How to Monetize the OpenStack Wave - Fri, 04 May 2012
After OpenStack was announced at OSCON in the summer of 2010, the degree of momentum behind this new open source platform has been nothing short of spectacular. Startups and enterprises alike have placed their strategic bets to monetize the OpenStack wave in various ways. As an ecosystem insider and one of the founding sponsors of the OpenStack Foundation, I wanted to offer my views on how various organizations are looking to skin this cat. I’d like to focus on three of the many efforts currently underway. These three, in particular, happen to be the most vocal about their position and represent three distinct strategy camps. They are Nebula with its OpenStack appliance; Piston with its PentOS cloud operating system; and Dell’s Crowbar, an OpenStack installer.

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Cloud Expo New York: Industry-Leading CxOs to Present June 11-14 - Fri, 04 May 2012
What do the CTO of the U.S. Dept. of Justice and the CIO of the National Reconnaissance Office have in common with the CEOs of Eucalyptus, GoGrid, ActiveState, Appcara, OpSource and Nortonworks, the CTO of Rackspace the Founder & General Manager of Dell Boomi, the VP of Big Data & Streams at IBM and the Chief Strategy Officer at Pacific Controls? Answer: all are shortly to present breakout sessions as members of the distinguished Speaker Faculty of Cloud Expo New York, taking place June 11-14, 2012, at the Jacob Javits Convention Center in New York City.

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Cloud Computing in Higher Education - Fri, 04 May 2012
The irony about cloud computing in the higher education environment is that most schools have already been using it to some extent but may not even realize it. Gmail is one example. Yahoo Mail is another. The fact is web-based applications, which many schools rely on for daily communication, don’t always register with most people as being part of the cloud computing trend. But they are, given that they essentially fit the layman’s rudimentary explanation of the cloud: where storage and computing capacity exist (provided by a vendor) so all that is needed on a PC, laptop, tablet or smartphone is a browser. There are more “technical details” to actual cloud infrastructure, platforms and delivery, but for the purposes here, we will stick with the basic view. There’s no question that cloud computing usage has exploded and will continue unabated. An article in the September 30, 2011 issue of Campus Technology stated that a new industry forecast is predicting that cloud computing will account for 33 percent of all data center traffic by 2015 – tripling the current percentage and about 12 times the total current volume.

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Cloud Expo New York: Building a Private, Public, or Hybrid Cloud?- Fri, 04 May 2012
Whatever your course, meet Cloud complexity head on with a unified approach to handle extreme performance, reliability, availability, and simplicity. In her session at the 10th International Cloud Expo, Ayalla Goldschmidt, Senior Director of Product Marketing at Oracle, will reveal the underpinnings for the Oracle Public Cloud as well as technology best-practices for developing private and hybrid cloud architectures using Oracle’s Engineered Systems together with Oracle Fusion Middleware. Oracle Fusion Middleware is a complete array of technologies enabling you to embrace the paradigm shift of cloud computing and take full advantage of the cost savings and improved agility they promise. Together with Oracle Exalogic and Oracle Exadata provide the world’s first and only integrated engineered system, which provide enterprises the best possible foundation for running enterprise applications with the performance, elasticity, reliability, and scale characteristics expected for cloud-based applications.

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Release of OpenNebula 3.4.1 - Fri, 04 May 2012
The OpenNebula project has just announced the general availability of OpenNebula 3.4.1. This is a maintenance release that fixes bugs reported by the community and includes new languages for Sunstone and the Self-Service portals. OpenNebula 3.4 (Wild Duck) was released three weeks ago bringing countless valuable contributions by many members of our community, and specially from Research in Motion, Logica, Terradue 2.0, CloudWeavers, Clemson University, and Vilnius University. OpenNebula 3.4 incorporated support for multiple Datastores that provides extreme flexibility in planning the storage backend and important performance benefits, such as balancing I/O operations, defining different SLA policies and features for different VM types or users, or easily scaling the cloud storage. Additionally, OpenNebula 3.4 also featured improvements in other areas like support for clusters (resource pools), new tree-like menus for Sunstone, or the addition of the Elastic IP calls in the EC2 Query API.

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Cloud Expo New York: The Growing Big Data Tools Landscape - Fri, 04 May 2012
Hadoop, MapReduce, Hive, Hbase, Lucene, Solr? The only thing growing faster than enterprise data these days is the landscape of big data tools. These tools, which are designed to help organizations turn big data into opportunities, are gaining deeper insight into massive volumes of information. A recent Gartner report predicts that enterprise data will increase by 650% over the next five years, which means that the time is now for IT decision makers to determine which big data tools are the best – and most cost-effective – for their organization. In his session at the 10th International Cloud Expo, David Lucas, Chief Strategy Officer at GCE, will run through what enterprises really need to know about the growing set of big data tools – including those being leveraged by organizations today as well as the new and innovative tools just arriving on the scene. He will also help attendees gain greater insight on how to match the right data center tools to a specific enterprise challenge and what processes need to change to handle big data.

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An IT Forecast: Where Cloud, Mobile and Data Are Taking Us - Fri, 04 May 2012
A thorough piece on CNET by Gordon Haff looks at the interconnectivity of cloud computing, mobility and Big Data, and sees these three forces as instrumental in shaping the future of IT. “Through the lens of next-generation IT, think of cloud computing as being about trends in computer architectures, how applications are loaded onto those systems and made to do useful work, how servers communicate with each other and with the outside world, and how administrators manage and provide access,” Haff writes. He says the trend also covers the infrastructure and plumbing that make it possible to effectively coordinate data centers full of systems increasingly working as a unified compute resource as opposed to islands of specialized capacity. Computing is constantly evolving. What makes today particularly interesting is that “we seem to be in the midst of convergent trends of a certain momentum and maturity to reinforce each other in significant ways. That’s what is happening with cloud computing, mobility and Big Data,” Heff writes.

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Concentric Cloud Solutions to Exhibit at Cloud Expo 2012 New York - Fri, 04 May 2012
SYS-CON Events announced today that Concentric Cloud Solutions, a provider of new cloud computing, content acceleration, and cloud voice solutions for businesses, will exhibit at SYS-CON’s 10th International Cloud Expo, which will take place on June 11–14, 2012, at the Javits Center in New York City, New York. Concentric Cloud Solutions offers businesses advanced cloud-based computing, content acceleration, and cloud voice solutions. Through its cloud-based platforms and online portal, Concentric Cloud Solutions helps organizations simplify the procurement and management of critical infrastructure, accelerate application and web site performance, and improve interactive communications with customers.

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Cloud Expo New York Speaker Profile: Ajay Budhraja – U.S. Dept. of Justice - Fri, 04 May 2012
With Cloud Expo 2012 New York (10th Cloud Expo) now well under six weeks away, what better time to introduce you in greater detail to the distinguished individuals in our incredible Speaker Faculty for the technical and strategy sessions at the conference…

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Informatica Upgrades Its iPaaS - Fri, 04 May 2012
Informatica, which already counts its Cloud processing upwards of a billion cloud integration transactions a day, has upgraded the stuff. It reckons its new Cloud Spring 2012 release will deliver the industry’s most comprehensive cloud integration platform-as-a-service (iPaaS). The biggest addition is a new Cloud Developer Edition that consists of a cloud connector toolkit and dynamic cloud integration templates for rapid connectivity to applications. Developers can embed end-user customizable integration logic and connectivity into cloud applications and platforms. System integrators and ISVs should be able to build, customize and deliver native connectivity to any cloud or on-premise business and social applications that have published Web Services APIs.

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Amazon Spiffs Up Cloud Drive Storage With New Desktop App - Thu, 03 May 2012
Instead of having to go to the Cloud Drive Website each time, users simply click on a desktop icon to access all their stored files in the Amazon cloud. – Amazon, which made available one of the first enterprise cloud storage services nearly seven years ago but was late providing one for consumers, on May 3 updated its year-old, consumer-oriented Cloud Drive storage service with a new, freely available desktop application for both Mac OS and Windows…

VMTurbo Upgrades Cloud Platform to Work With CloudStack Gateway - Thu, 03 May 2012
VMTurbo Operations Manager 3.1 also integrates directly with the open-standards-based application-delivery controller (ADC) infrastructure, which enables it to work with other ADC gateways, such as Citrix NetScaler. – VMTurbo, which makes intelligent workload management software for cloud and virtualized deployments, on May 2 upgraded its main platform for direct integration into the alternative open-source cloud operating system, CloudStack. VMTurbo Operations Manager 3.1 also integrates directly with the open-…

Cloud Startups Prevail at Under the Radar Conference - Wed, 02 May 2012
Dealmaker Media’s twice-yearly Under the Radar conference showcases some promising startup companies, and there’s a lot of competition by entrepreneurs to get into it so they can show off their latest ventures. DM’s spring event was held April 26 at Microsoft’s Silicon Valley campus in Mountain View, Calif. Each of the 32 companies selected gets six minutes on stage with the all-important PowerPoint, SlideRocket or video presentation to try to impress a group of skeptical venture capitalists looking for companies with good ideas and at least the potential for good execution. The theme this time was “Consumerization of IT,” reflecting the surging trend of bringing consumer devices and cloud services into enterprises. Most of the companies showed cloud-service-related products. Chances are good that if a company is a finalist to present at UTR, it will receive funding of some kind& whether from a venture capitalist, an angel investor or other source. These are companies& carefully selected by Dealmaker Media founder Debbie Landa and her team& that are likely to be serious IT influencers in the months and years to come. Following are short descriptions of 10 of this years award-winners, as voted on by the judges and audience members. eWEEK will examine many of these in closer detail in the weeks and months to come. – …

SnapLogic Brings Real-Time Data-Flow Analysis to Visual App Design Tool - Mon, 30 Apr 2012
Now with real-time data flow analysis, SnapLogic aids data-integration projects with a subscription-based service and connecting “Snaps.” SnapLogic is sold as a subscription and varies in cost, based on the amount of data throughput. – The SnapLogic Cloud Integration Platform Spring 12 release adds real-time data-flow analysis, component validation and debug tracing to the data-connection platform. I recommend this tool if you need to do regular data processing and data conversion. eWEEK Labs tests showed that the SnapLogic Sprin…

Adobe Creative Cloud: 14 Reasons Developers Need to Try It - Mon, 30 Apr 2012
On April 23, Adobe Systems launched Adobe Creative Cloud, a new way of providing tools and services for creative professionals. The Adobe Creative Cloud is a subscription service that is a hub for making, sharing and delivering creative work. It is based on the new release of Adobe Creative Suite 6 software, which features new design, Web, video and digital imaging tools. Adobe first announced its Creative Cloud in October 2011 at its MAX conference in Los Angeles. An Adobe Creative Cloud membership provides users with access to download and install every new Adobe CS6 application and two new HTML5 products, Adobe Muse and Adobe Edge preview. The Adobe Creative Cloud also integrates Adobes creative tablet applications, such as Photoshop Touch& synchronizing and storing files in the cloud for sharing and access on any device. Subscribers also will be able to easily deliver mobile apps to iOS and Android marketplaces and publish, manage and host Websites. In addition, Adobe Creative Cloud subscribers will have access to application upgrades, including new CS point-product features, before they are launched as part of major CS updates, as well as inventive new products and services as they emerge. Here, eWEEK offers 14 reasons users might want to try the Adobe Creative Cloud. – …

Google Ships a GDrive That’s No Better Than Microsoft’s New SkyDrive - Sat, 28 Apr 2012
NEWS ANALYSIS: Google’s much anticipated GDrive is available after years of anticipation, but was it worth the wait, or did Microsoft and even a gaggle of others beat Google to the punch? – Once youre allowed in, Googles new cloud storage service, usually called GDrive, is nice for people who need to find a place to store files so that they can access them on another device or share them with others. You get 5GB of storage for free, and you can buy more. Google Drive is closely link…

Intuit Makes Move to the Cloud With Acquisition of DemandForce- Fri, 27 Apr 2012
DemandForce, based in San Francisco, produces mobile device, email and social-networking tools that help small and midsize businesses automate their marketing and customer communications. – Fresh off yet another tax season in which a high percentage of U.S. tax filers rely on its annually updated software, Intuit made some other news April 27 by announcing the acquisition of DemandForce for $423.5 million in cash. DemandForce, based in San Francisco, produces mobile device, ema…

Google Drive Launch Delivers 10 Good Reasons to Try It Out - Thu, 26 Apr 2012
NEWS ANALYSIS: Google Drive will be the latest cloud storage service to hit the market in a few weeks, joining a large crowd of competitors. But it will provide a lot of good reasons for consumers and businesses to try it out. – Google Drive is all the rage in today’s hotly contested cloud-storage space. The offering, which was first announced on April 24, is widely believed to be the next big answer to services like Dropbox and Box and could very well become a popular option for those who already work with Google Apps …

Google Drive Cloud Storage: 10 Things You Should Know About It - Wed, 25 Apr 2012
NEWS ANALYSIS: After a long development program, Google Drive has finally been released to general availability. But what should customers know about the platform before they start using it? – It might have taken awhile, but finally, Google Drive has launched. Google has been talking about its intention to introduce a cloud storage service for at least six years. And rumors about the imminent release of a storage solution to take on companies like Box and Dropbox started percolating …

VMware drives shift to personal clouds with Project Octopus - Wed, 02 May 2012

Advances in virtualization, cloud computing, and mobile technology have created a perfect storm for a new era in end-user computing, one in which users can revel in their own personal cloud, c

Microsoft targets iPad, Android users with tablet virtualization license fee - Tue, 01 May 2012

Modern tablets have seen tremendous growth in both the consumer and enterprise markets, and many analysts estimate that the tablet will one day outperform the PC market as a whole. It therefore makes sense that Microsoft is now ready to stake its claim in the tablet market with the coming release of the Windows 8 operating system and Windows RT tablets (based on chips designed by ARM) expected to arrive sometime this year.

Shades of pcAnywhere in VMware breach - Thu, 26 Apr 2012

This week, virtualization software maker VMware acknowledged that a single file posted online came from the source code to its ESX hypervisor.

VMware source code stolen, impact unclear - Wed, 25 Apr 2012

VMware ESX source code has been stolen and posted online, but the company says its virtualization platform doesn’t necessarily pose an increased risk to customers.

The stolen code amounts to a single file from sometime around 2003 or 2004, the company says in a blog post.

IBM pushes new integrated, lower-cost Linux servers - Wed, 25 Apr 2012

IBM announced new “affordable” Linux servers on Wednesday as the company tries to push its new category of preconfigured servers for virtualization and big data to midmarket and enterprise customers.

The PowerLinux systems contain integrated hardware, software, networking and storage, and are configured to cater to specific requirements. The servers, which combine IBM’s Power7 processors with the Linux OS, are priced as low as $20,000 and go beyond $100,000, depending on client configuration choices.

Veeam launches solution for virtualization management - Tue, 24 Apr 2012

Server virtualization has become a must-have technology for almost any organization. While VMware vSphere still dominates the market with its mature and feature-rich platform, Citrix XenServer, Microsoft Hyper-V, and Red Hat KVM have gotten much closer to feature parity with VMware.

Dell brings 40-Gigabit Ethernet into PowerEdge blade system - Tue, 24 Apr 2012

Dell will flesh out its new virtual networking strategy at Interop next month when it shows off a 40-Gigabit Ethernet switch for its PowerEdge M1000e blade system announced Tuesday, extends its management software and shows its equipment working with the OpenFlow standard for SDN (software-defined networking).

Avoid disaster with stretched clusters - Mon, 23 Apr 2012

Because virtualization offers so much cost savings and agility, many organizations are going the whole hog and virtualizing mission-critical systems they wouldn’t have dreamed of virtualizing a little while ago. Who would have thought, for example, that we’d see enterprises deploy Oracle virtually rather than on physical hardware?

HotLink SuperVisor brings multihypervisor support to VMware vCenter - Mon, 16 Apr 2012

Ever since VMware first began changing its vSphere 5.0 pricing model to include a cost for virtual memory (dubbed the “vRAM tax” by competitors and angry users alike), many organizations have questioned whether they should rely on VMware vSphere as their sole 5 free tools for VMware View VDI admins to try - Tue, 10 Apr 2012

Server-hosted desktop virtualization environments can be tricky. Unlikeserver virtualization, which is well entrenched in the data center these days, VDI can still be a relatively new concept to desktop administrators, who for the most part have been used to working with local PCs.

Nokia hit with class action lawsuit; fraud claims ‘without merit,’ it says - Fri, 04 May 201
Did Nokia, CEO Stephen Elop and CFO Timo Ihamuotila engage in a scheme to artificially inflate its stock price and defraud investors? A new lawsuit alleges so.

Oracle-Google trial could result in partial verdict or even mistrial - Fri, 04 May 201
The court is mulling the possible options if the jury in the Oracle-Google trial cannot come to a unanimous verdict on charges of copyright infringement.

Yahoo ‘Resumegate’: Storm in a teacup, or scandal in the making? - Fri, 04 May 201
Yahoo’s chief executive is accused of lying about his college education. Storm in a teacup, much? What’s the worst that could happen?

Thomson Reuters offers EU commitments to end antitrust probe - Fri, 04 May 201
Data provider Thomson Reuters has offered European authorities further concessions in a bid to end an ongoing antitrust case.

NPD: Apple will lose quarter of tablet market by 2017 - Fri, 04 May 201
The tablet market is predicted to grow five times over by 2017, but Apple won’t account for as much of it by then.

LinkedIn Q1 earnings soar; ups outlook, acquires SlideShare - Thu, 03 May 201
LinkedIn jumps over Wall Street expectations with another solid quarterly earnings report, giving the professional the opportunity to boost its outlook.

Cisco to acquire network analysis firm Truviso - Thu, 03 May 201
Cisco plans to acquire real-time network analytics firm Truviso, but financial terms were not disclosed.

Oracle, Google lawyers split hairs over more jury instructions - Thu, 03 May 201
UPDATE #2: The jury came back with another question, suggesting that they might be not be so close to a verdict and back at square one.

Symantec’s Q4 earnings: revenue weak; eyeing cloud, mobile, SMBs - Thu, 03 May 201
Symantec’s flat fourth quarter earnings demonstrate a company in transition, switching business models from licenses to subscriptions. But to turn a corner, you’ve got to slow down.

No Apple TV set until 2014, says analyst: What’s next for Apple? - Thu, 03 May 201
According to J.P. Morgan analyst, Apple will not release its anticipated television set until 2014. That leaves two years of ‘Apple awesome’ on the cards. What can we expect to see?