Does your desktop belong in the cloud?

In this episode of the Uhuru podcast show Brian Byrne, the founder of MeshIP, tells about the benefits of running desktops in the cloud. For the same reasons that cloud computing makes sense for web servers, there are compelling reasons to run your personal productivity and desktop tools in the cloud as well. Brian’s company offers a VDI hosted solution which allows centralized management and backups. Running your desktop in the cloud might not be cheaper than buying a low cost PC for your desk, but when you add in the reliability improvements and IT management savings, the advantages of desktop hosting in the cloud are substantial.

You can find more about Byrne’s company here:
http://www.meship.com/

Download the sound(right click and save as link) : Download

Not all .NET roads lead to Microsoft

In this episode of the Uhuru podcast Troy Hunt, a software architect and Microsoft MVP for developer security, talks about his great experience using the AppHarbor Platform as a Service to host his .NET applications. He has looked at Microsoft’s Azure PaaS but found the requirements to rewrite his .NET apps to be prohibitive. Moreover, the AppHarbor integration with GitHub offers source control management that Troy hasn’t seen anywhere else.

The .NET PaaS takes away all the pain of having to manage servers. There is no going back to traditional hosting on virtual machines for Troy.

You can find Troy’s blog here:

http://troyhunt.com

You can find Troy’s app that tests the security of .NET web sites here:

http://asafaweb.com/

Download the sound(right click and save as link) : Download

Is Vendor Lock-in Unavoidable When Building An App?

In our continuing series of SEP group Practical Software podcast interviews, Bishop Greg, an expert in Model Driven software projects at Inegranova, talks about how organizations building their own internal applications are increasingly finding themselves locked into particular vendors and technology stacks similar to the ‘80s and ‘90s when people were building applications on custom systems from companies like DEC and IBM. In Greg’s experience these lock-ins can be avoided by working at high level models which can be easily transposed onto varying underlying technology stacks without too much trouble. One example Greg gives is a customer of his who swiftly moved a custom app to support Web Sphere and DB2.

Maybe every organization has to bite the bullet and take a dependency on specific technologies at some point. For example, trying to build a cross-platform mobile app can sometimes wind up with software that is mediocre, not really taking advantage of any of the key features on individual mobile devices.

How do you think technology lock-in should be avoided?

Download the sound(right click and save as link) : Download

You can find all the Optimistic Bear shows here: Software

You can find all the Entrepreneurs Northwest shows here: Entrepreneurs Northwest

RavenDB – the NoSQL database for the rest of us

RavenDB – the NoSQL database for the rest of us

In this episode of the Uhuru podcast show Oren Eini, a software developer and avid blogger, tells about his passion of bringing NoSQL database technology to Windows that led him to become a major contributor to the Open Source RavenDB project. While the NoSQL database offerings on Linux are pioneering a lot of great ideas they are inflexible and extremely difficult to configure and use. RavenDB is different. Almost anyone can get RavenDB up and running quickly and it doesn’t require an immersion in esoteric configuration settings to tune.

Since RavenDB uses simple REST APIs it can be used by any applications, whether they are on Linux or Windows. RavenDB runs well on cloud infrastructure services like Amazon Web Services and is also available in a dedicated service.

You can read more about Oren’s ideas at his blog (where he writes under a pseudonym).
http://ayende.com/blog

You can read about RavenDB here:
http://ravendb.net/

Download the sound(right click and save as link) : Download

The most common mistakes in selling a cloud service

In this episode of the Uhuru podcast show Peter Cohen, the founder ofSaaS Marketing Strategy Advisors, explains how selecting the right technologies for a cloud service requires a good dose of business and marketing acumen to succeed. Picking the right technology or platform to build a cloud service is just one piece of the puzzle.

Peter has seen wanna-be internet businesses make all manner of rookie mistakes such as under spending on marketing (who knew) and selling on cost alone (you’re dead if your only differentiator  is price). Unfortunately, there is no silver bullet for success as a cloud service. Good marketing and pricing strategies will vary based on the specific business. Just make sure you are flexible and measure, measure, measure, results of everything you do.

You can find out more of Peter’s SaaS marketing ideas at his web site:
http://www.saasmarketingstrategy.com

Download the sound(right click and save as link) : Download

Shadow IT and the cloud – Déjà vu all over again

In this episode of the Uhuru podcast show Brian Gracely, Director of solutions at EMC and host of the CloudCast podcast, reminisces on how cloud computing is filling the same role of empowering users as the PC and LANs did back in the ’80s and ’90s. With this phenomena of “shadow IT” developers and small departments are able to take advantage of cloud services and completely bypass traditional IT departments. All this empowerment does come with risks. Putting critical data on insecure cloud services with little traceability can come back to haunt you. There is still value in involving IT with cloud projects. Of course, forward thinking IT departments should show their users that they bring value to their cloud initiatives if they don’t want to see themselves shut out of even grass roots initiatives.

Brian also cautions that you shouldn’t expect cloud services to suddenly reduce bottom line costs. The cloud may offer unprecendented flexibility and start up velocity but they aren’t always as cheap as you think.

You can read check out Brian’s blog here:
http://www.cloudsofchange.com/

His cloud computing podcast show is here:
http://www.thecloudcast.net/

Download the sound(right click and save as link) : Download

Cloud Foundry Bridges the Clouds

In this episode of the Uhuru podcast, Dekel Tankel, a Cloud Foundry marketing manager at VMware, explains how one of the things that interested him most about Cloud Foundry was it’s ability to cross the chasm between clouds, allowing customers to easily move their applications between cloud service providers. To Dekel Cloud Foundry is all about giving more choices to developers without locking people into a particular service or technology.

Developers can start with the Cloud Foundry micro-cloud as they build their app prototypes, running locally on a laptop, and then deploy to a cloud service when their code has matured. No other cloud service offers this degree of flexibility ranging from the private to public clouds.

At times the enthusiasm for Cloud Foundry is daunting to Dekel (they had 10,000 developers register in the first 72 hours of launch) and the volume of Open Source contributions is hard to keep up with. It would be easier to control and contain the progress of Cloud Foundry if it had been closed and followed a proprietary architecture, but it’s all been worth it.

You can follow the Cloud Foundry blog here:
http://blog.cloudfoundry.com/

You can register for your own free Cloud Foundry account here (use the word “cloudtoday” for the promotion code for immediate approval):
http://www.cloudfoundry.com/

Of course, you can also register for a free account on the Uhuru PaaS, which is based on Cloud Foundry and offers extra enhancements like support for .NET applications.

Download the sound(right click and save as link) : Download

Taking .NET to the cloud is a process

In this episode of the Uhuru podcast show Michael Collier, an architect at Neudesic, shares his experiences in bringing .NET applications to the Azure Platform as a Service (PaaS). Michael explains how migrating existing .NET apps to a PaaS is a process. Managers have to be educated about the cloud so they feel comfortable using it. He has often had to rewrite parts of the .NET apps to make them compatible with the Azure PaaS. The migration process is different for each app, depending on how it was built. .NET apps that follow best practices can run on a PaaS with almost no changes at all (e.g. not storing state on the server, etc). Other apps can be much more difficult to migrate (e.g. using COM, relying on server state, etc).

In the end, the migration to the cloud is well worth it. Developers can focus on what they love doing: writing great apps!

You can find Michael’s blog here:
http://michaelcollier.wordpress.com/

Download the sound(right click and save as link) : Download

The Stateless App

In this episode of the Uhuru podcast Andy Piper, a Cloud Foundry developer advocate at VMware, talks about how to build great apps for the cloud. In his work with developers Andy has found that stateless apps are the easiest to transition to cloud platforms such as Cloud Foundry. Looking for particular files or settings on a server prevents your apps from being able to benefit from the automatic deployment scaling or redundancy features of new hosted Platforms of a Service. Luckily, many apps are ready to run on a PaaS already. At recent hackathons Andy has that many of the existing apps deployed on Cloud Foundry without any changes at all.

You can read more about Andy’s advice for building apps in the cloud on his blog:
http://andypiper.co.uk/

Download the sound(right click and save as link) : Download

When The PaaS Isn’t Enough

In this episode of the Uhuru podcast Andrey Cherkasin tells about his decision to abandon a Platform as a Service and move to a custom hosting solution. Andrey was an early adopter of the Cloud Foundry PaaS technology, and was thrilled with being able to setup his own private PaaS. Unfortunately, Andrey’s needs for support of numerous Ruby platforms made it impractical for his needs. He now relies on a custom cloud solution using Chef Scripts and a smart OS.

You can follow Andrey on his blog:
http://andoriyu.bestpersons.ru/

Download the sound(right click and save as link) : Download

The Long Path To The Cloud

In this episode of the Uhuru podcast Jason Nappi, a software developer with SmartPak, talks about the journey he has been on to move his .NET application to the cloud. Everything is now running in virtualized instances that can be easily replicated to handle additional load, but the monolithic database model used by his software doesn’t lend itself well to most cloud platforms. It would be nice to utilize the scalability possible on Azure, but that just won’t be possible without re-architecting the database. Jason is closely watching technologies like database auto-sharding to find ways to further improve the performance of his apps in the cloud.

You can read more about Jason’s ideas and trials on the cloud at his blog:
http://blog.nappisite.com/

Download the sound(right click and save as link) : Download

Gimme That PaaS Source Code!

In this episode of the Uhuru podcast show Krum Bakalsky, a software engineer, shares his passion of participating in Open Source projects. In particular, VMware’s decision to place Cloud Foundry into Open Source has inspired Krum to become a significant contributor to the community effort. The Cloud Foundry community has been the perfect place for Krum to learn about the guts of building enterprise class software and to gain real experience as a participant. The fragmented nature of the Open Source world can be frustrating at times, such as when Krum discovered other programmers had already been working on something he was doing, but the collaborative environment more than makes up for these deficiencies.

You can read about Krum’s Open Source exploits and ideas on his blog:

http://kpymkata.blogspot.com/

Download the sound(right click and save as link) : Download

Medical Imaging In the Cloud – Just a Matter of Time

In this episode of the Uhuru podcast Dr Victor Fang, a research scientist with Riverain Technology, talks about how the medical industry is well on its path to moving IT to the cloud. While medical diagnostic images (like x-rays and MRIs) are still stored locally today, most companies are looking at ways of putting them in the cloud. It has just taken a while for cloud services to reach the level of security and privacy needed to comply with government regulations. At conferences Dr Fang has attended recently he has noticed the explosion in businesses offering cloud hosting, which is just one indicator of where the medical industry is moving. Dr Fang also couldn’t help but notice that hospitals where he’s worked are typically behind in adopting stateless web applications, relying primarily on traditional Windows-based client/server solutions that are harder to move to the cloud.

The health care industry can move slowly at times, but it makes huge waves when it does move, and the cloud is just around the corner.

You can follow Dr Fang on his web site.
http://www.victorfang.com/

Download the sound(right click and save as link) : Download

Everyone Needs a Cloud – Even If They Don’t Think They Do

In this Uhuru podcast episode Jonathan Schnittger, a senior developer atiQuate, talks about even companies where cloud computing doesn’t make sense for their own products can still benefit from back-office cloud services like e-mail, file sharing, etc. Jonathan’s company creates security scanning software that has to be run on local networks which precludes cloud hosting. Many of his customers are using cloud services like Amazon. Even the large enterprises he works with are hosting more and more of their applications on the cloud. Desktop replacement with cloud services is another hot area Jonathan sees organizations adopting, but the solutions for this are still immature.

You can follow Jonathan on Twitter:

https://twitter.com/#!/JonnySchnittger

Download the sound(right click and save as link) : Download

Pioneer Of The PaaS

In this Uhuru podcast episode Wely Lau, a software architect at NCS Private Ltd, talks about his pioneering work with the Azure Platform as a Service (PaaS). He was using Azure as an early tester even before it was released! There have been growing pains along the way, but today Wely is building complex applications on Azure that save his customers loads of money. He describes one fascinating project where he reduced the time to process thousands of records to prioritize work for a shipping company from over 4 hours to 2 minutes by dynamically spinning up additional application instances as needed. This is the dream of the cloud – pay for what you need, when you need it, rather than having large sunk costs in systems that are only used on a periodic basis. Wely is also closely following other PaaS services such as Amazon’s new Beanstalk, and now the Uhuru AppCloud (of course!).

You can follow Wely on his blog:
http://wely-lau.net/

Download the sound(right click and save as link) : Download

PaaS Requires a New Set of Skills

In this episode of the Uhuru podcast Imran Ahmad, President of Cloudanum, tells about his experience helping major organizations roll out cloud computing projects. The new Platform as a Service space solves a lot of the cloud management issues Imran’s customers face, but it takes a new skillset and way of thinking of the cloud. Many of Imran’s clients are exploring Platforms as a Service (PaaS) but not one has rolled out a production service yet. Too many PaaSes require changes in how apps are written to be immediately applicable to existing applications.

I will just have to get Imran to try to Uhuru PaaS to see how it IS possible for apps to be deployed on the cloud without re-architecting.

You can read more of Imran’s ideas on his blog:

http://blog.cloudanum.com/

Download the sound(right click and save as link) : Download

Testimony of a cloud convert

In this episode of the Uhuru podcast show Tim Genge, a senior software architect at RealmSoft, talks about his recent conversion to the cloud. Cloud computing used to be nothing more than marketing double-speak as far as Tim was concerned. Now that he is running his own business and working with customers in the banking sector he “gets” it. Yes, many aspects of the cloud are similar to traditional client/server software models but the way in which people use it to transform their businesses is truly impressive.

Tim has been looking seriously at Azure as a platform for his software, but he needs it to run on a private networks as well since his customers won’t trust everything to the public internet. Tim also has a client-side component to his software which makes it difficult to find the perfect cloud solution since no one seems to focus on that area.

As an addendum to the interview, I should point out that after the discussion we clarified that Azure does NOT, in fact, have a local version that Tim’s customers can run on their local networks. Tim says he is going to investigate the Uhuru PaaS as an alternative .NET PaaS (which just happens to run in private networks just fine).

Download the sound(right click and save as link) : Download

Software testing moves to the cloud

In this episode of the Uhuru podcast show Feza Pamir, the VP of Marketing at QASymphony, explains how his company uses the cloud to offer their own cloud service, to help software test teams manage bugs and the entire quality assurance process. QASymphony currently uses Amazon virtual machines for hosting their service but support local deployments on private networks and are looking at other service providers that might have different levels of security that would allow them to meet varying customer needs.

Feza makes it clear that choice in cloud hosting is critical because his customers have such different needs – even private clouds have a role to play since there are still situations where organizations need to keep data on their own network.

While platforms as a service, like Uhuru, are an interesting hosting option to Feza the technology his company has built has such a degree of low-level customizations that they need the greater control of configuring the operating system to their needs. If he had to do it all over again it would be nice to build the QASymphony applications in a way that would make them more compatible with PaaSes.

Download the sound(right click and save as link) : Download

The database hitman tries the PaaS

In this episode of the Uhuru podcast show Anil Mahadev, a Principal Software Consultant aka DB2Hitman, shares his experience of working with the Uhuru PaaS. He was amazed with how quickly he was able to deploy a .NET app. Moreover, it was easy for him to configure his application to work with the Microsoft SQL Server service by following a few steps. By contrast, it took Anil a lot longer to get off the ground and running with Azure.

No question about it, Anil feels that the Uhuru PaaS is great for developers and test engineers. The big question is whether IT is ready to go the way of the PaaS.

Click here to read Anil’s blog, and his post about his Uhuru PaaS experience.

You can listen to the entire interview here.

Download the sound(right click and save as link) : Download

The health of the cloud

In this episode of the Uhuru podcast Terry Montgomery, a Project Manager at Health Roster, talks about his experience with managing IT projects in the cloud. According to Terry, the medical industry may be slow to adopt new technologies but the value of cloud computing is so compelling that they are moving fast. Amazingly, it is the small operations like physician offices which are leading in cloud adoption with products like practice fusion. Hospitals and large health-care organizations are dipping their toes into cloud computing with virtualization of their private data centers. Compliance issues, and HIPPA, may have created some initial caution with cloud adoption in health-care, but Terry sees that these issues are being addressed and that the industry is ripe for the cloud now.

Download the sound(right click and save as link) : Download