Comments
Richard Davies wrote: The UK has a good crop of technology pioneers in cloud computing - for example ElasticHosts, FlexiScale, Flexiant, OnApp - and also some strong government initiatives such as G-Cloud. We will have to see whether this kind of technical leadership converts into swift mass-market adoption or not.
Cloud Expo on Google News


2008 West
DIAMOND SPONSOR:
Data Direct
SOA, WOA and Cloud Computing: The New Frontier for Data Services
PLATINUM SPONSORS:
Red Hat
The Opening of Virtualization
GOLD SPONSORS:
Appsense
User Environment Management – The Third Layer of the Desktop
Cordys
Cloud Computing for Business Agility
EMC
CMIS: A Multi-Vendor Proposal for a Service-Based Content Management Interoperability Standard
Freedom OSS
Practical SOA” Max Yankelevich
Intel
Architecting an Enterprise Service Router (ESR) – A Cost-Effective Way to Scale SOA Across the Enterprise
Sensedia
Return on Assests: Bringing Visibility to your SOA Strategy
Symantec
Managing Hybrid Endpoint Environments
VMWare
Game-Changing Technology for Enterprise Clouds and Applications
Click For 2008 West
Event Webcasts

2008 West
PLATINUM SPONSORS:
Appcelerator
Get ‘Rich’ Quick: Rapid Prototyping for RIA with ZERO Server Code
Keynote Systems
Designing for and Managing Performance in the New Frontier of Rich Internet Applications
GOLD SPONSORS:
ICEsoft
How Can AJAX Improve Homeland Security?
Isomorphic
Beyond Widgets: What a RIA Platform Should Offer
Oracle
REAs: Rich Enterprise Applications
Click For 2008 Event Webcasts
SYS-CON.TV
Top Links You Must Click On


Cloud Computing Does Not Require Change in Programming Model – Microsoft
Microsoft’s cloud strategy assumes that they are going to retain the existing programming model

In two of my previous posts I have highlighted why I think cloud computing needs change in thinking. However, in a recent discussion Walid Abu-Hadba (of Microsoft) clearly stated that Microsoft’s cloud strategy assumes that they are going to retain the existing programming model for cloud. That is, programmers can develop their application without bothering about where it is going to be deployed.

This is how the logic goes:

  1. When mini computers came in, IBM did not / could not retain the mainframe programming model for mini and hence lost the mini race to DEC
  2. When PCs came DEC suffered in the same way
  3. The movement from character interface to GUI saw many companies (Ashton-Tate, Word Perfect) losing out
  4. When network based computing transitioned from file server to client server model, Novel lost out
  5. A programmer learns a programming platform in first few years of his/her carrier – very few make a transition to a different platform later on
  6. There are huge number of programmers who are familiar with the existing programming model – transitioning them is almost impossible

Do you see the fallacy in this logic?

Essentially what Microsoft is saying is that “we will be at a serious disadvantage if the programming model changes – so let us not change it”. But, is the current programming model right for the cloud?

In past Microsoft has changed the programming model twice – the change in each occasion has been triggered by competition. The GUI programming model was forced by Mac and the .Net programming model was forced by Java. They have retained the same programming model for mobile and the result is there for all to see.

So, let me restate why I think the programming model will change. I have based my thoughts on how Google App Engine is structured – after all Google has the largest cloud computing infrastructure.

  • You do not have to worry about object-relation (O-R) mapping. Big Table implementation of Google allows you to save the objects directly.
  • You will not need web server – app server – database server. All of them become redundant.
  • Designing for heavy transaction volume will not be necessary – it is in built. Instead …
    • …individual transaction performance will have to be optimized.
    • …designing for high data volume will be required.
    • …impact of data contention across transactions needs to be checked.
    • …compute intensive algorithm needs to be broken up.
  • Heterogeneity is the order of the day. Consuming services from different sources and providing services for others to use will be the starting point.
  • Approach to debugging will be totally different. I am not sure how it will be done.
  • In many situations, storing – searching – retrieving unstructured data may be advantageous compared to structured data.

I propose to elaborate each of these points in my future posts.

Is this Microsoft’s first major strategic decision in the post Bill Gates era? Let us see how it pans out.

Read the original blog entry...

About Udayan Banerjee
Udayan Banerjee is CTO at NIIT Technologies Ltd, an IT industry veteran with more than 30 years' experience. He blogs at http://setandbma.wordpress.com.
The blog focuses on emerging technologies like cloud computing, mobile computing, social media aka web 2.0 etc. It also contains stuff about agile methodology and trends in architecture. It is a world view seen through the lens of a software service provider based out of Bangalore and serving clients across the world. The focus is mostly on...
  • Keep the hype out and project a realistic picture
  • Uncover trends not very apparent
  • Draw conclusion from real life experience
  • Point out fallacy & discrepancy when I see them
  • Talk about trends which I find interesting
Google

Enterprise Open Source Magazine Latest Stories . . .
With Cloud Expo 2012 New York (10th Cloud Expo) just four months away, what better time to start introducing you in greater detail to the distinguished individuals in our incredible Speaker Faculty for the technical and strategy sessions at the conference... We have technical and st...
AMD said late Tuesday that its chief sales officer Emilio Ghilardi had left the company and that CEO and president Rory Read is going to do his job while a replacement is sought. AMD didn’t say why Ghilardi left but it’s assumed Read wants his own people. Read is relatively new to th...
During the lifespan of M3 (Monitis Monitor Manager) there has always been something lacking – timers. M3 execution procedure was outlined in this previous article. The execution mentioned in the latter was a one-time-execution, whereas server monitoring requires periodic invocati...
Red Hat is putting its bought-in Gluster scale-out NAS storage technology, acquired in October, on the Amazon cloud. It’s styled Red Hat Virtual Storage Appliance for Amazon Web Services and other clouds are supposed to follow in short order.
A new episode of the screencast series is now available at the OpenNebula YouTube Channel. This screencast demonstrates the new easily-customizable self-service portal for cloud consumers. Its aim is to offer a simplified access to shared infrastructure for non-IT end users. The scree...
C12G Labs has just announced an update release of OpenNebulaPro, the enterprise edition of the OpenNebula Toolkit. OpenNebula 3.2, released two weeks ago, brings important benefits to cloud providers with a new easily-customizable self-service portal for cloud consumers, and builders w...
Subscribe to the World's Most Powerful Newsletters
Subscribe to Our Rss Feeds & Get Your SYS-CON News Live!
Click to Add our RSS Feeds to the Service of Your Choice:
Google Reader or Homepage Add to My Yahoo! Subscribe with Bloglines Subscribe in NewsGator Online
myFeedster Add to My AOL Subscribe in Rojo Add 'Hugg' to Newsburst from CNET News.com Kinja Digest View Additional SYS-CON Feeds
Publish Your Article! Please send it to editorial(at)sys-con.com!

Advertise on this site! Contact advertising(at)sys-con.com! 201 802-3021


SYS-CON Featured Whitepapers
ADS BY GOOGLE