One term that has taken over CRM Software News is “Cloud Computing” and I would like to take this chance to delve a bit deeper into this topic, defining its categories and weighing some pros and cons. (Definitions provided by )
Cloud computing is a general term for anything that involves delivering hosted services over the Internet. These services are broadly divided into three categories: Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS), Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS).
- Infrastructure-as-a-Service provides virtual server instances with unique IP addresses and blocks of storage on demand. In the enterprise, cloud computing allows a company to pay for only as much capacity as is needed, and bring more online as soon as required. Because this pay-for-what-you-use model resembles the way electricity, fuel and water are consumed, it's sometimes referred to as utility computing.
- Platform-as-a-service in the cloud is defined as a set of software and product development tools hosted on the provider's infrastructure. Developers create applications on the provider's platform over the Internet.
- In the software-as-a-service cloud model, the vendor supplies the hardware infrastructure, the software product and interacts with the user through a front-end portal. SaaS is a very broad market. Services can be anything from Web-based email to inventory control and database processing. Because the service provider hosts both the application and the data, the end user is free to use the service from anywhere.
Although there are multiple versions of cloud computing, one thing is clear; it reduces costs, increases efficiency and makes business convenient. Cloud Computing is already a big hit in 2010 and getting more popular every day.
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Posted by Jonathan Taub
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