Data Center Dialog

Posted by Jay Fry at 10:08 PM

Posted by Jay Fry at 2:00 PM

Posted by Jay Fry at 12:49 PM

• Content and how it is delivered
• Primary processing location – on the device or remote
• Communication mechanism (which he said comes down to the protocol being used when considering scalability & performance)
• Security

Posted by Jay Fry at 8:28 AM

Last week’s “new iPad” announcement elicited the breathless attention of the industry, as expected.

One angle that didn’t get too much play by Apple itself, however, was the impact of this new device on the IT departments in large enterprises. But fear not. Others noticed the oversight. For example, salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff complained over Twitter that Apple missed a trick in not recounting the iPad’s in-roads in the enterprise. Last year’s iPad 2 launch, he tweeted “was enterprise friendly,” implying this one was, well, not.

In fact, many industry commentators took a shot at what Apple’s new announcement will mean for the enterprise. The sheer quantity of commentary tells me that the enterprise impact of this device, uncertain even 18 months ago, is pretty much guaranteed. The consumerization of IT is alive and well. Or at least it’s what people want to talk about.

Different ways that enterprises and iPads mix

The enterprise-related comments about the new iPad announcement fell into a few categories. First, they recounted where they thought enterprises were on the adoption curve of iPads -- and tablets in general. Second, they reviewed what the popularity of the iPad means to IT and the systems those folks must tirelessly maintain every day. Third, there were a few comments on how the enterprise might respond to all this. Here are some highlights I thought were worth repeating:

CIOs want to move to the tablet…now

Ted Schadler of Forrester believes things are moving aggressively, based on the 100 or so inquiries from CIOs he has taken in the past 6 months. So what has been the most common question they’ve asked? “How do I get business applications onto the tablet?” Our field folks here at Framehawk are hearing the same kinds of questions.

Ted also recounted all the business software that’s making a move to the iPad, though most of his examples are productivity-style apps that you’d find on a PC.The customers we are talking to are certainly interested in those, but they are also looking for ways to use the more business-critical applications with tablets as well.

“Post-PC”

Schadler also imagined a new question that the newest iPad will bring to the forefront: which employees get laptops instead of PCs? Eric Lai of SAP/Sybase called out the “post-PC-ness” of the new device in his CNET write-up. In fact, Wired called the “post-PC revolution” that Tim Cook talked about as “fighting words.” What does “post-PC” mean, specifically? Tim Carmody of Wired said it this way: it means that “computing time and attention [by consumers and the IT department, frankly] shifts to phones and tablets and television screens, among others. And the traditional PC becomes a more specialized device for particular tasks.”

The new iPad’s improvements will impact existing IT systems

But even before that shift happens, there's a chance that everyone in the enterprise is going to feel the impact of the new iPad -- and not in a good way. A Computerworld story by Matt Hamblen noted that people bringing the new iPad to the office (sanctioned or otherwise) might actually end up causing a huge network crunch.

Hamblen reported the possibility of employees trying to avoid high personal mobile network charges for downloading HD movies and the like just might do it at the office, impacting corporate Wi-Fi networks. He also pointed to what might happen if many people are trying to get iOS or app updates at the same time. “The Wi-Fi download burden on corporate networks could be severe,” said the experts that Matt interviewed.

Will the enhanced processing power change what’s ported to an iPad?

One interesting commentary that the specs of the new iPad brought up: the enhanced processing power could be a boon to running big applications on the iPad. One of the users interviewed by John Cox in a separate Network World article mentioned "4G, the new processor speed, and improved screen resolutions will allow IT to port more backend applications like Oracle, and Siebel to iPad."

In reality, it’s not only the processor that’s holding this back. It’s the development effort it takes to rewrite things. So while the new iPad’s souped up specs are beneficial improvements, don’t think it will mean suddenly SAP will be ported to your iPad. At least, not with this traditional approach. (Now, if you’re interested in some alternative approaches, I know some people to talk to.)

Cheap and cheerful for enterprises: iPad 2 ROI

Finally, Cox of Network World, Geoff Simon of Technorati, and several other folks commented that the lowering of the price for the iPad 2 might just be the ticket for the enterprise IT departments. “Starting at just 399,ドル the iPad2 with 16GB is perfect as an enterprise-level business tool," says Simon. "For enterprise, the promise of skyrocketing ROI is what makes the iPad so irresistible.” Simon believes enterprises will start with productivity and process management tools, eventually moving more toward business intelligence capabilities.

Leaving competitors in the dust?

Is this demand the same for all tablets? Schadler of Forrester and a number of data points say no: the other devices aren’t getting the same uptake or interest. Carmody of Wired reported that in his interview Schadler wasn’t “quite so bullish on other tablets” (including forthcoming Windows 8-related efforts), given Apple’s head start and the consumer-driven preferences of people selecting their own devices (read: Apple).

The projects that we’re working on at Framehawk seem to match this thinking: iPad projects are under consideration first, everything else after that. (I posted some relative adoption stats in a previous blog if you’re interested.) A round-up of analyst reports from Apple’s announcement continues the lovefest – with general agreement that Apple has lapped its competitors.

Either way, the era of tablets (which Apple ushered in in the first place) is certainly being accelerated by the newly announced iPad. And despite little commentary from Apple, that impact is definitely stretching far into the enterprise.

Posted by Jay Fry at 9:45 PM

As I’ve been settling in to my gig at Framehawk, I’ve been continuing to watch the cloud computing marketing closely (hello to everyone at Cloud Connect in Santa Clara this week). However, I’ve also been expanding that focus to mobility and how that relates to the enterprise market.

I’m finding a barrage of new stats about adoption come out almost daily.They are worth noting because this market is so new.And, even for those immersed in it day-to-day, they are pretty crazy.

I made note of a bunch of data points about mobile devices and the enterprise from my trip to CES a few weeks back and from articles in various trade journals as they have appeared recently.We’ve tweeted a few of them from @Framehawk ; I thought I’d share a few of them here as well.Any conversation about the consumerization of IT or an enterprise’s “bring your own device” (BYOD) policy is going to start from (or certainly be colored by) these stats.

Frankly, lots of tablets

For something that didn’t exist only a few years ago, the tablet market has been downright explosive.It even pulled me in last year.According to research from the Displaysearch division of NDP, I bought one of the 72.7 million tablets sold in 2011.That was a 252% increase over 2010 -- the year the iPad made its debut.

And the growth isn’t showing any signs of stopping.Tablet sales are expected to grow 38.8% and hit approximately 248.6 million units sold by 2015, according to predictions from Transparency Market Research.

In the enterprise (the market we’re tracking closely at Framehawk), there is currently 1 tablet request for every 3 smartphones, says a Cisco survey.

It’s (currently) all about the iPad in the enterprise

From what the numbers say, and what we at Framehawk are hearing from customers, the enterprise market is currently all about the iPad.There are other devices that are being talked about, but only as a distant second choice.At least, for now.

However, just before CES, Sarah Rotman Epps of Forrester quoted some numbers saying that the percent of U.S. shoppers that preferred Android jumped from 9 to 18% in the first 9 months of 2011. During that same period, the number of folks that would actually prefer Windows dropped from 46 to 25% (still placing it higher than the numbers for Android).

Of course, as new form factors appear, and the initial “cool factor” of the iPad wears off, its dominance could fade.For example, Framehawk’s own CTO, Stephen Vilke, took a particular liking to the Samsung Galaxy Note he saw at CES, stylus and all ("This may sound crazy, but the stylus is more natural for a guy like me who spent his school years with a pen or pencil in my hand," said Stephen in a recent CNET article on the topic).

As new devices launch and gain adoption at the expense of others, enterprises must be ready to react.

After initial caution, enterprises are being more aggressive about adopting tablets

Despite a reputation for moving slowly, enterprise IT seems to be jumping into the adoption of tablets faster than you might expect.

After “testing the waters” in 2011, according to a Forrester report, companies are expected to buy 10ドル billion worth of iPads this year and 16ドル billion in 2013. This lends credence to some stats from Apple from October 2011 purporting that 93% of Fortune 500 companies have deployed or are testing iPads.

I’d definitely believe that projects to test how best to make use of these devices have sprung up nearly everywhere in the enterprise, despite a few hold-outs prohibiting their use for official purposes.On the other hand, production deployments, from what I can tell, are less likely at the moment, though there’s intense pressure to get there – and to do so quickly.

What will the impact of all this be in the enterprise?

This is a lot of change to absorb, especially for big organizations. People are getting used to how and when to use tablets versus their other computing devices. In fact, an IDG Connect study reported that 16% of their respondents claim their iPad has replaced their PC.

I find it unlikely (as did a few of my Twitter followers) that this 16% actually handed back their PCs, but the point is an interesting one. What devices does the IT infrastructure team need to optimize for now? What devices should be considered important by the mobile application development team? And is there a way to take all of these changes and uncertainties in stride?

Stay tuned…I’ll be tackling some of those questions (and, yes, highlighting some of ways Framehawk might help) in the near future.

In the meantime, let me know of any other jaw-dropping stats worth adding to this list. And, if you’re interested in any others that we dig up, follow @Framehawk – we tweet some of the more intriguing ones as we find them.

Posted by Jay Fry at 4:29 PM

Just when you thought cloud computing was receiving an unending supply of positive hype, the Gartner Group pulls a fast one on us.

Gartner rolled out their list of strategic technology trends for IT to pay attention to for 2012 at their annual Symposium this week in Orlando.And, instead of Gartner piling on with more publicity for cloud, it seems they pulled a bit of a switcheroo.

Cloud computing, which reigned supreme atop their 2011 list, dropped all the way down to No. 10 this time around.Which might cause a cloudwashing vendor or two to worry that the sky (or at least the fluffy white parts of it) is falling.

Cloud drops

David Cearly, the analyst who presented the list in Orlando, gave a number of reasons for cloud coming down to earth this time around.“We could see the failure of the cloud to live up to the hype…The luster could wear off.”

But that’s been a distinct possibility for a few years now.In fact, most of us expect it.Gartner themselves placed cloud just over the peak of inflated expectations and starting to slide into the trough of disillusionment on their hype curve released earlier this year.

However, according to Jason Hiner of Tech Republic, Cearly also noted that cloud is not necessarily seeing a big drop in interest; in fact, it’s actually getting incorporated into lots of other various IT operational areas.

That leads to two potentially opposing conclusions.Either cloud computing is on its way to disappointing its many ardent (and often fanatic) supporters…or it’s gathering sufficient understanding and adoption, that it’s becoming a de facto part of the way IT runs itself in multiple areas.

I think I agree with Hiner’s assessment:neither of those diametrically opposed reasons is likely to be the true reason that Gartner knocked cloud computing down a few pegs.Hiner suggests that they might actually have done it for the shock value.Sounds entirely plausible to me.And if that was the reason, it worked.It got me (and many other more reputable writers) to write a post on the topic, didn’t it?

The new champs:tablets & mobile apps

So cloud is down and out…what took its place?

The new leaders at the top of the list are two topics that are the subject of a bit of a frenzy by enterprises – at least in the enterprises that I’ve been watching as part of my New Thing:tablets & mobile.

In fact, Larry Dignan of ZDNet wrote that “simply put, the analysts and the CIOs in attendance [at the Gartner Symposium] are a bit tablet happy.”Gartner analyst Nick Jones even started his early morning mobility-themed session on Tuesday welcoming the “smart people that realize mobile is more important than breakfast” [thanks, @mattfusf].

For “media tablets and beyond,” as Cearly put it, “the implications for IT is that the era of PC dominance with Windows as the single platform will be replaced with a post-PC era where Windows is one of a variety of environments IT will need to support.”

And as I’ve noted a couple times recently, tablets open up all sorts of interesting possibilities, alongside some pretty strategic development, support, and operations choices.The native interface for tablets like the iPad is very compelling and enterprises want to make use of it.Somehow.

The No. 2 item that Hiner reported Cearly mentioning onstage was “mobile-centric applications and interfaces.”If an enterprise is going to play in the mobile space, new types of tools are needed to take the data feeds from applications and transform them so they are usable on the target device.”This, Cearly notes, takes legitimate “engineering skills,” given all the screen sizes, operating systems, and applications themselves.

Mobility projects will have many follow-on effects, too

The mobility efforts that enterprises have underway or are considering will also likely have much broader and more profound effects, cascading into some of the other items mentioned on Gartner’s list, like context-aware computing and the rise of app stores and marketplaces.

In fact, once enterprises get past the initial roll-out efforts of mobile-enabling their applications and working on tablet support, that’s when a whole set of second-order effects would start to get attention.What will all this mean to application design? "Big" and "monolithic" are not ideal for small and frequently disconnected devices.There’s an opportunity to look at things differently, to re-evaluate how capabilities and services are surfaced to a user.

So, as Dignan noted, much of Gartner’s list comes down to the single concept of mobility.“The list makes distinctions between technologies, but in a nutshell you have mobility on the front end and back end that will keep companies busy for the next two years,” Dignan writes.

Quibbling over the order

The order of Gartner’s 10 strategic technologies for 2012 may seem like it had a bit of meddling from the PR department, but, in the end, I think the list feels about right.

Why?Cloud computing has users and providers that are working to make it standard operating procedure in many situations. It’s on its way.Meanwhile, tablets and other mobile devices have jumped into such prominence and have such sway over our personal life that making them enterprise-connected seems like a no-brainer.And something that needs immediate attention.

Besides, if you don’t like the order of Gartner’s list, just wait until next year.

Posted by Jay Fry at 10:28 PM

A week or two back, ReadWriteWeb ran and published the results of a reader poll of the “most over-hyped cloud technologies.” Amusingly, the results (aside from a NoSQL mention) read like the basic NIST definition of the key components of cloud computing. Software as a Service, private clouds, Infrastructure as a Service, and Platform as a Service all made the top 5.

Wow, I thought. That barely scratches the surface. Plenty more cloud computing terms were enjoying their moment of irrational exuberance, but were being left out in the cold by this particular survey. A few Twitter conversations unearthed some very deserving nominations. Not to be forgotten:


• Hybrid clouds. Apparently hybrid clouds didn’t have quite enough hype-y-ness to make the list. Weird, considering that term tends to be the punch line to nearly every cloud strategy and direction conversation that I hear. Better luck at next year’s awards ceremony, I guess.


• Cloud bursting (nominated by @reillyusa and @AaronMotsinger). Some folks have been arguing back and forth about whether it is really a legitimate (or even possible) use case. @pdowning1077 noted he much preferred the term “capacity on demand,” but that doesn’t help settle the argument.


• Cloud brokers. Forrester has been posting some interesting research for its subscribers on this new role (also defined by NIST in the July 5 version of its standards roadmap, if you want a standards org to weigh in for legitimacy). I’d say this conversation is still very early. The hype wagon train for this term has just set off down the road.


But probably the most impactful comment was another by @pdowning1077. “How about just the term ‘cloud’ [in general]?” he asked. How could they forget to include the mother of all hype-worthy terms in their polling?


So much hype that “cloud computing” becomes meaningless?


The same week of all this discussion, David Linthicum reported that cloud computing (the term) had now become essentially “meaningless.” That comment came on the heels of Gartner’s annual publication of their hype cycles. A quick scan notes that cloud computing is still close to where it was last year, just nosing over the (hype-laden) peak of inflated expectations. Private cloud computing is rapidly moving to join it, perched perilously over the trough of disillusionment, ready to take the leap.


OK, no one would argue with the extreme levels of marketing attention from everyone from start-ups to 30-year-old software companies (who, us?) to service providers. But just because a bunch of marketing people are in a frenzy doesn’t mean we should write off the trend they are talking about as a bunch of meaningless fluff.


The hype has caused IT to pay attention to cloud computing


In fact, if I’m reading the market right, I’d say that there are actually some really good things that have come out of the hype around cloud (and continue to do so).


• We suddenly had something to call this good idea. There were a bunch of technologies and entrepreneurs out there struggling for several years to put a palatable name to what they were working on. Some started off calling this grid computing, some utility computing, and others more obscure terms than those. But, the early hype around cloud computing a few years back gave a name to the idea. We pulled several of these companies into CA (Cassatt and 3Tera, to name two), but many others were struggling with this same issue. One of my early posts on this blog was about how the term private cloud may not have been precise or perfect, but it enabled us to have the right conversation. I think the same thing goes for the overall cloud computing concept.

• It created a way to catch the attention and imagination of enterprise IT. By talking about a Big Vision of IT infrastructure that matched compute supply with compute demands at any given time (and matched costs accordingly), ears perked up. It was the next logical topic to discuss with the IT guys who were fresh from thinking about how virtualization could free them up from particular pieces of hardware. In a world in which IT is fighting for every budget dollar, mostly just to keep treading water, an idea about how to get off this downhill hamster wheel is at least appealing to consider. That’s step one. (Ken Oestreich, by the way, has a great blog from a few months back on the brief history of the vision of cloud computing.)

• The hype extended the discussion past the technologists to the business people. All the hubbub over cloud computing got the business users excited at a time when the economy was giving them little to be excited about. “So, you mean I might have a way to turn some of these business ideas into reality, despite the drubbing that the sour economy has given us and the measly budget that my IT partners say we have at our disposal?” This has been important – the business guys are the ones, in the end, pushing when IT starts to get nervous and pulls back from the visionary edge that cloud puts them on.


• The hype has pressured big vendors into some self-reflection that will be beneficial for their customers. Many of the larger vendors jumped on the cloud bandwagon through new offerings, blatant rebranding of old offerings (shame on you), acquisitions, and the like. To make any of these moves, vendors have had to take stock and rethink what they can and should be providing given what their customers want. In some cases (like here at CA with Nimsoft), it causes the vendors to broaden the set of customers they are actually serving.


• The intense amount of discussion has started an intense amount of scrutiny, revealing how useful cloud can actually be. One thing that happens when the hype levels reach fever pitch is that people start pushing back. The recent demand for real-world examples and exasperation over cloud outages has been the natural backlash from being force-fed lots and lots of best-case scenarios, rainbows, and unicorns. Journalists and analysts have often helped push for these kind of reality checks, though they also tend to pile on as technologies or ideas drop into the “trough of disillusionment” that Gartner is so fond of describing. Enterprise IT, business users, and the vendors themselves all eventually do a fair bit of policing, sometimes too late for their own good, but we seem to be headed in this (positive) direction right now.


So while a lot of the hype can seem like so much wasted energy from all parties, when the trend or shift being hyped actually has merit, something useful comes out the other end. Now, would



So, hold your nose and smile. Hype is good – with a few important caveats. Be critical. Be well-armed with the right questions to ask in order to discern the valuable from the merely fancifully over-marketed. Be ready to see the value in approaching something a new way, even if it’s something you’ve done the same way for decades. Be pragmatic enough to know it won’t happen overnight or with the wave of a magic wand.

If it makes you feel any better, cloud computing isn’t the only term getting the Gartner Hype Curve treatment this year. Added to the list, according to this ReadWriteWeb article, were big data, gamification, Internet of Things, and consumerization. Misery loves company, I guess.


And, in the meantime, it may be time to come up with your own term to start campaigning for next year’s Cloud Hype Awards. I think the hype is here to stay for a while longer.

Posted by Jay Fry at 4:26 PM

I caved and joined the revolution this weekend. I bought an iPad.

And while it was very fun to do all the things that a newly minted Apple fan boy does (like downloading the app that turns the iPad into ones like they had on Star Trek: The Next Generation), that was just the beginning. I had yet to try to torment my internal IT department with my demands.

First and foremost: I wanted to use my iPad as part of my normal work day. I'm certainly not the first to want this. The appearance of consumer-purchased devices that employees would like to have (must be!) supported by internal IT is getting an amazing amount of attention. Though not always from IT departments, if they can help it. In addition, it’s not just 1 or 2 folks who want to start using tablets, smartphones, and the like. It’s everyone.

What does “not supported” mean for my iPad?

So, first thing Monday, I tried my luck linking into our IT systems. It started off innocently enough: I easily connected to the in-office wireless network. The first real test was going to be whether I could get my corporate email and calendar.

Dilbert.com

IT had obviously been through this before; there is a document in place on our help system that explains how to do everything. Unfortunately, it starts like this: "Please check if this iPad was purchased for business purposes or if it was a personal purchase. Note: personal machines are not supported."

Hmmm. That sounded ominous. But, despite being “not supported,” it was really simple to enable email and calendar access. I had to add some security precautions, as you might expect, but it worked. My fingers are crossed that it continues to work, given the help I’m not going to get. And, of course, there are a multitude of our enterprise apps I’m not getting access to.

But I’m satisfied. For now. But not everyone is. And corporations certainly shouldn’t be.

Cloud computing, intriguing mobile devices (and what you can do with them) are ganging up on IT

My process of tormenting IT with my iPad started Monday, but it’s guaranteed to last for a long time. And, as I said, the key issue is that I’m not alone.

People – and, yes, it’s about the people and what they (er, I) want to do – have devices that they love that give them easy, constant access. That should be good. There’s a blurring of the boundary between business and personal that businesses stand to gain from.

Cloud-based resources give organizations a fighting chance to scale sufficiently to keep up with the volume driven by these more-and-more-ubiquitous tablets and smartphones. But management and security are often thought of way too late.

In a piece posted at Forbes.com, Dan Woods, CTO and editor of CITO Research, noted that “the IT monopoly has ended but the need to ensure security, reliability, compliance, and integration has not. Most consumerization efforts are long on choice and short on ways to actually address that fact that IT’s responsibilities to manage the issues have not disappeared.”

Shirking management and security – or leaving it as an afterthought – will not cut it this time around, especially since users don’t think twice about going around the official IT channels, something that those official IT channels really can’t afford to have happen if they are going to get their jobs done.

The train is moving faster than you thought

In a study called “IT Consumers Transform the Enterprise: Are You Ready?” that IDC published a few weeks back (free copy without registration here; CA Technologies was a sponsor), they mention these needs – and the speed they need to be dealt with. “The train is moving faster than you thought. Adoption of public cloud, mobile, and social technologies in business operations has already reached high levels, often driven by ‘stealth IT.’”

IDC noted a “surprisingly high” (and concerning) level of personal and confidential information sharing. While the “consumerization of IT” introduces a bunch of new, innovative services and approaches into the enterprise, it also exposes the org to “business risk, compliance gaps, and security challenges if they are not managed.”

An InfoWorld article by Nancy Gohring noted another IDC study that found that even as more and more people are bringing their own tablets and smartphones to work, IT departments have been “slow to support them and may not even be aware of the trend.” Slow, I understand (given I just bought my first iPad a few days ago); not aware, however, is a recipe for big headaches ahead.

What are those ahead of the train doing to stay ahead?

Not everyone, however, is behind the curve. Part of the IDC survey I mentioned earlier highlighted the top characteristics of leaders in this area – as in, what behaviors are they showing. The leaders are more likely to be those using IaaS, PaaS, and Saas; those who are interacting with customers using their smart mobile devices; those who are concerned about data protection, back-up, and end-to-end user experience. “Businesses that are being proactive about consumer-driven IT are more likely to realize greater benefits from investments made to address the consumerization of IT,” said IDC’s Liam Lahey in a recent blog that summarized their survey findings.

In addition, in Woods’ Forbes article, he pointed out some questions that need asking, many at an application level: “Supporting mobile workers adds a new dimension to every application in a company. Which applications should be supported on mobile devices? How much of each application should be available? When does it make sense to craft custom mobile solutions? How can consumer apps become part of the picture? What is [the] ROI for mobility? How much should be invested[?] None of these questions have obvious answers.” Another post of his has some good suggested approaches for IT.

My CA Technologies colleague Andi Mann did a good job of netting this all out in another recent post: “While a minority of leading organizations already ‘get it’, there is still a massive latent opportunity to establish new game-changing technologies, drive disruptive innovations, build exponential revenues, and beat your competitors.” In other words, having IT bury its head in the sand is going to mean missing some opportunities that don’t come along very often to reshape the competitive landscape.

Especially when you couple the support of these tablets and other mobile devices with the changes coming about with the rise of cloud computing.

Look in the mirror

In the end, says Andi, “it’s all about you! ...The bottom line is that you — as an individual, as a consumer, as an employee, as an IT professional — are responsible for a radical change affecting business, government, and IT. You are both driving this change as a consumer of social, mobile, and cloud applications; and being driven by this change as an IT professional adapting to these new customer behaviors.”

Maybe TIME Magazine wasn’t wrong a few years back when they named You as their Person of the Year (congrats, by the way) with a big mirror-like thing on their front cover. It’s just that the revolution always takes longer than people think, and the results are never quite evenly distributed.

I’m a perfect example. I've been involved in cloud computing for many years, but didn’t join this particular part of the revolution -- the part where I expect flicking my fingers on a piece of glass will get me access to what I want -- until this past weekend.

But I’ll probably be confounding IT departments left and right from now on. Make it so.

Posted by Jay Fry at 10:06 PM

I dropped by the Uptime Institute Symposium in Santa Clara last week. It was a chance to step outside of my IT-focused world for a moment and hear the discussions from the other side of the fence: the facilities folks. And, I have to say, the view was a bit different.

In general, I think it's safe to say that facilities is not yet comfortable with where the cloud computing conversation is taking them.

Cloud computing is a part of the conversation on both sides of the fence, but people are looking at the cloud from very different angles. IT, despite having its own running battle with business users about cloud, can at least see cloud as an opportunity. Facilities in many cases views it as a direct, job-endangering threat. And, while there were hints at alignment, there are definitely some ruffled feathers.

A history of disconnects: IT & facilities

But this shouldn't be a surprise. A few years back, before Cassatt Corp. was acquired by CA Technologies, those of us at Cassatt spent quite a bit of time and effort understanding the facilities world and working to connect what the IT guys were doing with what was going on in the facilities realm. At that point, cloud computing was barely even called that. But the beginnings were there. The prototype ideas that would become cloud computing were starting to find their way into the IT and data center efficiency conversations in some of the more forward-looking companies. (If you want some historical snapshots, check out the work of the Silicon Valley Leadership Group in this area, plus the early entries from this blog and those by Ken Oestreich, now cloud marketing guy at EMC).

One of the biggest issues we ran into again and again was a disconnect between IT and facilities. And, after a few days at the most recent Uptime Institute event, I think it’s safe to say that the rift is still there.

IT (at the urging of the business) is leading the cloud charge

To show how the two groups are still pretty far apart, I’ll highlight a couple of the presentations I heard at the event. Several 451 Group analysts had presentations throughout the week, providing the IT perspective. One was William Fellows’ rapid-fire survey of where things are with cloud today. His premise was that cloud is moving from the playground to production in both public and private cloud incarnations.

Fellows pointed out that providing cloud-enabling technologies for service providers was one of the hottest spaces at the moment – he’s tracking a list of some 80 vendors at this point. Demand is moving cloud from an “ad hoc developer activity to become a first-class citizen.” Production business applications are “creeping up in public cloud” because of the ability to flexibly scale.

Enterprise IT, said Fellows, “wants to unlock their inner service-provider selves. They want to use cloud as just another node in the system.” In other words, the IT guys are starting to make leaps forward in how they are sourcing IT service, and even in how they are thinking about the IT role.

But from the other Uptime sessions and discussions, these forwarding-looking glimpses seemed to be the exception, rather than the rule.

Facilities is grappling with cloud’s implications and feeling uneasy

Contrast this with the keynote from AOL’s Mike Manos. Mike spent a chunk of his stage time on a self-described rant about how facilities people were feeling left out – “a bit gloomy” even – when it comes to the cloud computing discussion.

Manos compared facilities folks to Eeyore, the mopey character from the Winnie the Pooh children’s books. That prompted a few knowing chuckles in the crowd. But despite a predisposition to getting bummed out when the topic comes up, “you can’t duck your head,” said Manos, when the discussion turns to cloud computing.

He pointed out that the things that a Google keynoter from earlier in the conference had mentioned were not revolutionary, despite all they have accomplished. In fact, “Google is asking us to do the things we’ve been talking about [at Uptime conferences] for the past 10 years.”

The advice from Manos was good – and assertive. Facilities should step aggressively into the conversation about cloud computing. Don’t be worried that cloud might suddenly mean that data centers are suddenly going to disappear and you might lose your job. It won’t mean that, and especially not if you play your cards right. Instead of dreading cloud, figure out how to be part of (or even lead) the business decisions.

“No matter what, you’re going to have a hybrid model” in which data centers from external cloud providers will provide some of your IT service, and your own data centers will provide some as well. And, once you’re in that situation, “you’re going to have to manage it,” Manos said.

Now, there is a big list of things the facilities guys will need to get going on before they can take this head-on. Manos listed things as basic as “knowing what you have” in your data center and what it’s doing, as well as things that aren’t normally taken into account, including “soft costs you hardly ever capture.”

The cloud computing challenge for facilities

The ironic thing in all this is that the big cloud providers are given lots of kudos for their IT operations and their ability to enable IT service to aggressively support their business. One of the reasons that Google, Amazon, and others have gotten good at IT service delivery is, in fact, that they are good at the facilities side of things, too. Their facilities teams are integral to their success. So, folks, it’s possible.

Manos left his audience with a challenge – a challenge to jump into the cloud computing conversation with both feet. It means an investment to get applications ready for what happens when infrastructure fails (which it does) and to understand the operational impact of moving to the cloud (which is too often overlooked). It means an acknowledgement that a move to the cloud means a clearer understanding between how applications are architected and how data center facilities are run. Or at least an understanding of what you need to know when computing begins to happen both inside and outside your physical premises.

So, maybe cloud can actually help bridge the IT world and the facilities world. To some of us who have watched these two worlds dance around each other for a while, it’s been a long time coming. And, for sure, it’s not here yet. But Manos and others, in conjunction with the pressures facilities people are feeling from their business discussions about cloud comptuing, might just be providing the nudge they need.

Or, at the very least, a great nickname.

Posted by Jay Fry at 10:19 PM

One of the problems that has dragged down the transformational ideas around cloud computing is the impact of this new operating model on organizations and the actual people inside them. I noticed this back in my days at Cassatt before the CA acquisition. The Management Insight survey I wrote about a few weeks back pointed this out. And, if you’ve been following this blog, I’ve mentioned it a couple other times over the past few months as the hard part of this major transition in IT.

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