The Definition of ‘Inevitable’?

I believe cloud computing will become the default IT delivery model for public sector organizations within the next five years.   Some may think that this conclusion is “stating the obvious” while others may doubt the ability of public sector organizations to embrace a new way of delivering IT services during the worst recession in decades.  In fact, budget constraints will not stop the trend towards cloud computing – rather, the current financial difficulties in the public sector will accelerate the inevitable adoption of cloud computing.  Technology innovations and financial drivers have aligned to push IT organizations rapidly towards a cloud computing model.   I see cloud computing as the next logical step in the steady evolution of the distributed IT service model.   Cloud computing is neither radical nor new – we can see that the precursors of cloud computing were put in place over the last decade. The foundation of cloud computing is virtualization of IT resources –transport, storage, compute and presentation.  Years ago, public sector agencies and organizations started virtualizing the transport of data.  These were general purpose networks - sometimes built and provided as a service from external companies - that could scale up or down on demand.   The data transport service was pay-as-you go with billing and service levels to match.  Later, public sector data center managers virtualized storage.  Huge capacity storage area networks were installed to provide “storage on demand” that was decoupled from the server resource.  Unlike the network resource which was purchased from outside suppliers, most storage capacity remained inside the data center.   But storage vendors provided flexible provisioning, billing and costing tools that mimicked the network model.  The next category of IT resource to be virtualized is the compute layer and this is where we are today.  Server virtualization as a means of expense control is being implemented rapidly across all public sector organizations.  Virtualizing servers increases hardware utilization rates and decrease costs of acquisition and operation.  Currently, the need for management, monitoring and billing tools for virtualized servers is still an emerging market.  (Commercial:  Quest Software sees tremendous growth in this area and has several product offerings to meet this demand.)  There are two obstacles to fully realizing the benefits of compute resources.  First, industry standard databases and applications are not built to take advantage of virtualized servers.  Most current applications will tolerate virtualized servers, but few are optimized to exploit the dynamic provisioning and reallocation of compute resources.  Rewriting complex public sector applications to take advantage of virtualized servers is a tricky business that should give pause to many IT managers.  Second, the traditional dedicated desktop computer still dominates “the last mile” of the computing environment.  Until the desktop experience is delivered virtually, we will be faced with the twin problems of frustrating incompatibilities and unnecessary costs. The difference between a persistent problem and an enormous opportunity is the creation of a viable solution.  I believe all the problems facing server and desktop virtualization have viable solutions and a great opportunity is before us.  The budget challenges created by the current fiscal crisis push us to change – status quo is not an option.   These are exciting times for technology suppliers and consumers.  I believe the adoption of cloud computing is inevitable. (Note: This blog was written by Paul Christman, VP of Public Sector Sales for Quest Software and was re-posted with permission.)