[LINK] 'A short history of cloud computing outages'

[stephen at melbpc.org.au]

Bernard Robertson-Dunn wrote:

> Ivan wrote:
>>
>> Isn't using IMAP really just part of cloud computing? Or using GMail 
>> on the web? Or Facebook?
> 
> The mainframe timesharing model of the 70's can fit this definition.
>
> The only thing new is the degree and speed of configurability of the 
> infrastructure.

Interesting observation.

Perhaps another socio-technical distinction is that now clouds appear to 
be a somewhat of a commercial-social bottom-up tech-shift, rather than a
'techie-top-down' innovation? (And maybe, that alone tells us something?)

Eg, two current examples of finding uses for clouds at the tech 'top end'
both of which i happened to have come across in the last few days and do
appear pushing public-clouds into traditionally conservative ICT domains.

--
Computer Science > Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing

 http://arxiv.org/abs/0910.1979

Title: High-Performance Cloud Computing: A View of Scientific Applications
Authors: Christian Vecchiola, Suraj Pandey, Rajkumar Buyya (snipped)

(Submitted on 11 Oct 2009) Abstract: Scientific computing often requires 
the availability of a massive number of computers for performing large 
scale experiments. Traditionally, these needs have been addressed by 
using high-performance computing solutions and installed facilities such 
as clusters and super computers, which are difficult to setup, maintain, 
and operate. Cloud computing provides scientists with a completely new 
model of utilizing the computing infrastructure. Computing resources, 
storage resources, as well as applications, can be dynamically 
provisioned (and integrated within the existing infrastructure) on a pay 
per use basis. These resources can be released when they are no more 
needed. Aneka, an enterprise Cloud computing solution, harnesses the 
power of compute resources by relying on private and public Clouds and 
delivers to users the desired QoS. Its flexible and service based 
infrastructure supports multiple programming paradigms and address a 
variety of different scenarios: from finance to computational science. As 
examples of scientific computing in the Cloud, we present a preliminary 
case study on using Aneka for the classification of gene expression data 
and the execution of fMRI brain imaging workflow. 

--

Second eg,

A Google Future for Australia's Largest University  14 October 2009 

  http://www.monash.edu.au/news/newsline/story/1525
 

Australia's largest university is going Google with Monash University set 
to offer customised Google Apps for Education to all of its students.

Monash University Vice-Chancellor Professor Edward Byrne said the 
University's 58,000 students would be given sign-up details for their opt-
in Monash gmails next month, along with information about how they could 
use other online tools available through Google Applications.

Professor Byrne said adopting Google email and applications was a clever 
solution to the ongoing challenge of providing accessible, user-friendly 
and cost-effective e-communication tools to a growing Monash community.

"Online communication is one of the dominant mediums through which our 
students and staff exchange information, build knowledge and interact 
with the global community. So naturally we want to adopt the technology 
that will best ultilise this medium," Professor Byrne said.

"We want to give students the best online tools on offer in order to 
boost their communication and information sharing capabilities and in 
terms of our e-technology capital, we are giving the University plenty of 
room to grow in the future."

Monash University Vice-President (Administration) Peter Marshall said the 
move reflected the University's commitment to using the best technology 
available and to continually find better ways to facilitate quick, 
efficient and versatile communication and information-sharing 
capabilities. 

He said advantages of switching to "Google Apps" from the current in-
house email system included increased storage capacity (up to 7GB from 
the current 40MB for each user), instant chat functionality, the 
integration of email with online calendar and the ability to work 
collaboratively on shared documents. 

There was also the potential to spread the benefits of the new email 
system to Monash alumni. 

"We are investigating the potential of email for life and email-
forwarding services for our global alumni community," Mr Marshall said.

Monash University is Australia's largest university with 58,000 student 
and 7,000 staff. The research intensive University is a member of 
Australia's Group of Eight and has a strong international focus, with 
campuses in Malaysia and South Africa, a graduate school under 
construction in India and a research and teaching centre in Italy.

Monash University is consistently ranked in the top fifty universities in 
the world by the prestigious Times Higher Education Supplement. 

For more information, contact Tim Mitchell, Monash University Media and 
Communications Manager, on +61 3 9903 4840 or 0437 457 780. 

--

Cheers,
Stephen