In message <[email protected]>, P Witte
<[email protected]> writes
Norman Dunbar wrote:
George,
The current trend appears to be towards Cloud computing,
Aha! But how do you program for this?
Cloud is the latest marketing paradigm/buzz word to hit the IT
world.
Like most other "next great things" it will pass and fade from memory.
All it means is that instead of you or your company owning a pile of
servers onto which you install and run stuff, like Oracle databases,
WebLogic app servers and so on, huge companies like Amazon and
(possibly) Google own the servers and you rent space on them as and when
you need.
You pay by the time used and if you need, say, to run a training
course,
switch on a few more processor cores (or whatever) and pay the extra for
that training course only.
The problem is, all your data is on Amazon's servers - do you know
that
Amazon are making the security work? How safe is your data? Who else can
see it?
It's fine under certain circumstances, but personally, I don't trust
it.
However, I have become very cynical with the IT business - having been
in it far too long - and all these "next great things" that so far, have
all come to nothing!
Best avoided.
But surely you see that it could spell then end of the Personal
Computer, in which case the "next great thing" becomes significant and
not merely a fad. The issues you raise regarding privacy and security
will be solved, otherwise this idea will vanish (until needed on some
other occasion). The most common devices to access these vast resources
may well look very different from our standard PCs of today. They could
be small, always-online mobile devices with lots of bling and little
brain. In other words smartphones or iPads or what have you.
Of course there will be thousands of old fogeys, like me, and perhaps
you, who wont take to all that jazz, but will continue to issue our
curses and incantations over strange black boxes from another era, nay,
civilisation. Still, I have a DropBox account, and find it very handy.
Its like a folder in Explorer except its located in the Cloud. Anything
I copy there is immediately replicated across all my PCs and physically
reside there, as well as in the cloud. If my house burns down with my
computers and backups I can still access my data from anywhere. If the
Cloud should become inaccessible, I still have copies across my
computers. Privacy? I only store zipped and encrypted files in DropBox
unless I decide to share.
So its not all bad. It may not be the final word in computing
paradigms, but you dont NOT take the ferry because youre convinced that
in ten years time therell be a bridge.
These DropBox guys dont at present seem to want to program you or rifle
through your private papers. I suppose they make their money by getting
you addicted and then selling you more space above the two Gig "free"
bait. Seems fair enough to me.
Google Docs, Calendar, etc are really a peek into a possible future of
Cloud Computing. (Is it true that Google is as big as General Motors?)
If it is, they must be doing something right. It is right if it makes
sense, but more often it is right if it makes a profit and so you make
damned sure it makes sense too, by making every other way of doing
things increasingly difficult and expensive, and finally obsolete.
In the end it comes down to: "Eat shit! A trillion flies cant be
wrong!" We all do it, you know. We all finally succumb to that
scatological temptation. (Hands up all here with PCs! Right! See! I
rest my case.)
Per
(feeling a bit strange after those tablets my doctor gave me %o$ )
Hi Per,
Interesting stuff ... :-)
I agree that the "personal computer" may just become another
technological casualty as the 21st Century progresses.
Devices like iPads look like being the way forward that most people will
go for.
After all "PC's" and the www, only really became popular to use by
people who wanted to chat, play music, watch video, etc; and have it all
relatively easily presented to them.
I am looking forward to have an iPad like device myself, though, too ...
although I would expect to make a wider use of it than just
entertainment.
I haven't tried the Cloud, yet I understand the advantages that you
describe.
I believe that Google are developing their own OS, which will no doubt
be offered "free".
Anyway, I haven't heard any specifications, as yet for a QL21 - a QL
inheritance device for the 21st Century .....
--
Malcolm Cadman
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