by Bob Sweat, Open Door Solutions, LLP
I recently read an article in the December 2012 edition of Spirit magazine on Southwest Airlines that was entitled and noted “51% of us believe weather can affect cloud computing.”
At first glance I thought “what the heck,” followed by my wondering who takes these surveys and who are they polling anyway? A recent survey of 1000 Americans conducted by mobile solutions company Citrix revealed that more than half of those polled thought a little rain could adversely affect access to their cloud based data. As it turns out, most had no idea what the cloud really is.
So what is the Cloud? The National Institute of Standards and Technology in its 2011 description (some 790 words long) says “it is a model for enabling ubiquitous, convenient, on-demand network access to a shared pool of configurable computing resources” – to which I again said – what the heck? No wonder our brains cloud up!
It’s actually pretty simple. The cloud (a buzzword really) is a bunch of computers (remote servers) located at some off-site facility, meaning not at your office, which houses your files and in some cases the software applications and data you use. Many of us are using the cloud now without even knowing it. For example, when you check Gmail on your Smartphone, you’re using cloud computing.
It has been a pleasure to bring a little sunshine to 51% percent of your brains whereas hence-to-forth (to show off my paralegal skills) only fog and clouds existed LOL.
Open Door Solutions, LLP 