Friday | 9 January, 2009
CIO
Should You Start the Meter Running?
Looking for a dramatic change in the way the data centre is run? You may have just found your answer
Graeme Thickins 07 May, 2003 14:29:48

The Analysts Weigh In

Forrester Research, the firm that coined the term "client/server computing" (that would be last century), got back into the coining realm in 2002 by coming up with the term organic IT to describe this utility computing trend. In its report, Organic IT: The Whole View, Forrester says this is "the first fundamental change in backroom architecture in years". Frank Gillett, principal author of the report, adds that it will "change dramatically the way the data centre is run during the next decade".

Another analyst firm, Summit Strategies, seems to have a bead on the service provider aspect of this phenomenon. A favourite term it uses is multisourcing, by which Summit means selectively outsourcing parts of your IT infrastructure and applications to the best service providers in more of a specific, bite-sized approach, unlike the wholesale outsourcing of old. In a November 2002 report, Multisourcing Opens the Tap for Utility Computing, Summit says: "This (utility computing) trend will lead to quickening adoption of third-party management services, hosting and outsourcing during the next couple of years . . . More and more enterprises will decide that owning and operating their own IT infrastructures is too costly."

How Utility Computing Will Evolve

Experts say this movement will blend well with the related concepts of grid computing and Web services, mentioned above. With grid computing, storage, databases and applications are made available for customers to access on demand over networks that appear as one large virtual computing system. Part of what utility computing provides is the necessary chargeback function to support grid computing. Web services will let companies interconnect their software systems ever more quickly and cheaply, via automated methods based on XML and other standards. Its aim, as is that of its larger utility computing parent model, is to allow companies to make better use of their existing computing resources, and to achieve higher levels of productivity and business results through automating processes between partners and customers.

That's the real Nirvana - perhaps still 10 years off, according to the analysts.

Featured Whitepaper Sponsors
Market Place
 

Smart SOA World Tour

Discover how SOA can create smarter outcomes for your business.

Attend and learn:

  • How SOA is helping leading companies to become more agile
  • Where you should be applying SOA processes in your company
  • The top SOA implementation mistakes to avoid

Click here for more information.
  • +

    CIO Live Podcast #79: Brent D Taylor, author of The Outsider's Edge: The Making of Self-Made Billionaires Part II 05 October, 2007 06:00:00

    For his new book, The Outsider's Edge: The Making of Self-Made Billionaires, social researcher Brent D Taylor spent four years of intensive research investigating the psychological make-up and backgrounds of some of the world's richest men and women, including IT luminaries Bill Gates, Larry Ellison and Steve Jobs. Taylor discovered that, despite working in different industries and coming from different upbringings, they all have one thing in common -- they are all outsiders.
  • +

    CIO Live Podcast #78: Brent D Taylor, author of The Outsider's Edge: The Making of Self-Made Billionaires 28 September, 2007 17:34:25

    For his new book, The Outsider's Edge: The Making of Self-Made Billionaires, social researcher Brent D Taylor spent four years of intensive research investigating the psychological make-up and backgrounds of some of the world's richest men and women, including IT luminaries Bill Gates, Larry Ellison and Steve Jobs. Taylor discovered that, despite working in different industries and coming from different upbringings, they all have one thing in common -- they are all outsiders.
  • +

    CIO Live Podcast #77: Panasonic Speeds Up Trans-Pacific File Transfers, Part III 21 September, 2007 07:00:00

    Part three in our three-part special report from CIO's sister publication Network World in the US, as Paul Desmond reports from the Network World IT Roadmap Conference in Santa Clara, California. With development teams in the US and Japan, Panasonic needed a more efficient way to move very large files between the two locations. Iben Rodriguez, IT consultant for Panasonic Research and Development, explains how a storage-area network and virtual server technology helped speed up WAN performance.
  • +

    CIO Live Podcast #76: Panasonic Speeds Up Trans-Pacific File Transfers, Part II 14 September, 2007 07:00:00

    Part two in our three-part special report from CIO's sister publication Network World in the US, as Paul Desmond reports from the Network World IT Roadmap Conference in Santa Clara, California. With development teams in the US and Japan, Panasonic needed a more efficient way to move very large files between the two locations. Iben Rodriguez, IT consultant for Panasonic Research and Development, explains how a storage-area network and virtual server technology helped speed up WAN performance.
  • +

    CIO Live Podcast #75: Panasonic Speeds Up Trans-Pacific File Transfers, Part I 07 September, 2007 07:00:05

    Part one in our three-part special report from CIO's sister publication Network World in the US, as Paul Desmond reports from the Network World IT Roadmap Conference in Santa Clara, California. With development teams in the US and Japan, Panasonic needed a more efficient way to move very large files between the two locations. Iben Rodriguez, IT consultant for Panasonic Research and Development, explains how a storage-area network and virtual server technology helped speed up WAN performance.
  • +

    TJX Maxx hacker banged up for 30 years 09 January, 2009 11:26:00

    Key figure in the infamous TJX Maxx Wi-Fi hack of 2005 has been sentenced to 30-years in prison by a Turkish court.
    Maksym Yastremskiy, the Ukrainian accused of being a key figure in the infamous TJX Maxx Wi-Fi hack of 2005, has been sentenced to 30-years in prison by a Turkish court.
  • +

    Data breaches rose sharply in 2008, says study 08 January, 2009 08:27:00

    More than 35 million data records were breached in 2008, according to the Identity Theft Resource Center.
    More than 35 million data records were breached in 2008 in the U.S., a figure that underscores continuing difficulties in securing information, according to the Identity Theft Resource Center (ITRC).
  • +

    Rogue SSL certificate exploit puts VeriSign on the spot 07 January, 2009 11:04:00

    Wishes "white hat" researchers had notified VeriSign before public demo.
    Following the success of researchers last week in creating a false SSL certificate based on VeriSign's RapidSSL brand, the company is scrambling to explain how it happened, how it's preventing it from reoccurring, and whether its other SSL certificate-generation services are at risk.
  • +

    With Gaza conflict, cyberattacks come too 05 January, 2009 08:03:00

    Pro-Palestinian hackers have defaced thousands of sites following attacks in Gaza.
    The conflict raging in Gaza between Israel and Palestine has spilled over to the Internet.
  • +

    5 ways to secure your Blackberry 18 December, 2008 12:58:00

    What do Tom Cruise and the McCain campaign have in common? They have both been bitten by the loss of a Blackberry. Mobile expert Dan Hoffman gives advice on how to keep your cherished mobile device safe, even if it's out of your hands
    What do Tom Cruise and the McCain campaign have in common? They have both been bitten by the loss of a Blackberry. Mobile expert Dan Hoffman gives advice on how to keep your cherished mobile device safe, even if it's out of your hands.
CIO Webcast Innovation #8 - What are the biggest roadblocks to IT's involvement in innovation at your company?
Watch the latest latest edition of CIO Innovation which is now available for download.
Watch the webcast
Sign up to the CIO Innovation update email


CIO Live Podcast #79: Brent D Taylor, author of The Outsider's Edge: The Making of Self-Made Billionaires Part II
Listen to the latest edition of CIO Live which is now available for download.
Listen to the podcast
Sign up to the CIO Live email
Whitepaper

Choices in Storage Architecture for Oracle Environments

Database systems have always been at the core of the IT landscape. Not only is storage an increasingly large cost component of database investments, but storage architecture can significantly and directly impact the performance, availability, and recovery of data. Read on to explore the interaction between Oracle databases and EMC and Network Appliance storage architectures.