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Raw Bytes Computer News KPBX FM 91.1 Radio National Public Radio Network Frank Delaney Producer Broadcast on Wednesday Morning 7:35 AM During Morning Edition Support Public Radio ! The Theater Of the Mind |
In computer news this week 09/17/2008 Cloud
computing is part of the Web 2.0 concept – you don’t have to buy
hardware or software or pay for a technical staff and you just access the Web
for all your computer needs. So what’s wrong with this picture ? Cloud
computing is a buzzword you might have heard lately – it means that all
your computing resources are “up in the clouds” or online, and
you can compute from anywhere using a minimal pc or even a Cellphone to
access your email, calendar, and business applications like word processing
and spreadsheets. Your data and application software is all online, and so is
your hardware that makes everything happen. There’s
a saying that a civilization without a sense of history is doomed, so before
you get raptured up into cloud computing - let’s look at computer
history. The first
electronic computer – the Eniac created during WWII and which took up
an entire room and used thousands of vacuum tubes – was the start of
modern business computing. In the 50’s
and the 60’s mainframe computers were the business standard, and each
computer center had a staff of hardware and software people.
This was known as centralized data processing. The people who used computers –
the end users – were totally dependent on centralized data processing.
If you wanted something changed they’d send a systems analyst out to
talk to you. This could take months to happen. Then if the systems analyst
felt you had a valid concern, they’d turn it over to the actual
programmers. This could take many more months to happen. Then maybe sometime
after that you’d get the change you requested, but maybe not. End users
didn’t like being dependent on centralized data processing, and when
the first PC’s came out in the 70’s – end users flocked to
them, as they could maintain and program them themselves, and do much more
with them than with their in-house computer systems. This was known as the microcomputer revolution, and it
changed the world. Since
then the price of computers and networks and everything related to business
computing has dropped tremendously, and computers today can do much more than
the mainframes of old. Computing
today is simple and affordable and very productive. And with
the PC revolution came the user attitude that we can do anything ourselves,
and in tough times we’ll just circle the wagons and protect ourselves.
A real can-do almost pioneer spirit about the whole thing. A free spirit that
broke the tyranny of the control of centralized computer resources. Today any
small business can have an effective networked computer system at low cost
and be extremely productive and self-sufficient So when
we look past the enticing buzzwords of cloud computing and the promise of
free software and hardware and staffing, we have to realize that there is a
very major cost to this concept – and that is the cost of giving up
control of your computer system to a centralized data processing center in
the sky. |
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For Raw Bytes This is Frank Delaney (C) 2008 MTA Micro
Technology Associates http://www.mtamicro.com/kpbx.html PO Box 31522 Spokane, Wa 99223-1522 (509)624-7230 |
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