Cloud news
Cloud computing still in its infancy
A recent survey by SWC Technology Partners reveals that cloud computing takeup is still in its early stages. Over half of those surveyed indicated that their organisation is not implementing any cloud computing at all. Privacy and security concerns were cited as the main obstacles to the adoption of cloud computing.
Revenue from Software-as-a-Service will be over $12 billion in 2011
Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) revenues will increase by 20.7 percent to $12.1 billion in 2011, according to market analyst Gartner. The bulk of the revenue, 63.6 percent, will come from North America markets.
Cloud computing security risks
The HP 2011 mid-year edition of the biannual Top Cyber Security Risks Report, indicates that attacks on web applications are on the rise, despite an actual drop in the reported number of incidents, and that web applications are relatively easy to attack.
Head in the sand is not a data protection policy
Morgan Hill released an article about the conflict between the European Data Protection Directive and the USA PATRIOT Act. The conflict may have far-reaching implications for many aspects of cloud computing.
Infrastructure-as-a-Service news
Java available on Windows Azure
GigaSpaces has lauched a service to put enterprise Java applications on to the Windows Azure platform. The service allows J2EE and Spring applications to be deployed without code changes and makes Azure services native.
AppFog supports Node.js
As well as supporting PHP and Ruby, AppFog now supports the server-side framework Javascript Node.js. AppFog’s framework is based on the open source Cloud Foundry and is still in private beta.
Rackspace update cloud load balancers
Rackspace has launched a feature update for its cloud load balancers. New features include: balancing for any TCP-based protocol, an API for determining source addresses and an API for batch deleting load balancers and associated entities.
Joyent launches new cloud computing platform
Joyent has launched an update to its cloud computing platform. As well as offering improved speed and resilience, a utility-style pricing structure has been introduced.
Software-as-a-Service news
First cloud server security management service launched
Dome9 claims to have launched the first cloud server security management service. The service offers security management for both public and private clouds and will work with a number of operating systems and cloud computing providers.
Gmail is enterprise-ready
Gartner have determined that Gmail is now a viable alternative to Microsoft Exchange. Although Gmail’s enterprise email market share is only around one percent, that represents over fifty percent of the enterprise cloud email market share, a market which Gartner expects to experience significant growth in the next few years.
Software news
PostgreSQL 9.1 released
PostgreSQL has fast become the alternative to the previously ubiquitous MySQL and now PostgreSQL 9.1 has been released. New features include synchronous replication, per-column collations and unlogged tables.
VMware Fusion 4 released
VMware has announced the launch of VMware Fusion 4, a virtual machine application that lets Mac users run Windows. The new launch comes with introductory pricing until the end of 2011.
Microsoft drops Silverlight?
The new Metro style (aka full screen, device-specific) browser in Windows 8 will not support Silverlight, Microsoft’s rival plugin to Adobe Flash. Although this does not necessarily mean that Microsoft is ditching Silverlight, it doesn’t seem to bode well for its future.
Development
.NET Framework 4.5 Developer Preview
Details of .NET Framework 4.5 Developer Preview have been announced. Further details about Metro style developer support are available.
Visual Studio 11 Developer Preview
Visual Studio 11 Developer Preview has been announced. Projects are backwardly compatible with Visual Studio 10 and support for the above mentioned Metro style is available.
Funding
cloudControl has new funding
Germany-based PaaS, cloudControl has announced new funding. Hosted on Amazon Web Services (AWS), cloudControl offers a hosted PHP framework.
FreeAgent secures new funding
As a contract developer and manager I’ve worked in a wide range of enterprises in a variety of countries where I’ve encountered everything from great work, awful work, bizarre work, all the way down to quasi-legal work. If you think that you recognise your own organisation within my articles then you’re undoubtedly wrong, where you work isn’t that unique.
