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What is cloud computing anyways?. And why does it matter? | by Hamza Iqbal | Feb, 2024 – Medium

February 12, 2024 | Author: admin

What is cloud computing anyways?

And why does it matter?

If you have never heard about something like AWS or Azure before, then it must feel like some alien technology with cool names where nerds throw difficult words here and there. And nothing pretty much makes any sense.

Infrastructure, cloud, serverless- What does this all really mean?

But just like everything, its not complicated, and maybe the first step towards becoming a good cloud engineer is to understand its raison dtre; its reason for existence.

Why do Companies use Cloud?

You might think, in a world which keeps getting expensive, why would someone in their right minds decide to buy expensive cloud services? I havent even bought a spotify premium yet, and piratesbay is my netflix, so it really didnt make any sense to a peasant like me at all.

Not only these giant corporations lock you in their ecosystems, but you have to keep sending them hard-earned cash annually.

But the thing is, cloud services save you moneys. Loads of money. If you hire a good cloud engineer that is (Thats why you should hire me in future)

Anyways, the thing is, every big company worth its salt have a need of huge amounts of expensive hardware. The servers, data centers and all.

Lets take an example. Imagine you are a CTO or whatever of some big company, and you guys come with an idea of a new product that can take the world by storm.

After a long stupid meeting, you guys come to a conclusion that for this new product, your company will have to buy loads of hardware. It will take atleast 2 weeks to get delivered, a week to get configured, and a huge amount of upfront installation fees.

Worse than this is, what if that new brilliant app doesnt get any new customers. All of this will go to waste.

Even after all this, you might worry about how one earthquake or tsunami near your hardware resources can wipe away all the data of your precious little company. Its too much worry, and rich people dont like to worry at all. So, thats why smart people at amazon invented AWS.

AWS gives you access to all these hardware services online. So instead of going through all the worry, you can just rent some amazon hardware at a fractional cost and you are ready for development in a matter of minutes.

No installation cost, No salary to IT guys, and no worry about natural disasters or some technical issue wiping away your entire company.

Its just like putting your images on google drive. You dont have to worry about buying new memory cards everytime your storage gets full. You can just pay very minimal money and buy a good amount of storage.

Even if your mobile god-forbids gets damaged (or snatched if you live where I live: Karachi) you know that you still have access to your pictures.

Another great point is that you have to pay much less to AWS. They have what they call pay-as-you-go service. Something like google drive.

What this means is, you have to pay only for the resources you use, and as your customers grow, you can buy additional resources according to your needs. This is an important advantage.

If you had to buy your own hardware before the product launches, you would either fall in a condition where you bought less resources and now your product is crashing, or you bought more than needed resources and now they are sitting idle.

Both of them put you at a disadvantage, and in this cut-throat corporate competition, disadvantages like these can amount up to a failed business.

Anyways, so thats what the point of cloud computing is. Its a better way to use hardware resources for big companies who can not afford the hassle of having their own hardware setup.

So keeping this all in mind, big corporations prefer using a cloud computing platform like AWS or Azure. And thats where good cloud engineers come in.

They understand all the services in and out, and can make decisions as to which cloud services would save the most amount of companys cash.

But you might be thinking: What if there is a natural disaster at an amazon data center where my data is kept?

Smart people at amazon have thought about this too. Ill talk about this in the next article. Thanks for reading!

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Navigating the Cloud: Challenges and Solutions for Businesses in a Multi-Cloud Era – CXOToday.com

February 12, 2024 | Author: admin

CXOToday has engaged in exclusive interview with John Dumalac, Global Sales VP of Distributed Cloud Services at F5

Applications are at the heart of all digital experiences, and when theyre secure, they unlock value and potential. But just as apps have become critical for life online, theyve also become harder to protect. Todays apps are built on multiple architectures, distributed over various cloud environments, and connected by an exploding number of APIs. According to Deloittes most recent research, SMBs that use the cloud grow 26% quicker and are 21% more lucrative, while businesses praise the clouds resilience, agility, flexibility, and scalability. However, cloud security concerns continue to prevent organizations from fully adopting the cloud, resulting in reduced cloud ROI. Below are some of the hybrid and multi-cloud challenges that businesses face:

At F5, we understand these challenges and strive to help our customers simplify hybrid and multi-cloud environments. We make it easy to deploy and maintain applications and APIs faster, smarter, and more cost-effectively using automation and advanced deployment techniques such as dynamic security policies and API discovery. We also bring distributed ecosystems into focus with a single SaaS-based management console, robust troubleshooting tools, and insights from application behavior. With F5, customers can maximize app performance and reduce security headacheseverywhere their apps are deployed.

Distributed cloud computing decentralizes resources to improve closeness to data sources, addressing difficulties that centralized models ignore. It offers benefits like data localization, decreased latency, greater performance, cost-effectiveness, and a better user experience. According to SlashData, 55% of global developers are already using the distributed cloud approach in some form for their work.

And to strengthen organizations in this digital world, where organizations are adopting a distributed cloud approach, we brought forth our F5 Distributed Cloud Services. These are SaaS-based security, networking, and application management services that enable customers to deploy, secure, and operate their applications in a cloud-native environment wherever neededdata center, multi-cloud, or the network or enterprise edge.

Through F5s Distributed Cloud Platform, we provide flexibility as these services are centrally managed but can be deployed anywhere the app needs to be to maximize business impact and deliver a superior customer experience. We also enable our customers to automate application deployment, scaling, security, secrets/keys, and operations, as the control plane removes the overhead of managing individual Kubernetes clusters. In addition, it also provides complete infrastructure management for heterogeneous cloud and edge environments.

F5 Distributed Cloud Platform provides SaaS-based security, networking, and application management approach, providing businesses with a lot of advantages. The F5 Distributed Cloud Platform allows businesses to gain scalability and flexibility while lowering infrastructure costs and ensuring global reach for continuous service delivery. Businesses can streamline operations and focus on key skills by automating updates and maintenance, implementing strong security measures, and providing a unified administration interface. Integration capabilities and performance optimization improves the overall effectiveness of managing and safeguarding applications and makes F5 Distributed Cloud Services an attractive option for enterprises looking for a modern, cloud-centric approach to their IT infrastructure requirements.

India is a significant market for F5, and we have a base of 5000+ customers. Operating for more than two decades in the country, F5 has its largest R&D center in Hyderabad, with people working towards new developments and innovations. In India, we have a robust partner ecosystem consisting of distributors, resellers, and system integrators. Along with this, we also have a dedicated team that manages our channel partner network and drives growth in the region.

Our focus in India has been on application security and cloud-based services, resulting in the expansion of our operations. F5 products and solutions are widely used in various industries such as banking, financial services, insurance, telecom, etc. To cater to the specific needs of the Indian market, we are committed to investing in the region to expand our channel partner network and drive growth. The new excellence center in Bengaluru, an extension of our current R&D center in Hyderabad, supports our ambition to become a global leader in multi-cloud application services. The center will play a critical role in driving research, development and product innovation for F5 as the company expands its portfolio of multi-cloud application security and delivery solutions.

India is one of the worlds largest and fastest-growing digital consumer marketplaces, according to Nielsens India Internet Report 2023, India already had over 700 million active internet users by Dec 2022. As digital capabilities increase and connectivity becomes more widespread, technology is poised to rapidly alter every area of Indias economy. This is anticipated to provide enormous economic value while also changing the nature of labor for Indians. The public and private sectors are driving digital consumption growth. The government has recruited over 1.2 billion Indians in its biometric digital identity program. Aadhaar has brought over 10 million enterprises onto a digital platform through a goods and services tax. Digital applications are expected to proliferate across most sectors of Indias economy. Core digital sectors such as IT and business process management, digital communication services, and electronics manufacturing could double their GDP level to $355 billion to $435 billion by 2025. According to a report by McKinsey Global Institute on Digital India Sectors such as agriculture, education, energy, financial services, healthcare, logistics, and retail, as well as government services and labor markets could create $10 billion to $150 billion incremental economic value in 2025.

The coming years will definitely witness the Indian era when it comes to digital growth and we at F5 are working towards being a part of this by helping businesses leverage the digital developments in India.

The ever-evolving world of technology has an immense impact on businesses, modifying how they operate, develop, and remain competitive. In recent years significant trends have evolved, influencing multiple facets of the business ecosystem. Businesses are traversing a changing technical terrain that includes the integration of artificial intelligence and edge computing, developments in cybersecurity operations, and the growing relevance of API Security. Telemetry, cloud-native technologies, 5G, and robotic process automation all play an important role in the industrys pursuit of sustainability, connection, and efficiency. Below are some more technology trends that businesses must look out for:

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Google Cloud’s Anton Chuvakin Talks GenAI in the Enterprise – InformationWeek

February 12, 2024 | Author: admin

With the proliferation of generative AI, much of it consumer-oriented, it may be inevitable that such platforms and tools find their way into the workplace -- even if they are not designed to meet the oversight businesses require in their technology.

From proprietary code to sensitive data, the stakes can be high for organizations. Generative AI (genAI) that is not built specifically for the rigors businesses face could be a liability when it comes to regulatory compliance on information security and access. Moreover, what consumer-focused generative AI produces might be fraught with AI hallucinations, errors, and simply not measure up to the standards businesses require.

Amusing tools for spawning digital content might leave a few windows, doors, and ventilation ducts open -- potentially compromising digital security.

Anton Chuvakin, security advisor at the Office of the CISO with Google Cloud, spoke with InformationWeek about how consumer-oriented generative AI might bring more headaches than efficiency to businesses.

Consumer technology, such as smartphones, worked their way into the workplace, sometimes before folks really thought about how device management or security was going to be dealt with. Organizations might be caught up in the shiny new object of generative AI now, and not asking how they can actually police this. Can they shift to something else, potentially stop the use of consumer-oriented generative AI?

Related:How Generative AI Is Changing the Nature of Cyber Insurance

I think that the cases weve encountered are kind of fun and occasionally quite irrational. Wasnt there the classic case in the media about the lawyer who was using ChatGPT, and it was giving him made-up data? To me this is like the top of the iceberg of consumer-grade AI being used for business. In many cases what I would have to deal with as part of the Office of the CISO is the security leader calling me and saying, We need security guidance. And then they ask about these controls and those controls. And then they, Oh, by the way, we use ChatGPT-3.

Im like, But its a toy.

A very fun toy. The point is that these are toys for fun and personal education. But youre describing the levels of control, granular access between teams at your organization, but then you say you use ChatGPT-3. That makes absolutely no sense, but to him it did because his business was pushing him -- that they want to use this tool.

In essence, these stories are quite surreal at times because what we encounter from clients is just a lack of understanding of whats a consumer toy -- probably inaccurate, but still good.

Related:Selipsky at AWS re:Invent on Securing Data in the GenAI World

I was writing a letter to my former dance teacher using Bard [Googles chat-based AI tool. Today, Google announced it was changing Bard's name to "Gemini."] Its like a belated Christmas message. Bard [Gemini] is doing great with that. Would I do it for security advice given my realities to a customer? No. General advice would probably be good, but you need to have precision; you need to have certainty; you need to have provenance of data. But this intermixing is kind of endemic and sometimes it pops up not only as mismatch of use cases, but also people demanding controls, which they expect in enterprise technology from consumer-grade technology.

The result is even more hilarity is generated because its not going to fit.

When our field teams talk to customers about Vertex AI [Googles tool for testing and prototyping generative AI models], there are many, many layers of controls -- technology, procedural controls explaining how we do things.

What I want to invent, ultimately what we want to invent, is more than just education. We dont just want to tell people, Hey, youre really doing it wrong. It only goes so far. I feel like building an enterprise stack so that its as easy to adopt as consumer-grade tech but has all the controls is going to be the direction, probably for the future.

Related:Generative AI an Emerging Risk as CISOs Shift Cyber Resilience Strategies

Another common enterprise theme is people say, Would it learn from my prompts? And the answer is, Yes, of course for consumer-grade; no, of course not for enterprise.

Its like complete polar opposites. Yes, it would. No, it would not. Absolutely, yes. Absolutely, no. You see these forks in the road and if you really want an enterprise AI for enterprise use cases, you push vendors to build things, require things, require controls, require privacy controls, require governance controls -- a long list of things versus just go and sign up.

There are mindsets about being aware of security, visibility, access, and what is going on within an IT infrastructure or cloud infrastructure. For whatever reason, did that just kind of get forgotten once generative AI came onto the scene?

If you look at some of the online reports about some people who are trying to create an enterprise AI out of consumer AI, you would see some hilarity in the access permissions. For example, your function at an enterprise shouldnt see what my function in the enterprise does with the AI. It may be compliance; it may be just practical. It may be that mine is less sensitive than yours, but this type of cross-pollination, cross-learning is sort of assumed in consumer because you wanted to learn from everything. But its assumed to not be there in enterprise.

For example, if I am a security incident responder and you are an IT guy, I dont want you looking at my tickets (a very 1990s example), because it is possible that Im investigating you for leaking corporate data. There are many other reasons why security data is more sensitive. Imagine the same thing with genAI where youre training AI on tickets.

Some companies would say, AI -- tickets. Push the button. Did they think, Whoa, wait a second. Their permissions, the level of sensitivity here, its not just like a ticket database. Ive been telling a story -- it didnt happen to a client, but its something Ive heard from industry contacts where something vaguely similar happened. If they didn't have genAI, if they were just playing in enterprise, they would think, OK, what are the access rules? Who would access what?

But with this particular AI, not only they didnt think about it, the actual tech stack they used did not have a way to do it because it was kind of a derived from ultimately consumer genAI. To me this type of permissioning, and Im not talking about like fine permissioning, but more like, Just give it all the data.

What are the consequences for enterprises? Whats at stake here if organizations dont make it clear within their operations how theyre going to use gen AI, whether or not theyre going to allow use of the consumer-facing options? Have we learned lessons from examples in the earlier days for ChatGPT when proprietary code from Samsung got into the wild?

In essence they went to ChatGPT, and they submitted pieces of Samsung code and wanted to improve it or whatever the use case was -- I vaguely recall that. It wasnt really an accident from their point of view. They really did want to do exactly that. It was just the wrong tool.

The problem is that at the time, there were no right tools. I think that the excitement to use new technology is obviously a feature of many IT technologists. Maybe less so in security. Frankly, just the other day, I was polling security leaders about what they care more about: securing AI or using AI for security?

I expected them to go full-on paranoia and say, Hey, were all securing AI. But in reality, it split half and half. It was a very informal poll, not Google-sponsored. The point is that the balance wasnt, Im a CISO; I care about secure use of AI by my company. The result was one CISO, "yes," another CISO is, I care about using AI for security now. The motivation to move quickly is very strong and I sense that the fear of missing out here is stronger. This is my guess, based on my experience.

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The Rise of Hybrid and Multi-Cloud Computing Architecture – NEXTDC

February 12, 2024 | Author: admin

In today's dynamic business environment, the shift to cloud operations is more crucial than ever. As organisations transition, the need to scale securely and efficiently takes centre stage. This article unveils the secrets to mastering cloud strategies and navigating the contemporary organisational landscape.

These findings shed light on the evolving landscape of cloud adoption, showcasing the enduring popularity of hybrid and multi-cloud strategies among organisations.

In the ever-evolving realm of cloud computing, enterprises are expanding their horizons beyond in-house data centres, embracing strategic approaches such as multi-cloud, hybrid cloud, and colocation solutions. Let's unravel the distinctions and explore the latest trends shaping the diverse landscape of cloud computing strategies.

Example: In hybrid and multi-cloud environments, the integration of edge computing is revolutionising real-time data processing. For instance, a retail company employs edge computing to analyse customer behaviour data instantly, enhancing personalised shopping experiences.

Hybrid cloud and multi-cloud are enduring enterprise solution strategies integral to a comprehensive hybrid IT approach. Both terms are anticipated to remain relevant in the long term. While cloud services offer numerous advantages, they also pose distinctive challenges. IT leaders need to establish a robust IT automation strategy to effectively manage the chosen solution. Furthermore, a thorough assessment of enterprise transformations is essential, as the adoption of new technology introduces potential new threats and challenges.

Hybrid cloud and multi-cloud solutions are cornerstones of modern enterprise IT. As you navigate the complexities of cloud adoption, it's also crucial to align your strategy with your unique organisational needs and goals.

By weighing up your unique needs, you can narrow down your choice of multi or hybrid cloud. The perfect type of cloud service is one that delivers the resources you need, protects your assets, and fits your requirements.

Leverage Australia's most extensive partner ecosystem with a community of 750+ partners to enable more connections with carriers, cloud providers, and IT service providers.

Empowering customers to leverage cloud first strategies and optimise multi-cloud deployments to scale mission critical IT infrastructure.

NEXTDC is at the forefront of supporting Edge computing and High-Performance Compute (HPC) requirements, providing customised solutions to accelerate your AI journey.

The only data centre operator in the southern hemisphere with Tier IV Gold certification for Operational Sustainability, NEXTDC guarantees zero downtime for reliability and performance.

Secure, private, and direct access to Australias most connected range of global cloud providers, integrated with a nationwide network of data centre facilities.

Internationally recognised for designing, constructing, and operating Australias market leading Tier IV facilities, certified by globally renowned Uptime Institute.

Demonstrating a commitment to sustainability, NEXTDC prioritises renewable energy sources, achieving leading standards such as 5-star NABERS energy efficiency ratings and TRUE certification.

NEXTDC is certified by Australias Digital Transformation Agency (DTA), to ensure compliant and sovereign critical infrastructure choice for government at all levels.

NEXTDC, a listed company on the ASX 100, stands out with industry peer awards as the region's most innovative and customer focused data centre provider.

NEXTDC's corporate operations are certified carbon neutral under the Australian Governments Climate Active Carbon Neutral Standard.

Engineered for outstanding energy efficiency, NEXTDC data centres deliver industry-leading benchmarks for minimising operational cost and total cost of ownership.

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Tech Tip Tuesday: 5 Ways the Cloud Can Help Streamline Your Business – Hello Georgetown

February 12, 2024 | Author: admin

Cloud computing is an excellent tool for companies that need to provide employees with simple and secure collaboration. Utilizing The Cloud allows companies to access and store important data even while on the go. There are many benefits to implementing The Cloud into the workplace such as streamlined workflow, real-time editing, collaboration, and scalability.

The top 5 benefits of utilizing The Cloud for your business are broken down below:

1. Better Access

Employees will be able to access important files from anywhere when you utilize The Cloud. As long as employees have a stable internet connection, they will be able to get the information they need as well as edit and update documents. With The Cloud, collaboration is easier than ever before.

2. Real Time Editing by Multiple Parties

With The Cloud, your employees will not only be able to work from anywhere, they will also all have the ability to access and edit documents at the same time. Each team member will be represented by their initials and everyone accessing the document will be able to see changes happen in real time and implement their own changes as well.

3. Increased Security

Many cloud computing services offer robust security and data protection. Depending on which cloud computing service you choose, moving over to The Cloud could increase your cybersecurity company-wide. When trusting a service to handle such a large amount of sensitive data, its important to make sure they are reputable. Talk to your local IT expert to find out which cloud computing service is right for you.

4. Scalability

The Cloud offers the ability to increase or decrease storage as needed depending on your business needs. You will be able to scale for growth without the need to physically implement new equipment for your office. This is a perfect option for businesses that need flexibility with their data storage.

5. Data Loss Prevention

Some cloud computing services provide backup and disaster recovery. While backing up to The Cloud should never be your only form of backup, it can provide an extra copy of data in the event of hardware failure, user error, or cyber-attack.

In conclusion, ensuring your business is utilizing Cloud Computing capabilities can increase your workflow and keep your business running securely.

For more information about implementing Cloud Computing for your business, contact us at Computek. We can help you transition over to The Cloud with ease. Call 512-869-1155 or book an initial consultation online at Computekonline.com.

Thats all for this week, well see you next time for Tech Tip Tuesday!

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64% of organisations see their use of multi-cloud increasing in the next two years – CloudTech News

February 12, 2024 | Author: admin

62% of organisations are currently using a multi-cloud environment, with a further 18% actively in the process of transitioning to a multi-cloud environment.

This is according to OVHclouds recent executive report on the state of multi-cloud, which examined the views of more than 500 IT decision makers of large organisations in the UK.

Matt Tebay, sales director at OVHcloud, said: Using the right cloud for the right workload is rapidly being accepted as the best way to do business today.

Almost two thirds (64%) of organisations see their use of multi-cloud increasing in the next two years, so although it can bring considerable complexity, the benefits are clear to companies today. In fact, only 3% of organisations said that their use of multi-cloud would decrease in the next two years, and fewer than 1% have no plans to use multi-cloud at all.

The flexibility of multi-cloud, allowing organisations to run workloads in the right cloud environments, was recognised by half of the study as one of its main strengths, closely followed by improved agility (41%). Cost-effectiveness and gaining access to better infrastructure on an OpEx basis (40%) as well as reduced organisational risk (39%) through having fewer points of failure were also seen as key advantages.

Running the right application on the right cloud can bring significant operational gains to organisations, continued Tebay. Although working in multiple cloud environments can require higher levels of skills and training, when done well it can bring both enhanced agility and a solid commercial ROI.

However, the report also highlighted a number of challenges with multi-cloud environments, with 27% of IT decision-makers highlighting technical complexity as one of their main concern or area of risk, and 31% being concerned with a larger physical estate implying more endpoints to secure, and as a result, more possible vulnerabilities.

This complexity may explain why just under half (46%) of the study admitted to still being on the road to multi-cloud, taking it a step at a time, concluded Tebay. Despite this, almost a quarter (23%) of IT decision-makers said that their use of multi-cloud was plain sailing and that theyre seeing significant benefits, which shows the real impact of a mature, well-thought-out approach to multi-cloud.

The research was carried out by market research agency Censuswide and surveyed 504 IT decision-makers of large organisations with 201 700 employees.

Check out the upcomingCloud Transformation Conference, a free virtual event for business and technology leaders to explore the evolving landscape of cloud transformation.Book your free virtual ticket to deep dive into the practicalities and opportunities surrounding cloud adoption.Learn more here.

Tags: multi-cloud, research, strategy

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2024 in Telecoms: A Look Ahead with Amdocs Featured – The Fast Mode

February 12, 2024 | Author: admin

Technology is constantly evolving, and the telecoms space is no exception as communications become ever more important. Therefore, communications service providers (CSPs) must constantly evolve and innovate to stay front of mind in such a competitive space.

To navigate this and stay ahead of the curve, telcos must anticipate emerging trends and understand how these forces will reshape our digital future.

Here are the top five telecom trends I believe will lead the way in 2024 and beyond.

#1: AI will continue to redefine the landscape

Generative AI is reaching its full potential, as vendors rush to integrate it into their applications.

Open-source language models like Googles Bard and OpenAIs ChatGPT are democratizing access to this powerful technology and propelling a wave of innovation. The impending arrival of ChatGPT 5 promises to further disrupt the status quo, and a new contender has emerged in the form of Elon Musk's x.AI, poised to challenge the existing language model hierarchy.

Simultaneously, Europe is tightening its grip on AI regulation with the rise of sovereign cloud solutions, sending ripples across the globe. This will also impact non-European providers, necessitating a strategic approach from businesses that want to navigate this evolving landscape. While regulations may reign them in, AI CoPilots will become indispensable companions, aiding us all when it comes to decision-making and streamlining complex tasks.

#2: Cloud computing's quantum leap

As 2024 unfolds, we stand on the brink of a cloud computing transformation. The convergence of AI and computing power is making Digital Twins a reality and these virtual replicas of real-world systems will unlock unprecedented capabilities for simulation and real-time data analysis. Imagine optimizing capacity, predicting overload, or testing new features all within a digital sandbox, powered by the cloud.

Specialized functional clouds are also emerging, tailored for specific tasks such as AI and Generative AI training. These functions offer bespoke performance and resource allocation for these demanding workloads.

Hardware isn't staying idle either: Intel and AMD's Confidential Computing-enabled processors are becoming as affordable as their traditional counterparts, ensuring data privacy and security remain at the forefront of cloud innovation.

Finally, enter a new era of cloud interaction with GenAI integration at the OPS/ADMIN level. This will enable you to converse with your public cloud platform in plain English, issue complex commands, and navigate its intricacies with the ease of a natural conversation.

#3: Data fabrics adoption

The explosion of data, fueled by the rapid increase of connected devices and sensors, is creating a complex web of information. To navigate this, organizations must adopt intelligent solutions for data management.

Enter Data Fabrics, a framework that seamlessly integrates data across various sources, locations, and formats. When driven by ML and AI, Data Fabrics will be essential in an Industry v4.0 future, with adoption targeted for 2024 and beyond to handle the required data complexity, management, and automation. This will make it easier to enforce data privacy regulations like the GDPR and implement data masking for security, as well as other measures. Gartner estimates that by 2024, 25% of data management vendors will offer a complete Data Fabric framework, a significant jump from the 5% we see today.

#4: NaaS unleashed: A pioneering breakthrough transforms the networking landscape

The telecoms industry is set for a dramatic shift with Network-as-a-Service (NaaS) set to become a valuable solution this year. Deployed and pioneered by Verizon, NaaS delivers a fully functional internal cloud equipped with the entire networking stack and gear, all packaged within highly optimized, energy-efficient servers. This enables the deployment of a mobile 5G network at large-scale events, without the need for complex infrastructure setup.

But NaaS is not just about speed and convenience, it's also about efficiency. The low-voltage, energy-efficient servers reduce operating costs and minimize environmental impact, making NaaS a sustainable solution for the future. With Verizon leading the charge, we can expect other major players to follow suit, transforming how we think about and deploy networks.

#5: Igniting the quantum computing inferno

The race to quantum computing supremacy will continue to intensify in 2024, with tech giants IBM and Google leading the pack. As quantum computers become more powerful, the need for post-quantum-resistant encryption will become paramount. Public cloud providers are already taking proactive measures to implement innovative mitigation strategies to protect sensitive data in this emerging quantum era.

These five distinct trends each form part of a grander technological evolution. The convergence of AI, cloud computing, data management, network advancements, and quantum computing will create unimaginable possibilities this year and beyond. Therefore, CSPs must prepare to be agile, data-driven, and digitally fluent to thrive in this interconnected landscape and meet the ever-increasing expectations placed upon them. As the industry embraces these innovations, the future promises to be brighter, more efficient, and more connected than ever before, with CSPs unlocking ever more amazing user experiences.

The key takeaway is to embrace this evolution, remain curious and adaptable, and see challenges as opportunities for growth.

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Enhancing Observability: Amazon CloudWatch Logs Introduces Account-Level Subscription Filter – InfoQ.com

February 12, 2024 | Author: admin

The recent update to Amazon CloudWatch Logs introduces support for account-level subscription filtering. With this enhancement, developers can now access a real-time feed of CloudWatch Logs from all logs groups and have it delivered to a single destination for further processing.

The implementation of a single account-level subscription filter enables customers to deliver real-time log events that are ingested into Amazon CloudWatch Logs to a Kinesis Data Stream, Amazon Kinesis Data Firehose, or AWS Lambda for custom processing, analysis, or redirection to alternative destinations. It is possible to set an account-level subscription policy that includes a subset of log groups in the account.

All the logs that are sent to a receiving service through an account-level subscription policy are base64 encoded and compressed as gzip files. Designed to reduce the overhead of managing large and complex AWS deployments, the account-level subscription filter applies to both existing log groups and any future log groups that match the configuration. Jeremy Daly, CEO and Founder of Ampt, comments:

This is a dream come true for those of us who wrestle with tens (if not hundreds) of log group subscription filters.

The put-account-policy API can be used to set the CloudWatch Logs account-level subscription. For example, using the AWS CLI, the following command sends all log data to the helloWorld Lambda function, excluding the group names LogGroupToExclude1 and LogGroupToExclude2.

Source: AWS documentation.

Regardless of the chosen destination, AWS stresses the importance of evaluating upfront the volume of log data that will be generated to avoid throttling. Developers should make sure that the Kinesis Data Firehose stream or Lambda function can handle the volume, or that the Kinesis Data Streams has enough shards. With Kinesis Data Streams, throttled deliverables are retried for up to 24 hours and then dropped.

The cloud provider warns as well about the risk of infinite recursive loops with subscription filters, triggering large increases in ingestion billing. The team provides advice on recursion prevention:

To mitigate this risk, we recommend that you use selection criteria in your account-level subscription filters to exclude log groups that ingest log data from resources that are part of the subscription delivery workflow (...) When excluding log groups, consider the following AWS services that produce logs and may be a part of your subscription delivery workflows: Amazon EC2 with Fargate, Lambda, AWS Step Functions, and Amazon VPC flow logs that are enabled for CloudWatch Logs.

Referring to the new features added at re:Invent, and the recent announcement that CloudWatch alarms now support AWS Lambda functions as an action for state changes, Ran Isenberg, principal software architect at CyberArk, notes:

CloudWatch is on a roll lately and is making up lost ground in comparison to third-party observability tools.

CloudWatch Logs Account-level Subscription Filter is available in all AWS commercial regions except Israel and Canada West.

Each AWS account can create one account-level subscription filter.

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Enhancing Observability: Amazon CloudWatch Logs Introduces Account-Level Subscription Filter - InfoQ.com

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Red Hat Extends Enterprise Java to the Cloud with JBoss EAP 8 – ITPro Today

February 12, 2024 | Author: admin

IBM's Red Hat business unit is updating its flagship JBoss Enterprise Application Platform (EAP) with a series of new capabilities for building, running, deploying, and managing enterprise Java applications.

JBoss EAP 8 is the first enterprise Java platform release from Red Hat to support the open source Jakarta EE 10 specification. Jakarta EE is the open source successor to the platform that has had multiple names over the last two decades, including J2EE and more recently Java EE. The Jakarta EE name and platform came about in 2019 with a governance move for the effort from Oracle to the Eclipse Foundation. Jakarta EE 9 came out in 2020, but it was not supported by Red Hat JBoss EAP.

Related:Should Developers Learn Java Programming Language?

With Jakarta EE 10 support, companies can modernize legacy Java applications while continuing to leverage their existing investments. The platform's improved provisioning tools also empower developers to more easily manage and optimize Jakarta EE application deployments across bare metal, virtual machines, cloud environments, and Red Hat's OpenShift platform for Kubernetes container management.

In addition to Jakarta EE advancements, JBoss EAP 8 provides security enhancements such as native support for OpenID Connect.

With Jakarta EE 10, there are a number of new critical capabilities that JBoss EAP users will now benefit from.

"Much of the new innovation in Jakarta EE 10 is in the area of lightweight, cloud-native Java development and an effort to bring the specification in line with how developers are building and deploying modern applications," James Labocki, senior director of product management for Red Hat Runtimes & Migration Tools, told ITPro Today.

Related:What Is the State of the Java Ecosystem?

For example, Labocki explained that Jakarta EE 10 introduces a new Core Profile, defined as a small subset of the most useful Jakarta EE features needed when building lightweight Java microservices. But what's more important is that this also reduces the friction of modernizing existing enterprise Java applications by not requiring developers to learn a new framework to bring apps forward, he said.

Another key feature highlighted, according to Labocki, is CDI Lite, which enables the rising trend of using ahead-of-time (AOT) compilation techniques and natively compiled Java applications, first popularized by GraalVM and implemented by next-generation Java frameworks such asQuarkus and Spring Native.

"This has brought new life to Java in the age of cloud and containers, and represents another path forward to extend the life of enterprise Java apps," Labocki said.

Beyond supporting Jakarta EE 10, the new JBoss EAP release integrates improved provisioning tools.

Labocki said that the new provisioning system includes a new installation manager for bare-metal or virtual machine installations and a new Apache Maven plug-in for OpenShift builds. He explained that for OpenShift, the JBoss EAP Maven plug-in allows users to specify what they want in their server footprint and configuration for example, to specify a feature pack to include database drivers. The JBoss EAP Maven plug-in uses Galleon trimming capability to reduce the size and memory footprint of the server; it also supports the execution of JBoss EAP CLI script files to customize server configuration.

"For bare-metal or virtual machine installations, the new installation manager allows users to install JBoss EAP, apply patches, revert patches, and apply feature packs," he said.

In addition to making it easier for operations teams to install and maintain JBoss EAP instances, Labocki said the installation manager introduces similar layering concepts to container deployments, providing a more consistent experience across bare metal, VMs, and OpenShift.

Going a step further, JBoss EAP 8's OpenShift integration includes new lightweight OpenShift container images for running the server and the ability to build even lighter-weight containers with a smaller attack surface.

Labocki added that the new release also includes an update to the JBoss EAP Operator, which is similar to the Kubernetes Operator concept, that can manage container images for this release as well as the previous release (JBoss EAP 7.4), and includes new support for managing health probes directly in the custom resource managed by the Operator.

"Prior to JBoss EAP 8, this had to be done in the application container itself, which could result in configuration drift or developers specifying values outside of IT policy," he said.

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Microsoft in talks to end trade body’s cloud computing complaint – iTnews

February 12, 2024 | Author: admin

Microsoft is in talks with CISPE in an attempt to resolve its European Union antitrust complaint about the US software giant's cloud computing licensing practices, the trade group said.

Working the issue out bilaterally could help Microsoft stave off a possible lengthy EU investigation that could lead to a possible fine and an order to change its business practices.

CISPE, whose members include Amazon and 26 small EU cloud providers, filed a complaint with the European Commission in late 2022 alleging that Microsoft's new contractual terms imposed on October 1 were harming Europe's cloud computing ecosystem.

Microsoft, which ranks behind market leader Amazon in the cloud computing sector but ahead of Alphabet's Google, amended its licensing terms in mid-2022 after rivals in Germany, Italy, Denmark and France took their grievances to the EU competition watchdog.

However, Amazon, Google, Alibaba and Microsoft's own cloud services are excluded from the changes.

"Today, CISPE confirms that it has opened discussions with Microsoft aimed at resolving ongoing issues related to unfair software licensing for cloud infrastructure providers and their customers in Europe," the trade body said in a statement.

"Both parties are exploring potential remedies."

"We continue to work constructively with CISPE to resolve concerns raised by European cloud providers," a Microsoft spokesperson said, declining to provide details.

The Commission said it had received several complaints about Microsoft, including in relation to its Azure platform, which it was assessing based on its standard procedures, but declined to comment further.

CISPE said the discussions were at an early stage and it was uncertain whether these would result in effective remedies but said "substantive progress must be achieved in the first quarter of 2024".

"We are supportive of a fast and effective resolution to these harms but reiterate that it is Microsoft which must end its unfair software licensing practices to deliver this outcome," said CISPE secretary general Francisco Mingorance.

Microsoft, which notched up 1.6 billion euros ($2.6 billion) in EU antitrust fines in the previous decade, has in recent years changed its approach towards regulators to a more accommodative one.

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