I Love the Cloud: My Never-Ending Journey with AWS

[GUEST POST] I started exploring the cloud computing world around 5 years ago, and I must admit that my initial understanding of the cloud was a disaster. At first, it was difficult to find a comprehensive definition, but I finally settled on one from the National Institute of Standards & Technology (NIST). It clearly defined the cloud’s attributes and models, and removed my doubts regarding what falls under the cloud umbrella. The experience that I had finding this definition made me realize that I wanted there to be an easier way for others to find it, as well. Therefore, I decided to create my own list of cloud guidelines. This was a turning point in my cloud journey, as it pushed me to teach many students and IT professionals about cloud computing.
Stumbling upon AWS is inevitable when discovering the cloud, and just as with the cloud, my first interaction with AWS was not simple, either. I remember the moment of “Eureka!” that came after I was finally able to launch an EC2 instance and deploy a simple application. Sometimes, I laugh at the sheer joy I experienced from such a small achievement, but I realize that this was a stepping stone in my AWS journey and my love for Amazon. I am now able to manage bigger AWS cloud infrastructures, and I’ve consulted for and successfully designed various Amazon projects. I’ve conducted sessions on how to scale applications and how to make scalable applications using Amazon.
I see that two things have remained steady over the past few years: continuous innovations at AWS and my love for AWS. AWS has always kept me motivated to learn new things with its consistent new offerings, and I’d like to share the reasons that I believe make it the immense influence on the cloud that it is today.
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What Cloud 2015 Holds: My Predictions and Hopes for Enterprises

2014: A Reflection

t_F091CD55-1AEA-52CA-98B9-FC2558B77CF72014 has been a pivotal year in the enterprise tech world. Enterprise IT has begun to fully understand the cloud, and the development of a mutual understanding has grown. The cloud is, in turn, adjusting more and more to the features and traditional needs of enterprise  IT.

My perspective on next year is guided mostly by experiences I had this year (2014) at the AWS re:Invent conference. This huge cloud festival was the platform from which AWS publicly introduced the cloud as a means for creating today’s enterprise data center. Whether for native cloud web-scale applications or for enterprises of all shapes and sizes, the cloud is considered to be today’s best way to increase efficiency as well as flexibility in any IT environment. It is important to note that market saturation is still not here, however it’s just a matter of time until the cloud is used by everyone, covering a significant portion of the world of IT.

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Who are you, Cloud Broker?

cloud value chain bgCloud brokers were recognized and described by Gartner analysts as the `Intermediary services that support fast cloud adoption`. From their customers’ perspectives cloud brokers are the system integrators (SI) or the `cloud enablers` that support fast adoption and maintenance of cloud technologies. For example, the independent software vendor (ISV) can benefit greatly from a cloud managed service provider (MSP) starting with integrating into the underlying cloud infrastructure, all the way up to the offering stack wrappers, such as service provisioning methodologies’ implementation. From the cloud provider’s perspective, cloud brokers are key customers, value-added resellers and aggregators of its cloud services.
In this article, I cover the perceptions, evolution and future of cloud brokerage in great detail.
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The Cloud in HP’s Cloud (Part 2): HP Discover, the Enterprise and AWS Cloud

imageLast month I attended HP Discover (disclosure: my participation was funded by Ivy World). The IT war already started however HP stands still not taking initiatives and real risks as true leaders should take. At the three-day conference I learned why some companies don’t last and why this IT giant is at a great risk of losing in this new era IT battle. This is a story of a lasting company that might have already lost.
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The IaaS Management Market: Evolution, Vendors and More

A lot has already been said about the false cloud use where the IaaS platform utilized as an hosting extension of the IT organization’s data center and not taking advantage of the elasticity benefits to generate a cost effective and scalable IT operation. Using the public IaaS whether it is Amazon, Rackspace or any other vendor means using a highly dynamic environment which presents an increasing complexity hence loss of control. Checking the list below I can say that cloud (including all its layers IaaS, PaaS and SaaS) control basically contains the same aspects as the good old system management.

What is “System management” ?
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Developers are from Mars

The three layers of cloud computing IaaS, PaaS and SaaS occupy the headlines with significant capabilities undergo continuous improvement to host services in the cloud. This growing market is slowly changing so that offered services will become generic. The current evolving struggle is the deployment and management of SaaS applications in the cloud, Gartner calls this cloud market portion SEAP (Software Enabled Application Platforms). We will dare to say that developers are from Mars and cloud providers from Venus, let us explain in detail why.

SaaS application developer builds the application architecture structure including the database system, the business logic and the user Interface. The software developer (or the SaaS vendor for that matter) invests on building these main three infrastructure cornerstones in order to bring life to the business idea and launch a new on-line service.
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The Cloud Security Part 1: For Dummies

cloud security considerationsFrom an attacker’s perspective, cloud providers aggregate access to many victims’ data into a single point of entry. As the cloud environments become more and more popular, they will increasingly become the focus of attacks. Some organizations think that liability can be outsourced, but no, and I hope that we all understand it cannot. The contract with your cloud vendors basically means nothing, the ISVs or should I say the `SaaS providers`  still holds the responsibility, so rather than focusing on contracts and limiting liability in cloud services deals, you should focus on controls and auditability.

“Dropbox, … deceived users about the security ..The FTC complaint charges Dropbox with telling users that their files were totally encrypted” Wired Magazine

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Gartner: IaaS forecast to grow from an estimated $3.7 billion in 2011 to $10.5 billion in 2014

“Startup IaaS pure-plays, Web hosters, carriers and data center outsourcers are all competing in the cloud computing IaaS market. However, many providers have a market viewpoint that is restricted by…

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