I have been reading a lot about \u201cCloud Computing\u201d.\u00a0 Almost every networking journal, conference, seminar touches upon the subject.\u00a0 Cloud services providers aver that the traditional premise based network will soon be obsolete and network administrator better jump on the bandwagon quickly.\u00a0 They tend to overstate the benefits (as I would expect anyone selling anything to do) and brush aside some real concerns.\u00a0 They admonish network administrators to stop wasting their time managing premise based networks. \u00a0\u201cMove to our cloud service and relax while we do all the work\u201d.\u00a0 Really?<\/p>\n
The premise of the argument is tempting and there is a place for cloud services.\u00a0 Unfortunately, migration to the cloud is not as easy as flipping a switch.\u00a0 As any savvy network admin knows, many issues have to be resolved before making such a move.<\/p>\n
The biggest concerns are the security of the data you put on the cloud and connectivity to the cloud services.\u00a0 While service providers strive to eliminate breaches, security breaches have been reports recently.\u00a0 If your WAN is down and you cannot connect to the service provider, it will prove to be very costly in terms of lost productivity.\u00a0 There are many others that should be weighed against the benefits before making the decision.<\/p>\n
What I am advocating is a well thought out strategic process when making a decision to move to the cloud.\u00a0 It is better to ask providers tough questions upfront rather than confront them later.\u00a0 Some of the pitfalls in cloud computing are detailed in a white paper you can obtain here.<\/p>\n