[JMH3143]

The direction of computing is only going in one way—to the cloud

The cloud is well on its way to becoming the standard model for IT, just 16 years after it first formed. It couples flexibility, scale, and reliability to user-friendliness and ubiquity. It has created some of the world’s largest companies, as well as empowering some of the smallest. The cloud has changed the economics of providing and using services, bringing many new opportunities—and also a few teething problems of course.

Here in the British Isles, clouds are notorious for obscuring the view, but you might be surprised to learn that the technological underpinnings of cloud computing are now transparent, mature, and mostly based on open-source tech. The new, cloudy landscape is growing increasingly clear. For the first time, it’s now possible to see the nature and usage of private, public, and hybrid clouds and explore their respective strengths, weaknesses, and applicability.

Although initial worries about reliability, both of the Internet links into the cloud and of the cloud providers themselves, have been mollified through experience, the safety of your data when it’s away from home is a major worry.
"Security is a big area of investment because it is on the mind of every one of our customers and is more critical than ever due to the challenges presented by hackers and malicious actors." said Engates. Levine agreed: "Encryption everywhere and a solution to the username-password problem are two issues critical to cloud usage that have not been widely solved yet."

The direction of computing is only going in one way—to the cloud | Ars Technica