What's bigger than open source? Cloud computing. Plus it's a force for positive change. That's according to Marten Mickos, the recently recruited chief executive of Eucalyptus Systems – the startup that's partnering with Canonical on open-source computing clusters. Mickos was CEO of MySQL and then leader of the MySQL business …

COMMENTS

House rules Send corrections

This topic is closed for new posts.

Friday 25th June 2010 23:56 GMT efeffess

Cloudy Computing

Don't know if it's just me, but the possible lack of security and the chills I experience when thinking of relying on external services to host my important data are obstacles to my adopting Cloud Computing. If data is stored locally, with backups, and collaboration occurred via encrypted email and/or local, private Web server, how would Cloud Computing serve better?

1 0
1. Sunday 27th June 2010 19:24 GMT Probe
  
  Not just you
  
  Fills me with horror.
  
  0 0
2. Sunday 27th June 2010 19:50 GMT Dave_Page
  
  Title
  
  There's no reason the cloud cannot be in your own data center. Some of the vendors have some really cool features these days that are a sysadmin's dream for management, efficiency and availability of services. Eucalyptus is also cool, but has a fair way to go to catch up.
  
  0 0
3. Sunday 27th June 2010 20:04 GMT M Gale
  
  Re: Cloudy Computing
  
  The idea of Eucalyptus is that you can run your own personal "cloud" (which seems to be as nebulous a term as its sky-borne namesake). As for uses.. well I imagine if you've got a business with a lot of workstations in it, maybe there's some sense in ploughing a fair amount of money into a HAL-strength server while the workstations are cheapy not-so-dumb terminals? Of course, your mileage may vary.
  
  0 0
Monday 28th June 2010 09:44 GMT Geoff Campbell

Goes around, comes around....

And so, the great centralisation/decentralisation cycle begins yet another weary, weary circuit. Perhaps I'm getting old, but I'm not sure I have the stamina for yet another go around - I think I've witnessed something like three complete cycles in my time in the industry.

GJC

1 0
Monday 28th June 2010 10:23 GMT Anonymous Coward

Don't know if its just me but...

I don't see cloud computing going anywhere. It has its own small nich but I just can't see it gaining any force beyond limited portable storage.

0 0
Monday 28th June 2010 15:39 GMT cmaurand

yawn, the cloud again?

I work for a small automobile insurance company. The cloud isn't even on our radar screens. We're so not going there for a myriad of security and privacy concerns. I've already seen articles in the trade journals that talk about how cloud computing hasn't taken off like everyone had hoped. Its a new name for a 30 year old concept (time shared computing) Why, after all the money that we've spent moving computing out of the glass house, would we want to move it back into the glass house?

0 0
Tuesday 29th June 2010 00:36 GMT Jeff 11

Clouds

Great for content distribution, really really bad for sensitive data. That's about it. It's nice and cheap-ish but Amazon et al don't manage your instance's security, it's just another nice fat centralised layer they add for someone to eventually break into. I'd love to see anyone try to hold Amazon or Google legally accountable when there's a breach. But don't let that stop the hype machine from blowing out hot air. Or vapour, perhaps...

0 0
Monday 5th July 2010 14:50 GMT Anonymous Coward

Mickos beged to make quick cash like with MySQL

It is not really opensource company anymore, since Mickos took over. They sell proprietary Enterprise Edition, and open source version is severely crippled and unsupported. It is Open-Core business model which is in fact old proprietary shareware business with new label. It just diminishes credibility of open source when customer get that they are locked in worse than with proprietary software. Those who get burned with fake open source will never look at open source. They will asume it is fake again. It is Better to buy from proprietary company, at least you know what you can expect.

0 0