Computers Archives -

What is Cloud Computing?

Cloud Computing sounds complicated if you totally have no idea what it is about. You might initially think it is something related to the weather. But for starters, it is not. It has absolutely nothing to do with actual clouds or meteorology in general. So exactly what is Cloud Computing?

Cloud computing is storing and accessing data and programs over the internet. To put it simply, Cloud Computing is a model of delivering computing services over the internet. The internet is a metaphorical cloud here, hence the name “Cloud Computing.” These computing services include servers, storage, databases, analytics, software, and networking among others.

We are all very used to having a hard drive. This is where we save files to or look for our photos. However, Cloud Computing is not about your hard drive. In fact, you don’t really need much of a hard drive at all. You do not run programs or store data on your hard drive with Cloud Computing. The internet is where you will do those things instead.

It is a platform for SaaS

Another answer to the question “What is Cloud Computing?” is it also serves as a platform for Software-as-a-Service or SaaS. Cloud providers manage the infrastructure that run these applications. Instead of installing and operating software on your hard drive, cloud providers will perform those tasks on the cloud and cloud users can then access those software from cloud clients. All the work for these programs is done on a server someplace far away.

Because cloud users do not manage the infrastructure and platform where these applications are being run, maintenance and support from the users’ end get more simplified and less complicated. It also means less costs for you because Saas is an on-demand software. Cloud computing is either priced on a pay-per-use basis or through a subscription fee.

It is a storage and backup for your data

Aside from being a platform for SaaS, Cloud Computing can also host Infrastructure-as-a-service or IaaS. With IaaS, computing infrastructure becomes virtual. Physical computing resources such as location, data partitioning, scaling, security, and backup are eliminated.

Through Cloud Computing, you can store and back up your data without using your hard drive. This means you no longer have to be physically near your data in order to access it. You just simply need the internet if you want to access or recover any file or piece of data. This also means you no longer have to keep on purchasing hard drives if your volume of data keeps on mounting up.

It is a PaaS

If you still find yourself asking “What is Cloud Computing?”, the answer is it is also a host for Platform-as-a-service or PaaS. Cloud Computing provides a platform for its users to develop, run, and manage applications. You can launch your own applications sans the complexities and difficulties of building and maintaining the infrastructures that are usually required in application development.

Through Cloud Computing, PaaS can provide you the servers, storage, network, and databases needed to develop an app. It makes it easier and simpler for users to create and manage their own apps.

Now that you know what Cloud Computing is, you might even realize that you have been using or doing it already. You were just probably unaware what it was called as such. Cloud computing is not really as puzzling as it sounds. In fact, it even makes using and maintaining computers and other gadgets less complicated.

Apple and Tech Sectors See an Increase

Apple reported earnings this week and the stock market loved what they had to say. Their earning beat expectations handily and the stock reacted by a pop of 6%. It’s giving back a little bit today, but remains very positive after yesterday’s report.

Just a few short months ago, the stock was almost left for dead. The commentary was that they had fallen behind. People said the days of significant growth were behind us. The talk about the company was that it was a one trick pony, the iPhone. And there was a lot of skepticism after the loss of Steve Jobs.

Turnaround

The stock has been up since it’s low last year. Obviously, not everyone agreed with the negativity because the stock has been bid up. From a low in the 90s to about 130, this has been a big winner.

Will we see it back at it’s previous highs? Very possible if you look at the trajectory recently.

Driving the stock now is the possible return to growth. Analysts are calling for another super cycle due to the upcoming iPhone 8. This iPhone is touted to have a lot of new features that will drive mass purchasing. This will be the 10 year anniversary of the iPhone, which is why Apple appears to be putting extra emphasis on it.

Intel and Micron Just Made Every Tech Device You Have Obsolete

Intel and micron simply declared 3D XPoint, a replacement memory technology that blends the speed of DRAM with the storage capabilities of Flash. Unfortunately the technology won’t be shipping for a while, you’ll have time to cycle out your current tech devices. however very similar to flash memory that made nearly everything that used a harddrive obsolete. This effectively makes several things that use DRAM or Flash obsolete. Similar to the way like Flash did, this technology can move wherever performance in storage has high worth and may support a better value.

Think about analytics, monetary services, defense (weapons and analytics), on demand translation and AI. In a way, this could follow a path the same as Flash as it moves through the market. it should render HP’s somewhat similar Memristor technology obsolete before it even ships.

Let’s mention that. Ultra-Fast Storage Intel and micron represent that this new memory technology is 1,000 times quicker than Flash, that is presently employed in superior systems. that’s a huge increase in performance. the businesses indicated that this comes without a major increase in energy consumption, that keeps densities up and warmth down.

Flash arrays are employed in high-end storage systems and still be driven by industries that are willing to pay nearlyanything for performance increases. Therefore, this could dramatically modify the storage landscape.

EMC, that features a terribly tight and close relationship with Intel, ought to be the foremost obvious beneficiary at the high end. HP, which features a competitive technology within the Memristor, is presumably to be overtaken, with others falling between the 2 extremes.

Buyers of technology in this category purchase strategically. They will| probably begin gravitating to the firm that they assume will have the best advantage once the merchandise hit market, and also the market pivots to optimize around them. therefore albeit actual merchandise are months out, this announcement could force some very arduous decisions for all of the most important vendors. they’re going to notice that whichever company is last to promote with this technology could lose entire market segments to competitors that are very aggressive.

As with any technology, there’ll be a learning curve; but, vendors won’t be ready to merely swap out Flash for 3D XPoint. With this level of performance increase, optimizing the ensuing hardware so it doesn’t badly bottleneck can take time.

Personal Devices to Self-Driving Cars and Robotics

Just as hand-held devices went from magnetic drives to Flash over a decade past, 3D XPoint guarantees to try and do something similar . The result ought to modify entirely new categories of apps that run locally. as an example, they might modify translators, or much more intelligent (and off-line capable) versions of Siri and Cortana. Fast, in-memory process is important to the present new wave of ever-more intelligent systems.

Obvious applications may be autonomous artificial intelligence and self-driving cars. each would require a hugequantity of in-memory processing to work within the world. The performance increase secure by this new technology ought to make these systems for very capable ahead of otherwise would be. Initial implementations areprobably too far down the development path to form this switch simply, however by the top of the last decadewe will probably see an increase in overall performance and accuracy.

The next generation ought to sharply move to this technology, and given that it’s the second generation that’sexpected to increase distribution, it’s timed ideally for the market spike.

Is the traditional hard drive obsolete?

This new flash storage drive is amazing! Building desktops is still a really popular hobby, although some are now building tablets. It’s true that the Surface and Apple Air or event the iPad have become big, but there is something to be said for the home builders.

Each component has made incredible improvements, like a solid state drive for instance. And the great thing is that the prices of solid state drives have been falling.

Today, Samsung announced a drive that is sure to excite the DIY computer builder — a 3.2TB PCIe SSD.

From the manufacturer:

“Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd., the world leader in advanced memory technology, today announced that it has started mass producing 3.2-terabyte (TB) NVMe PCIe solid state drives (SSDs) based on its 3D V-NAND (Vertical NAND) flash memory technology, for use in high-end enterprise server systems. The new NVMe PCIe SSD, SM1715, utilizes Samsung’s proprietary 3D V-NAND in an HHHL (half-height, half-length) card-type form factor, to offer 3.2TB of storage capacity — doubling Samsung’s previous highest NVMe SSD density of 1.6TB”, says Samsung.

The manufacturer further explains, “the newly introduced 3.2TB NVMe SSD provides a sequential read speed of 3,000 megabytes per second (MB/s) and writes sequentially at up to 2,200MB/s. It also randomly reads at up to 750,000 IOPS (input output operations per second) and writes randomly at up to 130,000 IOPS. In addition, the 3.2TB SM1715 features outstanding reliability with 10 DWPDs (drive writes per day) for five years. This provides a level of reliability that enterprise server manufacturers have been requesting for their high-end storage solutions”.

This drive is probably going to be pretty expensive, but imagine the speed. The size and speed is really impressive.

I’m sure you’ve already seen SSDs available at your hosting companies, like Go Daddy. They’re really moving into big markets and performing well.

With the decline in traditional hard drives, it may just be a matter of time before they actually become obsolete.