCations
eve all heard that cloud computing can be cheaper than paying for your own server. But the dirty little secret is that, because almost everything is priced la carte, comparison shopping can be like prying a final number from your local car dealer. Recently I learned this lesson when I got a monthly bill from Amazon Web Services (AWS) for $37. My past bills were only a few pennies a month for some test virtual machines (VMs) I had placed on AWS servers; so how could I run up $37 worth of services? The culprit was the virtual private network (VPN), which I had forgotten to turn off when my tests were complete. Oops. And therein lies the challenge for any IT manager on the hunt for cloud savings: to read the fine print and understand what is billable and when the meter startsor, in my case, stopsrunning.
The ComplexiTies of AmAzons Cloud priCing
Amazons pricing is so complex that the company has devoted an entire website to calculating cloud costs. You enter your region for storing your environment and plug in the number of VMs you plan to run as well as the amount
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shopping for Cloud serviCes
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of storage and data transfer you plan on using. The calculator then interactively shows you an estimate of your bill. It isnt pretty, and you need to spend time plugging in various numbers, but it may prevent billing surprises. The calculator has lots of annotations to help you enter the right information, and it also spells out the various promotional rates (such as 25 free machine hours for the first SimpleDB instance) when appropriate. The only downside is that you have to be familiar with Amazons many service offerings. Amazons calculator is laudable because of its transparency; while some competitors require users to enter a customer ID before calculating prices, Amazon doesnt limit usage to existing
Figure 1: amazons cloud pricing calculator
customers (see Figure 1). There are also pricing templates to get you started, such as for a sample Web app or marketing website.
fixed priCes in The Cloud
If you crave greater simplicity, a good place to start is with vendors that offer a fixed monthly pricing plan. Skytap starts at $500 a month for its basic environment, and CloudShares Pro plan is $49 per month. That $49 will get you up to six VMs that can use up to 10 GB of RAM and 300 GB of disk. If you can make use of the companys pre-made OS templates that run a variety of Windows and Linux operating systems and applications, this offering is a bargain.
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CloudShare used to offer an even better deala free planbut sadly it was discontinued earlier this year. This brings us to another challenge: In the cloud, things change quite often and without much notice. Just because you went to a particular website and got one quote today doesnt mean that the vendor wont adjust things tomorrow and render all your research obsolete. Amazon, for example, is fond of reducing its prices quite frequently as it buys new and cheaper equipment.
Cloud ContraCts
geTTing Billed for The Cloud You use
Another question to ask: Are you being billed only for VMs that are up and running, or are you paying for all resources
all the time? Verizons Computing as a Service, SMB, offering, for example, charges for all VMs whether or not they are turned on (see Figure 2). If you want to test a VM environment and then turn it off, its wise to use a provider like Amazon that doesnt bill around the clock. A single test Windows Server cost me roughly $100 per month, which is more than youd pay for some competitors. The Verizon CaaS main dashboard, however, makes it easy to see which resources are in your cloud. Verizons cloud offering is based on the Terremark and VMware vCloud platform. Interestingly, although the telco purchased Terremark earlier this year, Terremarks website shows a completely different pricing scheme. GoGrid offers a different pricing
Figure 2: the dashboard of verizons computing as a service, smB

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editors letter
scheme called RAM Hours, which is the amount of deployed RAM multiplied by the number of hours that it runs (see Figure 3). Each of its pricing plans includes a fixed number of RAM Hours; if you exceed the total, you are charged for the overage. GoGrid also supplies a calculator to estimate your bill.
exTrA ChAnges for Cloud liCenses
Cloud ContraCts
You also need to explain any surcharges for particular OS instances. Each cloud vendor passes costs on to users differently. The best deal is CloudShare, which doesnt add on any costs. But Terremark, for example, charges extra for its WinFigure 3: gogrids pricing calculator
dows templates. The price ranges from $19 per month for the simplest configuration up to nearly $500 per month for a full-fledged Windows server with multiple virtual CPUs. It can be helpful to envision the precise VM configuration you want to place in the cloud. For relatively simple OS configurations that use only a few Web applications, it can be more economical to skip the cloud entirely and use one of the shared Web hosting plans from major domain providers such as Go Daddy. You can get 10 GB of storage on a Windows or Linux machine for less than $5 per month with no additional bandwidth or storage charges. Finally, consider all available offer-
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ings and understand how each vendors various plans fit together. We have Amazons numerous services, but even Rackspace offers two plans: one for simple file storage called Cloud Files and a more general cloud computing plan called Cloud Servers. Cloud Files starts at 15 cents per GB per month plus bandwidth usage charges, while Cloud Servers starts at $10.95 per month plus other charges. And like other providers, Rackspace has its own pricing calculator. As you can see, price comparison shopping isnt simple. There are many other factors to consider, including 24/7 live support and various remote
access plans. Make sure you understand all the dimensions of the environment you intend to create in the clouddisk storage, bandwidth, CPU usage and so forthbefore you sign up with a provider. Use the calculators from Amazon, GoGrid and Rackspace as starting points to test your assumptions and predict your costs. And if all this makes you nervous, consider a fixed-pricing vendor. p
david strom is an expert on network and Internet technologies and has written on topics such as VOIP, convergence, email, network management, Internet applications, wireless and Web services for more than 20 years.
Cloud ContraCts
Figure 4: rackspaces pricing calculator

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CAlCulAtinG the Cost ADvAntAGes of pRivAte ClouD

In the right situation, a private cloud can save you money. Heres why its valuable to estimate the pricing benefits of an in-house cloud.
By anDi mann, Kurt milne anD Jeanne morain
Cloud ContraCts
Cloud appliCations
o master private cloud economics, tune up your spreadsheets and refine the business value proposition of your portfolio view of computing environments. You need a simple model that describes the cost and benefit of each environment. With this model, you and your CIO can explain your private cloud strategy to business executives and application owners in simple terms. Start by highlighting the cost, service quality, agility and landscape measures for each environment. Create an elevator pitch that goes something like this:
We can offer you several options. We can manage your application on a dedicated physical server for $X per year with Y service levels, and it takes Z days to set up.
Or we can put that application on a virtual server. Well charge you only $X per year based on how many resources are allocated, with Y service level. And it only takes Z hours to set up. Or we can tailor business-optimized services in the private cloud. Thats only $X per year based on actual resource usage with Y service levels. The really great thing is you can self-service provision it in about 15 minutes. And we can automatically adjust and charge for just enough resources as usage levels change. At comparable levels of resources allocated, it costs more per year in a virtual static environment than in a private cloud, but you can fix the resource levels and pay for what is allocated. It costs less per year in a private cloud environment for equivalent usage, but we right-size resources dynamically to maintain service-level agreements.
This article is an excerpt from Visible Ops Private Cloud: From Virtualization to Private Cloud in Four Practical Steps by Andi Mann, Kurt Milne and Jeanne Morain.
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This kind of pitch helps position IT as a department that proactively deploys capabilities designed to quickly respond to changing business needs. As you continue your discussion with business and application owners, emphasize these facts about IT: pp offers self-service provisioning to It match or exceed services offered by third-party providers. pp provides services that were deIt veloped with input from business users and that are tailored specifically to address business needs. pp includes stronger security and It compliance controls than are available from public cloud providers. pp scales resources automatically to It minimize disruption from changing work levels. pp offers lower annual cost per It server by increasing workload density to optimize utilization without sacrificing performance and agility.
Cloud ContraCts
Cloud appliCations
The VAlue of priVATe Cloud
Dont forget, however, that there are costs associated with the tools and automation routines that enable private cloud services. How can you offer agile services at a lower per-unit cost? The cost efficiency of private cloud computing depends on economies of scale, higher workload density and dynamic management of resources that ensure service levels. When all the resources in a pool can be allocated (or even overallocated) to specific
workloads, you can achieve optimal costs. That requires high efficiency in allocating the resources and effective strategies for responding when workloads consume all resources assigned to them. Conceptually, utilization and agility have an inverse relationship: That is, higher utilization reduces agility. (Think of it as rush-hour gridlock on the highway as compared with 3 a.m. open-road driving). In a static virtual environment, its generally true that higher utilization translates into lower agility. In a private cloud environment, however, dynamic resource management strategies that automate response to changing usage levels allow high utilization and high agility. Automatic response alleviates the queuing and gridlock of oversubscribed resources. There are fixed and ongoing costs associated with deploying and maintaining the automation and tools that manage dynamic resources in a high-density computing environment. The benefits, which include lower Capex and Opex, must exceed the costs of monitoring, automation and tooling to justify moving to the private cloud. Otherwise it makes more sense to simply stock a bank of unused virtual servers so you can quickly respond to business needs. You can use an economic model to show the cost advantage of moving to a private cloud. For example, you can create a model that highlights the footprint measures for the three computing environmentsphysical, virtual and cloudfor both your current data cen-
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ter configuration and the configuration of the target private cloud. Estimates for physical resource utilization in an optimized virtual environment suggest that server, memory and network interface card bandwidth can be 70% or higher. But there are considerable variations based on type of workload and whether they are deployed in development, QA or production environments. Other estimates suggest that 40% to 60% utilization is typical for highly virtualized environments. Some IT executives we interviewed suggested that utilization of 50% or more is required to reduce the cost of cloud services below comparable virtual environment costs.
other variation shows, for each environment, the percentage of workloads in development, test and production and highlights the cost differentials for each environment. Overall, emphasize the faster, better, cheaper value proposition. Highlight custom-designed services and greater business alignment in addition to cost comparison metrics. As you create a cloud model to fit your organization, keep the following in mind: pp Agility is one of the key benefits of a private cloud. So dont sacrifice agility as you work to drive up utilization. pp Private cloud economics require high utilization to work in your favor. Make sure your service-design process is effective (that is, build the right thing), and monitor customer satisfaction to identify drifting requirements. pp Application targeting must be accurate. Otherwise, you fill your private cloud resources with workloads that are a better fit for a virtual static or physical environment. p
Andi mann is a product marketing executive at CA Inc. Kurt milne is the managing director at the IT Process Institute. Jeanne morain independent expert on cloud, application virtualization and systems management.
so how muCh will A priVATe Cloud CosT?
Cloud appliCations
For cost estimates for each computing environment, many IT organizations charge back virtual servers at half the annual cost of physical ones. Analysis of cost comparison of private cloud and public cloud suggest that private cloud is 40% less expensive than public cloud for enterprises with significant IT resources already in place. You can then highlight the current percentages of total IT budget spent on each environment in the current configuration and show how that overall mix changes with private cloud. An-
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cloud securIty
ten KeY pRovisions in ClouD ComputinG ContRACts

Cloud computing customers need to pay attention to contract terms, security requirements and other provisions to avoid getting burned by the fine print.
By FranoiSe GilBert
Cloud ContraCts
Cloud appliCations
eneral wisdom states that, when venturing into a business relationship, it is prudent to create a written agreement that outlines the obligations and responsibilities of all parties. Cloud computing services are no different. No matter how fast or easy it is to enter into a contract for cloud services, there are essential terms and provisions to which the parties should pay attention. Here are 10 key provisions for cloud computing contracts.
2. description of services. Ensure that
1. modifications to the contract terms.

Scrutinize the cloud service providers ability to change the terms of the contract. Many cloud service agreements allow a cloud service provider to changeat any time and without advance noticecontract terms, fees and rate structures and the services provided.
there is a clear description of the cloud service, which should include the type of services provided, overall goals of the services and how services will evolve during the life of the contract. Many contracts grant vendors the freedom to add or remove features. Cloud customers may need to ensure stabilitythe ability to continue using the features or version of an application that is most appropriate to business operations, for example. Service-level agreements (SLAs) are an essential part of a contract. They define when a service will be available and when interruptions are permitted or can be expected. SLAs also identify how a customer will be compensated for service interruption.
3. limitation on the use or reuse of the

data. Customers should limit a cloud providers access to and use of their
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data unless its strictly required for the provision of the services. This requirement may stem from applicable laws, such as the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA) or foreign data protection laws, and it may make sense. A cloud provider is intended to be a host or a facilitator; it should not use the customers data for its own benefit, unless it has specific permissions. The location of the data is also of particular interest. All parties should agree on where the data will be housed, because location is likely to determine which law applies to the data. For example, if a cloud provider transfers personal data to a server in Argentina, Belgium or Canada, the data will be subject to the local laws of those countries. And the data protection laws of these countries contain specific provisions that limit how personal data may be transferred out of that country.
4. confidentiality and security re-
quirements. Cloud customers should also ensure the confidentiality and security of their data. In many cases, they will want to be promptly informed of any breach of security that may have affected the data. Appropriate provisions that address vendors confidentiality and security obligations, and allocate liability among the parties, are essential.
pear in many different forms. Some services may allow for the posting or publication of user photos, video clips, poems or other content. When a service is provided at no cost, its likely that the related contract may grant the hosting provider a royalty-free license to use this content. Some cloud services may involve granting a user a license to the cloud providers intellectual property. This license may be very narrow. It may be limited, for example, to the use of the technology or application and could prohibit any modification. As a result, the user may be permitted to use only generic, standardized features and may be barred from developing customizations that would make its use of the service easier or more efficient. The service may grant access to a database but strictly limit what a customer can do with the information it contains. Thus, it is very important for cloud users to understand the precise scope of the licenses granted to one anothers intellectual property. In balancing the pros and cons of entering into a service contract, the scope of the license granted or received may be a crucial element.
6. representations and warranties.
5. Intellectual property rights. Intellectual property right issues may ap-
Representation and warranty clauses contain statements by a party on which the other party may rely. A contract outlines specific remedies if the statements or promises made are untrue or not fulfilled, where the party who relied on these statements or promises is en-
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titled to damages from the other party. Representations and warranties in cloud service contracts may address, for example, where or how the services will be performed, the qualifications of the individuals performing the services, the reliability of the technology used to perform the services or ownership of intellectual property rights.
7. Indemnification. Indemnification
disputes arise. For example, the contract may give a vendor the freedom to terminate the contract at any time and for no reason. The vendor could automatically renew the contract for another term if a customer fails to inform a provider within a certain window of time. The unexpected termination or extension of the contract could cause significant loss to the affected party.
Cloud ContraCts
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provisions identify how one party will compensate the other for a loss incurred as a result of the indemnitors acts or omissions. For example, a cloud service provider may agree to indemnify a customer if the technology used to provide the services infringes or misappropriates a third partys intellectual property rights. A customer might agree to indemnify the cloud provider if it faces a third partys claim that arises from customer negligence, misconduct or violation of law.
10. effect of termination. Its not
8. limitation of liability and damage.
Limitation of liability clauses are among the most negotiated. They are critical because they determine the extent of the damages that a party may have to pay, or may receive, in the event of a breach of contract or other omission.
enough to know when a contract will terminate. Anticipate what will happen when the contract terminates. What will happen to the data? How can data be retrieved, and in which form and format? Will the service provider be required to keep the data on its systems during a transition period? It can be easy to sign on with a cloud provider, but companies that dont pay attention to these cloud computing contract provisions may pay a steep price. So take the time to ensure that your companys interests and data are protected when contracting with a cloud service. p
franoise gilbert is the managing director of the IT Law Group and serves as the general counsel of the Cloud Security Alliance. She has been named one of the countrys top privacy advisers and has been recognized by Chambers USA and Best Lawyers in America as a leading lawyer in the field of information privacy and security. Gilbert is the author and editor of the two-volume Global Privacy & Security Law, which analyzes data protection laws in more than 60 countries. This article reflects only her opinions and not those of her clients or the Cloud Security Alliance.
9. contract terms and renewal. Know
when the contact will end and the conditions under which it can be terminated or extended. Clauses are often neglected when parties enter into a contract but highly scrutinized when
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Content mAnAGement seRviCes tAKe to the ClouD

Decentralized and widespread enterprises are moving content management services to the cloud and reaping the benefits of lower costs, flexibility and scalability.
By Stan GiBSon
Cloud ContraCts
Cloud appliCations
ontent management has proved its worth as a way to control website information, organize workflow and handle important corporate documents such as customer contracts and product specifications. Now many organizations are discovering that, when delivered as cloud-based services, content management applications can offer even greater value. With the cloud, we get a multimilliondollar infrastructure thats always on. Its scalable, and we can compete at a level that was unheard of before, said Daniel OLeary, vice president for global solutions at LincWare LLC, a Rochester, N.Y., maker of electronic forms management software. OLeary has found that cloud-based content management services benefit from the same characteristics that are driving the cloud to become an alterna-
tive or, in some cases, primary platform for all applications: lower overall cost, no requirement to build and own IT infrastructure, and the ability to add and subtract capacity as needed.
with the cloud, we get a multimilliondollar infrastructure thats always on.

Daniel OLeary, VP for global solutions, LincWare LLC
Further, many cloud-based content management service providers now enable integration with other cloud apps. In addition, advances in logistics have spurred the creation of new hybrid content management services that include paper-based document scan-
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ning. Finally, the cloud is gaining credibility for security and reliability, which historically have been two stumbling blocks for companies considering using the cloud.
editors letter
Cloud ContraCts
we create a project folder in Box.net and store all the content there. then we invite customersthey could be in Australiato participate in the Box folder.
Daniel OLeary
and we would not have to build a massive content management system. We really like the value, the flexibility and the speed, OLeary said. We create a project folder in Box.net and store all the content there. Then we invite customersthey could be in Australiato participate in the Box folder, he said. From the Box.net application, LincWare connects to other cloudbased applications including Basecamp for project management and Highrise for customer relationship management (CRM), both of which are provided by Chicago-based 37signals LLC.
sTrATus mAnAges ConTrACT lifeCYCles in The Cloud
fiTTing ConTenT mAnAgemenT serViCes inTo A Box
Cloud appliCations
LincWare faced a dilemma. It wanted to store its document creation applications and data on its network drives, but it also wanted to make this content large attachments such as training videosavailable to its global workers. Although its headquarters are in the U.S., LincWare has a global network of developers and partners. Low cost and work anywhere were requirements. We wanted the same interface, no matter the location, OLeary said. The company discovered that Box. net Inc., a Palo Alto, Calif., provider of Web-based content management services, could meet those needs. We started using it internally, then decided our customers could benefit
Integration with another cloud-based application was a critical requirement for Stratus Technologies Inc. The Maynard, Mass., vendor of fault-tolerant servers and software relied heavily on Salesforce.com Inc. and its Software as a Service CRM application. It needed a new contract management system, and it had to integrate with Salesforce.com. As a $260 million company, Stratus couldnt justify purchasing a highend contract management system, but a bare-bones, retail cloud offering wouldnt suffice either. SpringCM Inc., a cloud-based content management provider in Chicago, afforded Stratus with a custom integration. Stratus now has a streamlined contract management system that has replaced an unwieldy paper-based system. All interested parties can track and
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manage contracts, whether theyre in their offices or on the road. When people know the status of a deal, they dont have to pick up the phone. Its making everybody more productive, said Steve Parker, business development manager at Stratus. Thanks to the integration, Stratus employees log into Salesforce.com to access the SpringCM system, which performs contract lifecycle management tasks. Its very tightly coupled with Salesforce, Parker said. The SpringCM application also streamlines Stratus compliance with the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. The laws requirements for accurate revenue accounting underscore the need for a precise and reliable contract management system. The system lets the management team know where a particular deal is at a moments notice, Parker said.
more important, we wanted to stay away from the capital [expense] side and turn it into an operating expense, said Chris Moore, CIO for the city of Edmonton, Alberta.
when people know the status of a deal, they dont have to pick up the phone. [the content management system] is making everybody more productive.
Steve Parker, business development manager, Stratus
Cloud appliCations
ConTenT mAnAgemenT underpins edmonTons puBliC weBsiTe
Edmonton handed over much of the work to Yellow Pencil Inc., an integrator in the city. The new service relies on Hummingbird Ltd.s Red Dot content management system, which was acquired in 2006 by OpenText Corp. in Waterloo, Ontario.
Even though it has an IT staff of 340 people, the city of Edmonton, Alberta, faced a build-versus-buy decision when it came to managing the content for its public website. When the city overhauled that website four years ago, a cloud-based content management service was part of the mix for many of the same reasons cloud computing initially gained popularity. Time to market was important. If we hosted it ourselves, it would have taken a while to build. Cost was a factor; but
The persisTenCe of pAper in ConTenT mAnAgemenT serViCes
Many businesses need paper documents, a fact thats spurring new cloudbased content management services. Janitorial services provider Unique Cleaning Service Inc. in Marietta, Ga., needed a system to handle travel expense receipts for its mobile quality control managers. Staff members who
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travel send their receipts daily to Cambridge, Mass.-based OfficeDrop, which scans them and stores them as searchable PDF files. Accountants can view information according to expense category or managers name. Managers send in their expense receipts to OfficeDrop. Accountants get immediate access to the information and put it into a central depository, said Wayne Goodman, vice president of administration at Unique Cleaning. And quality managers dont have to sort through a pile of receipts at the end of the week. If they choose, workers can photograph a receipt with a corporate-issued Apple iPhone and email the image to OfficeDrop.
Just a few years ago, the idea of placing critical documents offpremises and putting ones business at the mercy of an internet connection would have made cloud-based content management services a nonstarter.
initially concerned about the security of the companys customer contract data. The CIO, however, convinced the companys general counsel that the risk was minimal, Stratuss Parker said. The city of Edmonton also had security questions, which ultimately were satisfied. The legal people understand and embrace the opportunity, CIO Moore said. People need to become involved and educated as to the perceived risk. People who are trying to sell other things try to convince people the cloud is a dangerous place, he said, adding, But you do your due diligence, like anything else. p
stan gibson is a Boston-based contributing writer.
Cloud appliCations
ConTenT mAnAgemenT in The Cloud no longer A nonsTArTer
Just a few years ago, the idea of placing critical documents off-premises and putting ones business at the mercy of an Internet connection would have made cloud-based content management services a nonstarter, even at smaller companies, which tend to gravitate toward cloud-based services. But a solid track record is convincing IT professionals at these firms that the cloud is a safe bet. At Stratus, the legal department was
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soliDifYinG the soA AnD ClouD ComputinG linK

Service-oriented architecture and the cloud create a perfect technology pairif you implement them in the proper order.
By DaviD S. linthicum
Cloud ContraCts
Cloud appliCations
hose who know me know that Im about the cloud, and Im about using serviceoriented architecture (SOA) to leverage the cloud. To me the two concepts are inseparable: You cant have a successful and efficient cloud implementation without SOA. But cloud computing and SOA are different concepts. The trouble is that most in the emerging cloud computing space have experience in infrastructure planning and management, not architecture and especially not SOA. Thus, without creating solid links with the cloud and SOA, many end up in technology-driven cloud implementations that fall short of providing the required value. Processes, applications and services are tossed out onto the cloud willy-nilly, without proper thought and planning. A proven fact is that if you marry the use of cloud computing with a SOA,
youre likely to get to the proper cloud computing technology, including agility and extensibility, which most enterprises lack. The core purpose of SOA is to provide structured architectural guidance to a loosely coupled architecture that can better make use of cloud resources.
whY soA And Cloud Are meAnT for eACh oTher
SOA fits with cloud computing. Consider that SOA is all about breaking down existing and new systems into their component parts, typically data, services and processes. These components are loosely coupled and thus can exist anywhere inside or outside the enterprise. So you can mix and match system or architectural components that run on local servers, or on private or public clouds, and select the best platformcloud or notto do the job.
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At the heart of the issue is that many enterprises dont focus on architecture or planning but instead on technology. SOA is something you do, not something you buy, so you cant purchase a tool and bring it to your enterprise. Over the years, the focus on technology has gotten us into trouble. In many respects, were looking at the next generation of technology to save us from the troubles created by the last generation. Cloud computing wont provide that solution. Instead the cloud can be just another way to create new silos within your enterprise; it can also make your enterprise architecture more complex and therefore less adaptable to required new business processes. Youll dig a much deeper hole by once again tossing the most-hyped technology at a problem. The movement to the cloud should focus on the fundamentals of SOA. Understand all existing and new IT resources at the primitive levels, including data, services, processes, rules, interfaces, etc. From there consider all these resources as services. Define them logically, and add them to a portfolio of services. Then consider the platforms that will best host those services. This is the point at which cloud should enter the picture. Cloud computing is not a replacement for architecture but merely a platform alternative that provides more effective and efficient places for processing. SOA is the path, if cloud is your destination. p
david s. linthicum is the CTO of Blue Mountain Labs, an IT consulting firm.
Cloud Computing Review is published byTechTarget Inc. and is the product of several sites. This issue is a collaboration of the following:
SearchCloudComputing.com SearchCloudSecurity.com SearchCIO.com SearchSOA.com
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June 2011
addItIonal resources
preparing for a Hybrid cloud move You wont get far with hybrid cloud unless you know the increasingly popular cloud model inside and out. Take these important steps into consideration when planning a hybrid cloud leap. Why arent all enterprises Building private clouds? Not all organizations are prepared for massive organizational change. See what separates cloud-ready organizations from the rest. salesforces cloud computing strategy pushes Forward Salesforce.com keeps adding to its cloud computing strategy through acquisitions and development, but some observers wonder whether the company isnt spreading itself too thin. reducing the pain of a cloud transition The road to cloud can be bumpy, but previous commitments to virtualization or service-oriented architecture can help smooth the path. From virtualization to private cloud: making the move The authors of a new book on private cloud discuss the obstacles in moving to a private cloud and share their advice. shaking up the cloud storage market As big players like Iron Mountain change gears on cloud storage, users are turning to new tools and commodity cloud services. What Is project conceros role in microsofts cloud strategy? Microsofts Project Concero offers a way to manage services that run on Windows Azure and Azure appliances from any Web interface. Could it broaden adoption of Microsofts cloud tools? a cloud providers guide to multiservice cloud platforms This look at cloud platforms walks providers through creating one flexible platform for multiple services, internal and external cloud uses and the necessary database analysis. three tips for private clouds If youve already mastered the introductory steps to a private cloud implementation, dig a little deeper with these lessons on operating an internal cloud service. detecting unauthorized use of cloud computing Want to know if your developers or sales executives are moving data to the cloud? Here are three tools that can help detect cloud use.
editors letter
Cloud ContraCts
Cloud appliCations
20
vol. 1, no. 1
June 2011

Cloudcomputingreview June 2011

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Cloud Computing

Analyzing cloud computing news and trends

Industry trends and strategIes

Ten Key Provisions in Cloud Computing Contracts

Content Management Services Take to the Cloud

Solidifying SOA and Cloud Computing Links

GettinG YouR BimonthlY Dose of ClouD tRenDs

CalCulating private Cloud advantages

Content ManageMent in the Cloud