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Nov22

Want to Run Your Own Mail Server? Think Again…

Posted by in Dedicated Server, Industry debates · No Comments

Setting up a domain leads to a need to have a mail server to take over incoming and outgoing mail of your domain. One option would be to operate your own mail server, though that is seldom the best solution. There are a various reasons why it may not be the best option to run your own mail server. Here are some of the reasons why you may not prefer to run your own server. Mail server complexity Typically, mail servers consist software components providing specific functions. Each component is uniquely customized to come together and provide a fully-functional mail server. Due to the various parts, the set up can be difficult and complicated. Some of the components to set up a mail server: Mail Delivery Agent Mail Transfer Agent IMAP and/or POP3 Server Some additional components include AntiVirus Webmail Spam Filter The choice of components to use is often left to the user. The domain name, SSL Certificate and appropriate DNS records are necessary for mail servers. Let’s explore the components Mail Transfer Agent (MTA) This handles the SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol). It is responsible for Sending out mail form your users to an external MTA Receipt of […]

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Oct28

A Money-Mining Botnet hidden in the Clouds of Amazon

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It has been a long standing habit for hackers to apply malware to dominate PC’s, however Oscar Salazar and Rob Ragan had a different mindset. They set out to explore the available computing resources rather than the traditional approach of stealing computing resources. Salazar and Ragan will be revealing next month in Las Vegas how they put together a botnet with freemium accounts and free trials within online application-hosting services. These are mainly used by coders in testing and development to avoid purchasing storage or their individual servers. The duo generated distinctive email addresses and signups for the free accounts in bulk by automating the process and subsequently bring together a cloud-based botnet of approximately a thousand computers. That Salazar and Ragan believe their creation may have been even legal given that it was adept at initiating synchronized cyberattacks, excavating hundreds of dollars of cryptocurrency and even cracking passwords is just a tip off the iceberg. Ragan who works with alongside Salazar as a researcher for the security consultancy Bishop Fox said, “We essentially built a supercomputer for free, we’re definitely going to see more malicious activity coming out of these services.” Many players such as CloudBees, Heroku, Google, and […]

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Jun21

Enterprise Cloud Computing is Maturing, while Investments in App development is Increasing

Posted by in Industry debates · 1 Comment

The cloud computing label is applied to several technologies and is laden with vendor and industry hype yet we must acknowledge there is something to it. This is important to software developers who know that the next big thing will impact their employability. Savvy career minded programmers are always improving their skill sets and preparing for the next must have tech. For enterprises, cloud has been ranked among the top 5 peak expenditure priorities for this year with a percentage of twenty as per the spending survey conducted by Cowen and company. Over 50% of enterprises have the intent to buy Infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) services from an IT services provider. For digital and SMAC-based initiatives this year, funding is anticipated to grow 7 to 8 times against typical IT Services resources. The IT expenditure survey used 95 reactions from companies that represent over $51M in IT expenditure and based on the results, the respondents are forecasting 5.4% growth in the second half CY 2015 IT services spending as compared to the first half CY2015. The survey also had numbers of verticals which included: 36% of respondents in financial services, 25% in Manufacturing, 16% in Healthcare Pharm, 14% in retail, 5% in […]

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Jun20

OpenStack Acquisitions: IBM Buys Blue Box

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Blue box has met Big blue. Blue box is a unique OpenStack company that offers Private cloud as a service. Blue Box took it upon themselves to mesh ten years of infrastructure operations with a unique infrastructure management platform called Box Panel. As expected this is no easy task as only very few organizations have the resources, skill set and most of all focus to design, deploy and operate private cloud infrastructure. This was aptly managed by Blue Box. An undertaking that placed it in the eyes of cloud computing market. It is no wonder now that it has agreed to be bought by IBM in a deal of undisclosed value. This merger was made amidst a flurry of acquisition and merger activity in the cloud computing market which saw the cloud hosting vendor Codero and Virtustream bought by the much larger conglomerates. “IBM is dedicated to helping our clients migrate to the cloud in an open, secure, data rich environment that meet their current and future business needs,” reported the IBM General Manager of Cloud Services.  “The acquisition of Blue Box accelerates IBM’s open cloud strategy making it easier for our clients to move to data and applications across […]

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Mar26

Benefits of Managed Hosting for Businesses

Posted by in Industry debates, Small Business · 1 Comment

Even though most of the businesses and enterprises are shifting their attention to cloud hosting, they still want firm control over their data and the cloud does not offer this. This is why most of them are latter reverting to the old types of web hosting. However, as much as businesses want firm control over their data, they are not willing to pay mountains of money and invest huge sums for the same course. This is where managed hosting comes in and to many companies and businesses it has been a savior. With a wide range of benefits, it is allowing different business to tread the fine line between being able to save and conducting business and still being able to have control over their data. Cost saving and scalability One of the biggest advantages that managed hosting has to offer is cost effectiveness. Although this will cost more than cloud hosting in most instances, the business does not incur the cost of owning servers or having a fully-fledged IT team which is by far more cost implicating on the business. The best part is that the managed hosting provider can change with your scalability needs and this means that […]

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Dec28

Is cost of service the only factor while choosing managed hosting?

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Cost has various connotations in business. How often have you heard that time is money? So is quality. There are different factors to be taken into consideration while evaluating cost rather than the bare hosting. Here are a few aspects of managed hosting which must be considered to assess the true cost of proposed managed hosting package. Uptime The best managed services are worth nothing if you don’t have 100% uptime. Opportunity loss is stated to be the biggest factor in deciding future of online businesses. A downtime of a few hours can cause irreparable damage to your reputation. It’s all the more important for startups to ensure that you have no downtime. Loss of opportunity can cost you your business. Ironclad SLA You can know the quality of service offered by managed hosting providers by looking at the SLA offered. Service level agreements must be simple, easy to implement and clear. You must also speak to existing customers to get their feedback. There is no point having a great SLA if the managed hosting provider has a history of reneging on their promises. Changing hosts can be troublesome process and therefore you must do due diligence before finalizing on […]

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Dec23

RightScale Survey Indicates Bright Cloud Future

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A recent RightScale survey entitled “Cloud Computing Trends: 2014 State of the Cloud” has indicated that this hugely significant technology has a very bright immediate future indeed. Among the critical figures which came out of this report were the following: 94 percent of respondents were already utilising the cloud within their businesses. 18 percent of enterprises are already cloud-focused, and are eagerly adopting the cloud. 31 percent of respondents are cloud explorers, currently looking into how to expand their cloud operations. 35 percent of respondents were cloud beginners, while just 16 percent were on the sidelines currently debating whether or not to engage with cloud computing. 90 percent of those enterprises who consider themselves to be cloud-focused stated that they had achieved a tangible improvement in their operations since moving to the cloud. The figures recorded by enterprise and small business within this report are extremely encouraging for the cloud. Two clear conclusions can be drawn from the statistics compiled in this report. Firstly, doubts about the cloud, its security and effectiveness are clearly diminishing rapidly. Secondly, the cloud has been delivering on the promises of increased computing power that cloud providers have stated would come to fruition for some […]

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Dec07

Biggest Cloud Tech in 2014 and Coming Trends in 2015

Posted by in Cloud Computing, Expert Opinion, Industry debates · No Comments

2014 was a massive year for cloud computing, one in which the technology truly began to seep into mainstream consciousness. So as the year draws to a close, it seems a viable time to assess the biggest cloud technologies over the calendar year, and look forward to predictions in the cloud space for 2015. Of course, it is difficult to give blanket coverage to every single technology that emerged in cloud computing during 2014 given how popular the technology has now become. But the following article will look at some of the cloud technologies that made the largest impact. Information Delivery Models A particular trend during the calendar year was the concentration around the user and the information delivery model. This has enabled data centres and the contemporary cloud infrastructure in general to evolve significantly. What was once considered a niche technology that many businesses couldn’t quite work out how to utilise has really begun to be a central part of commerce over the last twelve months. As this has occurred, new methods of optimising and controlling the cloud, and entirely new ways of delivering the user experience have emerged. Cloud apps (APIs) This has arguably been the most important […]

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Dec03

Gartner and KPMG Insight: Why Almost 50% World Data will be Held in Cloud

Posted by in Cloud Computing, Expert Opinion, Industry debates · No Comments

The world’s business ecosystems are being changed by cloud computing. ‘Cloud is poised to change the business arena’ this is according to A report by KPMG titled, ‘The cloud changing the business ecosystem’ KPMG suggests the need for more efficiency through solutions brought about by putting heads together and by actual-time exchange of information. In another survey published in January 2011 dubbed ‘the why of the cloud Gartner’s CIO’s Agenda’ CIO’s declared the cloud as their top priority for that year. Gartner also predicted about 33 % of digital content would be stored on the cloud. “Users are turning to the cloud and their data will be stored on the cloud” claimed Gartner a firm that deals with analysis. Kumar Parakala head of IT advisory KPMG India and EMA and Pra Deep Udhas, head of IT/ITeS sector KPMG India said that advanced economies and businesses have gained a competitive edge by combining creativity and technology. Further they stated that countries like India and China which have taken advantage of their large populations and technology could improve their ability to compete with developed world through acceptance of the cloud. Times are rapidly changing and every ten years since the 70’s there […]

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Dec03

Cloud and How It Will Impact the Broadcast and Entertainment Industry

Posted by in Cloud Computing, Expert Opinion, Industry debates · No Comments

An overhaul is taking place in the broadcast and entertainment industry since consumers are now demanding oriented content and makers of content have out shined the distributors. New technologies in the area of content delivery, workflow and even entertainment devices open up the field for well performing companies whether big or small to take the helm of the industry, and cloud computing is set to affect this greatly by assisting new breakthroughs. Cloud computing is highly cost effective, flexible and reliable and it is therefore a very viable option for players in the entertainment industry. The change taking place in the media market is as huge an industry changer as the overhaul of the music industry by Apple. In this specific case, a new kind of music player took advantage of innovation to cause major changes in the industry. Apple’s music playing device, the iPod and the iTunes system of music delivery created a new level that captivated users completely changing the industry. Another example of the same kind is the change that occurred in the banking sector during the late 20th century. Electronic innovations brought about new methods of transaction on the business arena, while the use of ATM’s […]

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