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December 2011 - Posts

Pragmatic Cloud: A look at yesterday paints a picture of tomorrow (Part 2)

Published: December 28 2011, 08:05 AM | no comments
by George Watt

What I learned at Cloud Exchange 2011

In Part 1 of this series I discussed the first three of the top five topics of discussion during this year's Cloud Exchange events (security, resilience/business continuity, data, finance, and user experience). In this post I will discuss the last two items, as well as a few others that almost made the top five.

Finance

This is a topic that generated two very distinct types of discussion. The most common was what we might call "cloud economics". There was discussion of budget constraints and what we call "The New Normal". There's a desire to understand the cost of the cloud, with agreement in many cases that organizations do not really fully understand the cost of current on-premise services; which makes comparing business cases a challenge at best. (That is, of course, an understatement.) In my former role as a private cloud provider this is something I had to manage actively, as I was frequently the recipient of incomplete and/or "first order only" business cases.

The topic of "rogue users" or "shadow IT" came up in this context as well. There were stories of out of control costs related to users going outside their IT department to acquire cloud services. Often the per-use rates of the cloud vendors were low enough to be acquired on a company credit card or account; and those charges quickly grew out of control as nobody was looking at overall consumption.

The second finance theme honed in on a partnership between the cloud team/IT team and the Finance team, and around communication with key stakeholders. (One attendee asked: "How do I talk to the CFO?") If ever you have spoken with me you likely already know I believe this is a key requirement for the success of a cloud team (or any IT team for that matter).

Some raised the point that senior executives often associate cloud only with cost savings. To think only in those terms is to potentially miss huge opportunities to improve service or revenue. Thus, cloud benefits must be included in any business case. One participant summed it up nicely: "(Cost) is important, but other features (of cloud) are of more value: Agility, time to market, the ability to service a Global workforce..."

I was also encouraged that three people from one large company's Finance team attended one of the events. They saw the potential of the cloud and wanted to take a leadership role to bring its benefits to their business. (Insert a virtual fist bump here.)

User Experience (Performance)

The last, and certainly not the least, of the top five (most mentioned) topics was the end-to-end user experience. What I found interesting is that prior to the past few months it rarely came up. I am hopeful that this is an indication that cloud computing, and the benefits thereof, are generally better understood. It appears people are starting to shift their thinking from "what is it?" and "I don't think this will work" to "how can I leverage this approach?" and "which services would it benefit us most to move?"

Again, several aspects of this topic were discussed. There was general concern over ensuring the consumer's experience was engaging, compelling, and pleasant, whether they were an employee or a customer. And a user experience discussion would be incomplete without mentioning the impact mobile devices and consumer driven IT is having on the enterprise. One participant spoke of how they used cloud services to address a global performance issue they had been experiencing. This is something I have seen before as well. (Some similar cases are documented on the Cloud Leaders site. Check out PGi and DonorsChoose.org.)

Honorable Mentions

So, after thousands of miles of travel and dozens of hotel meals, those were the issues that people were most often speaking about. And this is by no means a complete list. There were many other issues that were also frequently mentioned. Among those that almost made the list were:

  • Where do I begin? / How can I get started? / What should I move?
  • Application consolidation
  • Data center (infrastructure, real estate) consolidation
  • Choosing cloud partners / Selecting cloud services / Sourcing
  • Measuring service / SLAs

None of these can be considered any less important overall, and there were many more. Let me know if you would like me to expand upon, or offer an opinion on any of these.

This year I was extremely fortunate to have spoken with, and learned from, many people. I offer a sincere "thank you" to the Cloud Exchange participants for making this a truly enjoyable and enriching experience. I would also like to thank the other Cloud Exchange presenters: Kirk Laughlin and Steve Kovsky (InformationWeek), Jonathan Donaldson (VCE), and Andi Mann (CA Technologies). It was a pleasure working with each of them and I learned a lot.

This blog is cross-posted at Pragmatic Cloud. Follow @GeorgeDWatt on Twitter.

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By: George Watt
George Watt ( @GeorgeDWatt ) is VP of Strategy for the Cloud Computing organization at CA Technologies. For nearly 25 years, George has been helping customers simplify and automate their complex IT infrastructures. Prior to his current role, George founded CA Technologies Engineering Services team, which...
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Pragmatic Cloud: A look at yesterday paints a picture of tomorrow (Part 1)

Published: December 22 2011, 10:18 AM | no comments
by George Watt

What I learned at Cloud Exchange 2011

Having completed my last road trip of the year, I dusted off the notes I took during this year's Cloud Exchange events (and a few others) to see what I might learn from them. (The first thing I learned was that I take a lot of notes.) In the spirit of the Cloud Exchange events, I thought I would share what I discovered, which I will do in a 2-part series.

The Top Five

The following five topics were top of mind for Cloud Exchange participants, which included IT leaders from large enterprises, government agencies, defense, small businesses, consulting organizations, and hardware and software vendors: security, resilience/business continuity, data, finance, and the user experience. These received roughly equal attention, so they are not listed in order by rank. Though each attendee's most top of mind issue was heavily influenced by the maturity of their cloud implementation (or preparation).

In this first post, I will share my notes and observations on security, resilience, and data. Check back next week for part 2 covering finance and user experience, plus a few that deserve an honorable mention.

Security

It probably comes as no surprise that security on the list. I cannot recall a single event where it has not come up in some form. However, it's not always in the context one might assume. The discussion was not always "cloud risky, on-premise safe". There was also much discussion regarding how cloud services can actually be more resilient and secure than on-premise services in some cases.

The conclusion: Don't let security be an excuse not to think about cloud.

Of course, there was also discussion regarding cloud computing risks and how they might be addressed. And there was a lot of exchange on how to make environments more open to consumers. Participants spoke about how to improve the user experience by providing simple access while maintaining an adequate level of protection over corporate assets. I was very encouraged by the fact that even discussions regarding security were often from the perspective of how to deliver more to the consumer (safely).

Mobile computing and consumer driven IT often arose in this context (which is in part why they were not listed separately).  There were often two viewpoints: "It's too complex and risky. We're not even considering it."; and, "We want to take advantage of it (often because a competitor was) so we need to better understand it". I must declare a personal bias in this case. I believe that teams that choose to ignore consumer driven IT because it may introduce risks may, in fact, create more risk than they hope to prevent. Though, I have already written about that.

In summary, security concerns are valid. They need to be addressed. "No cloud is secure enough for anything" should never be accepted as a reason to take cloud options off the table.

Resilience / Business Continuity

Discussion often turned to resilience (reliability, high availability, business continuity...). Again, there were several angles. The most common was the viewpoint that cloud infrastructure, especially public cloud infrastructure, is not resilient. This was, no doubt, fueled by a few very visible public cloud failures that occurred around the time of the events. And while this statement is an over-generalization and what I would consider a cloud myth, the concern is valid. There was agreement that those who are considering cloud solutions need to ensure that there is sufficient resilience in the service, whether they provide it themselves or procure it. Essentially, nobody will care about "your assets" as much as you do.

Other detailed discussions centered on speed of recovery. Many believe that the objective is to have sufficient resilience such that nobody would notice the failure of a specific component. (It is achievable.) It is also the case that not every service requires the same level of resilience, and that more resilience usually means more cost. So care must be taken to apply the appropriate level of resilience. And some spoke of plans to use cloud services to increase the level of resilience in their business services.

Data

Open discussions often turned to the topic of "data". Certainly protecting data and maintaining access to data were discussed when security or resilience were being discussed. Though "data" came up on its own in other contexts as often as each of the other top five items.

From my notes it looks like data location was the top topic of data related discussions. Participants were concerned about knowing where their data is stored and who might have access to it. There were concerns that moving data to a cloud environment where data might reside in a different nation than it was created could result in violation of laws and/or compliance regulations; or that it might make the data subject to search or seizure by agencies of "other nations". This may be one of the most challenging of the concerns voiced by participants, though cloud providers are beginning to offer "local" services in more nations and to address data location concerns. So, businesses need to pay diligent attention to whether the location of data they plan to put into a cloud matters, and if it does they need to pay even more diligent attention to the laws of their nation, the nation and locale where the data is hosted, and the provider's contract and reputation.

There were also discussions regarding the protection of data stored in the cloud (more or less data security) and regarding providing simple access to data ("how do we make it easy for people to access data they are entitled to see"). And there was quite a bit of discussion on the benefit of public clouds in the context of storing public data. This was often brought up by government agencies that see public clouds as a perfect fit for providing non-sensitive data to their citizens at a reasonable cost.

Watch for my next post to learn more about our finance and user experience discussions, as well as a few honorable mentions.

This blog is cross-posted at Pragmatic Cloud. Follow @GeorgeDWatt on Twitter.

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By: George Watt
George Watt ( @GeorgeDWatt ) is VP of Strategy for the Cloud Computing organization at CA Technologies. For nearly 25 years, George has been helping customers simplify and automate their complex IT infrastructures. Prior to his current role, George founded CA Technologies Engineering Services team, which...
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Hey Enterprises: Is Your Head in the Cloud?

Published: December 19 2011, 01:05 PM | no comments
by Jeffrey Abbott

Only 9 months ago, I was writing about how the word "cloud" has no business being used on the consumer level. It was just the latest IT buzzword that nerds used to make the "normals" feel dumb or go buy some "i-stuff."

But today, I stand here, behind our firewall, to tell you that it is the consumer and small business owner, not the large enterprises and telcos, who are making the most progress. And hindsight being 20-20, I now see why. Whoever is the least equipped is the most nimble. For them, the transition to cloud is just a matter of awareness, education, and signing up. But the businesses that have invested the most, for the longest periods of time, are the ones having the most trouble making the jump to hyper-drive.

For example, consider telcos, with their strong lineage in the notoriously slow-to-evolve utility industry. Telcos are at the top of the cloud food chain and are positioned to be delivering everything cloud to everyone. But they are so invested in their own legacy systems and infrastructure, they can't figure out if, when, what, and how to transition their own businesses to cloud. They're making some headway, but so far it seems to be a long and rather arduous process.

And large enterprises. They can talk the talk. They have extensive IT departments, number-crunching business operations executives, and dramatically rising needs to be more agile. They already understand the benefits of private, hybrid, and public cloud models. But for them, altering their business operations is so complex and in some cases so risky, they just don't know how to identify what approach is best for them, whom to buy it from, and how and where it should be deployed.

[And now for a quick commercial break... the above pains/issues are exactly why we have rolled out CA Cloud 360 and updates to the Cloud Commons ecosystem and Marketplace, which you can read more about in this Tech Target article.]

Now consider mobile and wireless. Remember the ‘80s, when Keith Richards still looked really old, and the United States had the most advanced and widespread communications infrastructure? Then suddenly, the wireless revolution happened and Europe and Asia leapfrogged the US, putting the US instantly years behind. Fortunately at the same time, Europe and Asia ceased being rock bands because of Nirvana, so it was fair. Spoiler alert: the same thing is about to happen to the US again, with cloud.

But it is the consumer and small business owner who have now seen the light and are adopting the idea (and vocabulary) of cloud faster than I ever thought possible. For example, today, a friend of mine reached out to ask if and how I thought his growing Atlanta-based gourmet restaurants could benefit from cloud computing. On his wish list:

  • Easier offsite access for all needed files/documents and secure offsite document storage
  • Allow authorized users access to all needed documents/information using one username/password (in other words, single sign on), and manage their access to various documents and systems
  • Reduce dependence on in-house hardware/software
  • Allow for further growth/expansion as we grow comfortable in the cloud
  • Social media integration
  • Integration of industry software systems

This is a restaurant owner who just wrote the cloud use case for SMBs! He even titled the list "Head in the Clouds." and I'm the guy in marketing!

So again, I'd like to rescind my earlier blog with my head a bit lower, and declare that cloud is here and, people get it. Now our large enterprise businesses need to get on the evolution train, or go the way of the dodo.

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By: Jeffrey Abbott
Jeffrey Abbott ( @JeffreyAbbott ) is a Senior Product Marketing Manager for Cloud Commons at CA Technologies. In this role, Jeff focuses on industry trends and IT management challenges to position the company’s cloud solutions to viable market segments. When he’s not thinking about clouds, Jeff is often...
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10 Virtualization and Cloud Predictions for 2012

Published: December 15 2011, 10:25 AM | 2 Comment(s)
by Andi Mann

Welcome to IT prediction season! Again, I am inspired to throw my exceedingly fallible hat into the ring with my predictions, specifically for virtualization and cloud. I seem to have had a decent run of predictions last year, but I claim more luck than credit. I still think predictions are a mug's game, and continue to eschew both the importance and reliability of predictions.

That said, here are my predictions for 2012:

1. Brands May Come and Go - But No Technology Will Die

Not only are we not living in a ‘post-PC' world, we are not even living in a ‘post-mainframe' world! Cloud will not kill data centers, virtual will not kill physical, tablets will not kill PCs, Mac will not kill Windows, Android will not kill iOS, streaming will not kill DVDs. The technology pie is growing, our choices are expanding, and almost every slice is getting bigger. So be prepared to manage an ever-increasing selection of technologies across public and private boundaries.

2. Hybrid IT Will Be ‘The Next Big Thing'

‘Hybrid cloud' was soooo 2011! In this new world of choices, business will expect hybrid IT: a combination of on-site and off-site; cloud and legacy; private and public; physical and virtual; social and secure; enterprise and consumer; desktop and server; mobile and static. Business will also expect IT to make them work together, whether IT owns the service or not. IT must act as a trusted advisor, as a service broker, and as quality assurance for this brave new world of complex Hybrid IT.

3. Service Quality Will Be IT's Responsibility Again

As hybrid IT proliferates, business owners will (again) realize they do not want to manage technology; they just want it to work. In 2012, end users will increasingly expect IT to take responsibility for service quality, regardless of who is buying, selling, or delivering that service. IT will need to eliminate the blind spots in hybrid IT, actively support an explosion of devices, deal with complex cross-boundary services, and find a way to deliver a 360-degree service assurance across all facets of end-user experience.

4. Public Cloud Adoption Will Slow

Given the results of this year's Longhaus research from Australia - an early adopter market and a bellwether for business technology - I suspect the rest of the world is in for a slowdown of public cloud adoption. Issues (perceived or real) with security, compliance, service quality, skills, staffing, complexity, and good old politics will all put the brakes on. Whether ‘cloud stall' will be as pronounced as ‘virtual stall' is unsure, but 2012 will see a marked slowdown in public cloud adoption.

5. Public Cloud ‘Gets' Security

Sad but true - many (most?) enterprise decision-makers still do not trust public cloud. In 2012, IT must do a better job of deploying and explaining cloud security - and I believe we will! In 2012, CIOs will see security as less of a barrier to cloud adoption as organizations adopt more and better cloud-oriented security solutions - including solutions designed for complex hybrid cloud services, as well as solutions that are delivered through the cloud with easily-consumed Security SaaS options.

6. Big Iron is Back - Part I

No, mainframe is still not dead. On the contrary, 2012 will see the rise of the mainframe as a *gasp* cloud platform. Massively scalable, hosting critical (and underutilized) ‘big data', capable of running complex cloud workloads on a variety of architectures (z/OS, Linux, UNIX, Windows), mainframe is really an obvious cloud platform. It will not replace commodity clouds, but large enterprises and governments especially will leverage their investments and bring big iron into their cloud mix.

7. Cloud Gets Heterogeneous

Not only will mainframe become part of the cloud landscape, but public cloud providers will also start to offer UNIX and maybe even other non-x86 platforms. I have recently seen this in action (CA did it internally years ago), and most large enterprises are heavily dependent on heterogeneous systems for their mission-critical applications. Despite the common myth that cloud == commodity servers, heterogeneous servers will start to become more available for large enterprise deployments.

8. Big Iron is Back - Part II

Big iron concepts of integrated compute, network, and storage are resurgent - but this is not your grandpa's mainframe. Deployment of integrated fabrics like Cisco UCS and VCE Vblock will accelerate rapidly in 2012 as IT changes the way it thinks about integrated infrastructure for virtualization and cloud - and realizes how amazing these integrated boxes are for diverse, dynamic, high-volume workloads like desktop virtualization, pop-up data centers, and cloudbursting.

 9. ‘Grown-up' Cloud Service Management Comes To The Forefront

In 2011, the NIST Cloud Reference Architecture devoted a whole section to ‘Cloud Service Management', and IT started to talk about ‘grown-up' disciplines - planning, budgeting, performance, asset, inventory, service levels, audit, etc. In 2012, even ‘commodity' cloud vendors will finally take cloud management seriously, as enterprises and governments demand these disciplines - and smaller providers differentiate on service and security, not just price.

10. Virtualization Management Becomes Irrelevant

In January 2009 I predicted, "in 3-5 years ... niche [Virtual System Management] vendors will no longer survive, as virtualization becomes a core part of the enterprise compute fabric." Three years later this trend has definitely started, and will accelerate in 2012 as IT turns instead to hybrid IT management, recognizing that silos of standalone virtualization management is a costly and inefficient burden. Maybe 2012 is not the end of Virtualization Management, but it is going to be the start of the demise.

---

So that is my punt on 2012. I have no idea whether they will come true, but they seem to make sense to me. Again, if you are reading this in December 2012, please feel free to e-mail me and let me know how I went. I won't be surprised either way. :)

This post was first published at VMblog.com.

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By: Andi Mann
Andi Mann is vice president of Strategic Solutions at CA Technologies. With over 20 years’ experience across four continents, Andi has deep expertise of enterprise software on cloud, mainframe, midrange, server and desktop systems. Andi has worked within IT departments for governments and corporations...
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Excerpts: When Cloud and Consumers Collide: Consumer Driven IT

Published: December 14 2011, 09:59 AM | no comments
by Christine Needles

Earlier this week, Adam Famularo's latest post "When Cloud and Consumers Collide: Consumer Driven IT" was published on the CA Perspectives blog, where we feature executive commentary and general trend topics, and featured on our Consumer Driven IT page. I wanted to post a few excerpts here since the topic ties closely to what we cover here related to the impact of cloud computing on IT, the enterprise, consumers and more. To read the full post click here.  Excerpts follow.

Excerpts from: When Cloud and Consumers Collide: Consumer Driven IT

By Adam Famularo, GM, Enterprise & Cloud Solutions

It's no secret that the consumerization of IT is defining a new era of corporate computing, bringing with it both business opportunities and technical challenges. A host of technologies-ranging from cloud-computing services, mobile applications, social networks and mobile devices-are being introduced into the enterprise ecosystem by employees, business partners, customers, and corporate executives.

...

With every shift in technology or approach comes new trade-offs, and for consumer driven IT, the cost is myriad new demands on IT departments already stretched to the limit. IT now has to figure out how to support and secure a bumper crop of user-owned smartphones, tablets, and other devices; along with third party mobile, social, and collaborative apps that users embrace, often times going around existing IT policies.

This gives new meaning to the phrase many global IT organizations have been operating under for years: "Do more with less." A lot more.

...

It could be argued that cloud computing is one of, if not "the" key enabler of consumer driven IT. Without the cloud model, everything else driving consumerization breaks down.

Enterprise cloud services let IT departments keep up with computing trends. They create new levels of flexibility, more cost-effectively extending enterprise infrastructure in rapid response to competitive business demands. In doing so, cloud services bring agility to the IT organization and the business as a whole, by:

  • Dealing with spikes in service demand
  • Improving the user experience
  • Speeding time-to-market for new services

There are several business and technical challenges to consider before you can reap these rewards. Step one: to take an inventory of the business services IT currently provides, along with the policies and procedures that accompany those services. Next, roll in the consumer driven services employees, customers, and partners are asking for; and any consumer driven services competitors are hurting you with. Only when you have a good grasp of the current state of affairs and new requirements can you can decide which services are best moved to or supported by the cloud.

Read the rest of this post here.

...

Visit the Perspectives blog for more executive insights and commentary on a range of IT topics, or the Consumer Driven IT page to follow our take on this trend.

 

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By: Christine Needles
Christine Needles ( @cmneedles ) is a director of communications at CA Technologies, working with the Cloud Computing business. She is immersed in the world of B2B public relations and marketing communications, with 11 years of experience spanning several PR firms, until joining the communications team...
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