Posted by Rathin Sinha

The IT world is abuzz with “cloud computing.” If one performs a Google search for the word, almost 20 million results show up now compared to just a few barely two years ago. The number of news references to cloud computing today is several times that of the term “web-hosting”. Pundits and practitioners keep on speculating over the promise of cloud computing and if it might one day allow companies to move all of their data and applications into “the cloud” and out of data centers.But where exactly is this mysterious cloud? And what really is cloud computing? In the simplest terms, the cloud is just some form of network connection to an IT infrastructure, and cloud computing refers to using distant, interconnected servers and hardware to store data and run applications, over the internet. The connected infrastructure allows users to perform a variety of functions that their own company’s infrastructure might not be able to offer on its own. Read more…