Cloud Computing. Following the American Psychological Association s Guidelines. Dustin Self. The University of North Texas

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1 Running Head: CLOUD COMPUTING 1 Cloud Computing Following the American Psychological Association s Guidelines Dustin Self The University of North Texas

2 2 Cloud Computing by Dustin Self ABSTRACT According to the US National Institute of Standards and Technology, cloud computing is defined as a model for enabling ubiquitous, convenient, on-demand network access to a shared pool of configurable computing resources (e.g.: networks, servers, storage, applications and services) that can be rapidly provisioned and released with minimal management effort or service provider interaction. This article will discuss the technology behind cloud computing and more importantly, its place in the future of computer networking. Cloud computing has many private and public uses. This article will discuss those uses, as well as some terminology and level of service. Advantages and disadvantages are also an important consideration when talking about the future of this type of service. Cloud computing is a rapidly growing technology, and a growingly popular solution for many different areas in the technology world today. WHAT IS CLOUD COMPUTING? According to Wikipedia, cloud computing is the delivery of computing and storage capacity as a service. (Wikipedia, 2012) A more simplified definition is one defined by Mike Tuttle in his WebProNews article, cloud computing is the use of remote computers accessed via the internet to store, manage, and process data. (Tuttle, 2012) The three types of cloud computing are Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS), and Software as a Service (SaaS). The basic idea behind this is to take the burden of computing and storage off of the user,

3 3 greatly lowering their need for expensive equipment and maintenance. Maintenance would include a qualified technical staff to offer in-house support. With cloud based services, users have to depend heavily on the support of the service provider. It s arguable if the benefits of the services outweigh the risk for having your sensitive data out in the cloud for anyone to potentially access. It s also arguable when questioning whether or not the monetary savings of cloud computing are that great when considering that you still have to pay for the service and support; and that its still good practice to backup your data on your own equipment. This article will discuss this in greater detail later. HISTORY OF CLOUD COMPUTING The basic idea of cloud computing has been around much longer than it has actually had a name. The beginnings of cloud computing are considered to come from several different places depending on who you ask. To some, the concept of cloud computing can be seen back as far as the 1950 s when computers were expensive; and more cost effective measures had to be found in order to justify the expense. Mainframes were shared through multiple terminals, allowing things like CPU time to be shared. Another idea about the beginning of cloud computing can be J.C.R Licklider s development of the Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANET) in 1969, with the vision for everyone to be interconnected and accessing programs and data at any site, from anywhere. (Mohamed, 2009) Some other experts would say that scientist John McCarthy best envisioned cloud computing in the sixties when he coined computation may someday be organized as a public utility. Whatever your belief is on where exactly cloud computing was conceived or originally envisioned, one thing is for certain; the basic idea of cloud computing has been around for quite some time. Even though it has a long general

4 4 standing as a great concept, cloud computing wasn t really fully realized until the 1990 s when internet bandwidth increased significantly. Salesforce.com was founded in 1999 by Marc Benioff, Parker Harris, Dave Moellenhoff, and Frank Dominguez. It was a website deigned to specialize in software as a service (SaaS) to deliver enterprise applications over the internet. The success of this cloud computing company paved the way for many more moving forward. In 2006 Amazon launched its Elastic Compute cloud (EC2) as a commercial web service that allowed small companies and individuals to rent computers on which to run their own computer applications (Mohamed, 2009). According to CEO of Brightcove, Jeremy Allaire, Amazon EC2/S3 was the first widely accessible cloud computing infrastructure service. Since these milestones, we ve seen many more companies offering great cloud computing services; like Google and Microsoft. TERMINOLOGY OF CLOUD COMPUTING As with just about any technology, there is a certain unique terminology that comes with cloud computing. The Telegraph has a great write-up on what they refer to as the Microsoft Cloud Computing Glossary. While some may refer to this as jargon, it s definitely important to make yourself familiar with these definitions to fully understand this aspect of cloud computing. Here is some cloud computing terminology as defined in The Telegraph s article: Platform as a Service (PaaS) PaaS is a software operating environment, which supports the delivery of highly scalable cloudbased applications. With PaaS, the development tool is hosted in the cloud and accessed through

5 5 a browser, allowing developers to build web applications without installing tools on their own their computer. Software as a Service (SaaS) SaaS is the delivery of application software as an on-demand, utility-based service. The purchasing organization rents the software from the service provider, limiting its ability to customize it. In a cloud-based application, the product may be designed to run in a highly scalable, cloud environment and can still be owned by the purchasing company. Public Cloud Resources are shared between organizations for maximum cost-efficiency. Private Cloud The private cloud is a closed, dedicated cloud-based resource, giving more control and peace of mind about data security. The private cloud can be in an organization s data center or thirdparty s specialist facility. Hybrid Cloud Infrastructure Hybrid cloud infrastructure combines public and private cloud, with sensitive applications and data in a private cloud; and more generic systems and processes in the public cloud. Virtualization Processors, memory, and storage devices are linked to behave as one system, enabling capacity to be added and removed.

6 6 (Barclay, 2011) ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES OF CLOUD COMPUTING As aforementioned, there are some advantages and disadvantages to consider with cloud computing. Cloud computing has only recently been increasing in use, and as with any newly growing technology; there are going to be problems and concerns to be dealt with. Among the concerns with cloud computing are privacy and security. Privacy and security are especially a concern when dealing with cloud services used by the business, health, and even educational world. When people think of security, they often think of keeping people out. With the cloud, security is also defined as having access to your own data. According to Joseph Idziorek and Mark Tannian of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Iowa State University, the six most important aspects of security are; confidentiality (data kept secret), integrity (data accessible to those authorized to use it), availability (data accessible to those authorized to access it), authenticity (validation that data is genuine), possession (authorized users have full control over their data) (Tuttle 2012). These six items are definitely something to take into consideration when electing if cloud computing is right for you. You should thoroughly research any service company you use for your cloud computing. You really need to ask yourself these two things when considering the cloud: Am I going to have consistent and dependable access to my data? Who else is going to have access to my data? As with anything network related, cloud services do go down on occasion; some more often than others. Another thing to consider is that companies that offer these services aren t immune to going out of business; especially in today s fragile economy. Both of these are important reasons

7 7 to backup your data yourself. Backing up your vital data is especially important in the business world. There s a dilemma here that is currently being argued. Many will argue that if you still have to save all of your data and you still have to own the storage room, equipment, and manpower to do this; then what is the point of cloud computing? There are also some advantages to consider when deciding if cloud computing is right for you. Cloud computing virtually allows you the ability to access your data anywhere that you have internet access. This saves you from having to rely on being able to access servers or local computers. There are many very useful and tested applications for cloud computing. To name a few; web-based , media streaming systems, and online data storage and backup are all great services offered in the cloud. Users must decide on where their personal needs and concerns lie, and decide if cloud computing is right for them. This would involve weighing the pros and cons and making the choice based on thorough research on the company they are thinking of using. WHAT IS THE FUTURE OF CLOUD COMPUTING? As mentioned before, cloud computing has only recently become popular and more widely used. It is a rapidly growing and constantly evolving technology. There are still some problems and concerns to be worked out; like privacy, security, and dependability. Even with these concerns, companies are still steadily adopting and implementing cloud based services into their strategies. The increasing amount of users requiring adequate protection for their sensitive data will only place more pressure on cloud services to address these concerns. Once more of these problems are corrected, it will be much easier for potential users to move toward this promising technology. With huge advances in bandwidth in the last 15 years or so, cloud computing has vastly increased in popularity. As bandwidth keeps increasing, so will the utilization of the

8 8 cloud. Envisioning a world where instead of going to the store to purchase a new PC, but instead going online and purchasing a better virtual system; isn t really too far off. Cloud computing has a great future and is adaptable from everything from business to education. REFERENCES: Barclay, D. (2011, August 2). Microsoft cloud computing glossary. The Telegraph, Retrieved from computing/ /microsoft-cloud-computing-glossary.html Mohamed, A. (2009, March). A history of cloud computing. Computer Weekly, Retrieved from Tuttle, M. (2012, March 5). Cloud computing: The pros and cons. WebProNews/Business, Retrieved from Cloud computing. (2012, August 3). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 01:39, August 7, 2012, from