Have to admit, some of the news recently concerning drag and drop clouds is kind of exciting. Yes, we’ve dreamed about cloud bridges for a while now, and it is something the cloud user community finds very attractive, if not essential, for the future of cloud computing.
However, we need to take this one step beyond simple drag and drop bridges. Cloud computing bridges need to operate among all platforms, and need to provide modeling for both geographic load balancing, as well as a powerful disaster recovery models. The idea a company can easily bridge and provision a cloud computing strategy through either a one stop shop with a local company, or as an alternative, making on-demand arrangements with an inter-cloud bridge to multiple companies makes the cloud argument much more compelling.
What will it take to make this “bridge” an industry reality?
There are standardization groups working within the cloud industry – one being the Cloud Computing Interoperability Forum (CCIF). The CCIF promotes the “Cloud Computing Manifesto,” which has had controversy and lack of general support within the cloud development community. The objectives of the CCIF appear fairly benevolent, and from a user perspective actually make a lot of sense. Those objectives focus on interoperability, security, standards, and transparency.
This is great, unless you view it from the perspective of a cloud computing vendor, struggling to discriminate their product from the pack, ensuring one or two very large service providers and software developers do not suppress innovation or competition within the cloud marketplace.
So, we’ll consider the probability we in the early days of cloud computing and virtualization (yes, while the product is becoming mature, we are at the 1995 level of Internet development). Think of the Internet in 1995. It was a pretty stable protocol, and Internet networks in general ran pretty well. We were using email, online applications, file transfers, and remote logins – not bad for the early days of Internet use. Solid operational network, and both academic and commercial Internet networks rapidly began showing how they’d make X.25, frame relay, and even ATM-based networks irrelevant.
Cloud computing is clearly showing its value, and is a pretty stable infrastructure. However, unlike development of Internet protocols, cloud computing still has competing architectures and standards. As the technology develops, and applications available from within the cloud become more powerful and useful to the community, interoperability standards will evolve.
Much like default routes available to networks and content providers through the Internet today, a default or common denominator protocol in the cloud service provider industry will emerge that will continue to extend interoperability of data and application among cloud providers, much like a Mac is able to read and write files created by a PC (and vice versa). The bridge between cloud service providers will be understood, and the utility of interoperability will continue to grow.
The value of Cloud Computing is in service execution
So, many companies may be concerned that if true interoperability exists, then competition will be more intense, and products will be diluted into commodity pricing. To an extent that is true, however the true value of cloud provisioning is, and will be, in the company that understands the customer’s needs, and meets service level agreements.
Companies such as ScaleUp Technologies continue to give the cloud computing industry credibility by delivering on that promise.
Drag and drop provisioning is truly exciting, and the potential of distributed computing and disaster recovery modeling as a logical extension of drag and drop is on the boards. This vision will be fulfilled with service provider partnerships, industry standards, and a lot of hard, creative work.
As a cloud user, or future cloud user, what is important to you? What does the cloud service provider industry need to hear from you to make their product meet your expectations?
Let us know!
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