Jeff Wouters's Blog

Cloud
What is it? What can it offer me? How do I make use of it?
All these questions are relevant when you are looking into “cloud”. But to get back to the first question.. what is “cloud”?
There are a bunch of definitions out there that would define a cloud, there are even separate definitions for a private and public cloud.
I asked myself how hard it can be to think of a single definition, and one everyone could agree on. Microsoft, Google, Citrix, VMware and even Apple have tried to do it and none of them had a definition everyone could agree on.

One of my favorite quotes is from Albert Einstein: “The problems that exist in the world today cannot be solved by the level of thinking that created them”.
That doesn’t necessarily mean we need to think beyond the level of thinking that exists today (as he did), since that is how most people would read this quote.
What if we would take the level of thinking from about 100-400 years ago. Back then things were “simple” and most people didn’t feel the urge to think beyond the current level of thinking… yet, that time brought us the most famous architects, scientists, poets and philosophers of our history!

So, let’s give it a go, shall we?

Reasoning
To define a cloud, we would first need to know what if can offer, what sorts there are and how it is offered to end-users.
A “cloud” solution offers us a higher level of availability.
A “cloud” solution is accessible from any location through an internet connection.
A “cloud” solution can be on-premise, off-premise or a combination of the two also known as hybrid.
A “cloud” solution can be in a private or public cloud.

All together now (aka the definition)
A private or public service, offered off- or on-premise with a higher level of availability which can be accessed through the internet from any device and location.