My EtherealMind» cloud

Poster: Cloud Price Negotiations

Greg Ferro — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 19:42:50 +0000

Some time ago, I was asked to work with a Cloud Provider to establish a budget for a potential project. I was unable to set a project budget because there was no way of capping the cost and meeting a budget. This is how the conversations with the sales representative went when discussing “How much [...]

ConsultoBabble Deployment Analysis Report for Cloud Deployment of EtherealMind.Com

Greg Ferro — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 22:14:00 +0000

I don’t use a Cloud for any of my blogs or email services. I’ve looked at three different cloud providers including Amazon, Rackspace and others. I guessed that they all would work, more or less. Except they cost between four to ten times the solution from a managed service provider. Here is my exit report for the fictitious consulting engagement with myself.

A Rolling Upgrade Strategy, Apple OSX and Cloud Infrastructure

Greg Ferro — Sat, 18 Feb 2012 18:41:01 +0000

One point that was buried in the Apple's Mountain Lion updates this week is that Apple is shifting to a yearly update model for OSX. Think about that in a corporate environment. Yes, it's another piece on change management.

Musing:Cloud Data, Ownership and Government Sponsored Data Theft

Greg Ferro — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 20:50:45 +0000

Pondering on data ownership, and whether governements could legally steal data from offshore organisations

Complex Systems Have Complex Failures. That’s Cloud Computing.

Greg Ferro — Tue, 26 Apr 2011 17:00:48 +0000

Exposing cloud failures The result of the Amazon EC2 failure this week has exposed a number of technology strategies in cloud infrastructure as being less than perfect. Complex systems have complex failures The most vexing problem of Cloud Computing is that these systems are complex, and the more complex system the more complex the failure. [...]

Internets of Interest:21 Apr 11

bookmarks — Thu, 21 Apr 2011 15:12:24 +0000

Collection of useful, relevant or inane places on the the Internets for 21 Apr 11:

Cloud Security Blanket – I’m Safe NOW

Greg Ferro — Thu, 17 Mar 2011 15:51:27 +0000

I've got a Cloud Security Blanket. Got to know that all my data is safes now.

QFabric – What Excites Me!

John McManus — Tue, 01 Mar 2011 22:47:21 +0000

I was intrigued and excited about the Junipers announcement last week of QFabric. I was vaguely aware of TRILL and Cisco implementation (Fabric Path), but came to the table (so to speak) with no pre-conceptions of what I might expect. SCI-FI ñ Is this just me? Is the ëQí in †QFabric taken from sci-fi [...]

Cisco Cius Versus iPad Versus HP WebOS – Year of the Tablets

Greg Ferro — Thu, 06 Jan 2011 13:12:52 +0000

Comparing Cisco Cius and the iPad in the Enterprise

Teaching Management to Think New Thoughts

Greg Ferro — Wed, 13 Oct 2010 09:22:25 +0000

HP has developed a Cloud Workshop for Managers. Which means that you might not have to teach your managers about Cloud Computing after all. Huzzah.

VMware vCloud, Isolated Networks and L2 Network Overlays.

Greg Ferro — Tue, 12 Oct 2010 13:02:12 +0000

Apparently VMware vCloud product supports the use of "isolated networks". What I just found out is that Isolated Networks are MAC-in-MAC encapsulated Ethernet. Oh my.

Blessay: Cloud Convergence, Skills and Your Career

Greg Ferro — Sun, 19 Sep 2010 09:27:35 +0000

Did we forget that change is the only constant in IT ?

Internets of Interest:31 Aug 10

bookmarks — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 17:14:40 +0000

Collection of useful, relevant or inane places on the the Internets for 31 Aug 10:

Internets of Interest:29 Aug 10

bookmarks — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 18:22:35 +0000

Lots and Lots happening on the web this week: Collection of useful, relevant or inane places on the the Internets for 29 Aug 10:

Bisectional Bandwidth. And Why L2MP and Trill/RBridges Is Important ?

Greg Ferro — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 15:56:07 +0000

Greg Ferro looks at Bisectional Bandwidth as a design technique in the data centre and why the impact of Layer 2 Multi-Pathing is a vital part of Data Centre Network Design.

TRILL: Its a Deja Vu All Over Again

Ivan Pepelnjak — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 20:12:31 +0000

If youíre old enough to remember what ZX-81 was all about, youíll probably experience a weird sense of dÈj‡-vu when being exposed to the beauties of TRILL says Ivan Pepelnjak.

Market Positioning Acadia, EMC, Cisco and the Whole vBlock Idea

Greg Ferro — Mon, 17 May 2010 08:44:22 +0000

So a while back, Cisco, VMWare and EMC announced that they are forming a partnership to co-operatively sell and support products in a joint venture named Acadia. Selected engineers and sales grunts, USD$200 million bucks and "no large customer left untouched" door to door marketing campaign. Is there anything to it ?

Cisco FWSM and ACE Resource Allocation Strategies

Greg Ferro — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 21:11:46 +0000

This post looks at design models for handling the allocation of resources within the Cisco ACE and FWSM modules. In may be relevant to other virtualisation system where allocation of virtual resources needs a strategy.

Blessay:Cloud Computing Not “Essential Service”, More Like “Public Transport”

Greg Ferro — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 10:35:05 +0000

I believe that Cloud Computing is unlikely to become Essential Service, but will be more like Public Transport - cheap, mass market, limited function and "acceptable" for some.

Internets of Interest:21 Dec 09

bookmarks — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 13:32:21 +0000

Collection of useful, relevant or inane places on the the Internets for 21 Dec 09:

Networking Is Cloud Ready. But Where Is Network Management ?

Greg Ferro — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 15:56:47 +0000

Doug Gourlay recently postulated that the Networking Industry was not ready for Cloud Computing, and there are no answers to the technical challenges that lie ahead. What a load of tosh. All we need is pastel colours and rounded corners and we are there.

Blessay:Cisco UCS Really Is Just Blade Servers With Fancy NICs & A Response to HP Network Ambition

Greg Ferro — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 16:24:24 +0000

I found some information today, realised that UCS is really servers with fancy NICs. It also reinforced my belief that Cisco is responding to HP & IBM, not attacking them.

Humour:Cloud Computing – A Visual Tale

Greg Ferro — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 12:12:31 +0000

I saw this picture today titled "Blue Sky Thinking". I was struck by its Cloud Computing references.....

Network Fabric:TRILL for Server and Network People. Welcome RBridges

Greg Ferro — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 19:34:00 +0000

TRILL is a key network technology for enabling Cloud Computing by allowing for better migrations of VM's, and better utilisation of the network switching fabric and much improved stability of the Data Centre Server Fabric.

The Greatest Risk to Cloud Computing ? The Vista Effect.

Greg Ferro — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 17:23:57 +0000

Everyday brings news of another failure of a "Cloud Computing" service. It won't take much in the current economic climate for the market to take a "Vista view" and not buy it.