Cloud anyone?

Is DiscountASP considering offering Cloud hosting in the near future? Are any of your customers asking for it, like I am?

 

I suppose it depends on the definition of what cloud computing means to you, me and DASP. Everyone appears to have a different interpretation of what this term means and it's conceivable to take the view that existing DASP shared hosting coupled with SQL Server that has connectivity over the web is already providing some level of cloud computing. Obviously Azure application cloud and Amazon EC2 platforms go way beyond this.

I agree that if DASP are considering something beyond what's already on offer specifically for cloud computing, it would be very nice to know what the plans are.

 

I've chatted with the staff about any future Azure ventures, currently there are no plans.
On the other hand I'm in the process of running tests with Microsoft, Partner network.
I don't at this time see any reason why your DASP site can't integrate Azure services.
For example, your DASP site could use a web server for your site membership.
And it could be using Cloud services for storage and Microsoft Live integration.
There are so many scenarios where this can offer a DASP customer flexibility.

 

The wikipedia defenition of Cloud Computing is close what I had in mind. I am looking at purchasing processing time on multiple instances of my app.
The most important advantages in cloud computing is reliability and scalability. The minimum order would be two instances, increasing reliability and availability during system maintenance. Instances can be moved from one box to the other without the app owner knowing about it.
Because replication of app instances is a built-in feature in clouds, the app owner doesn't not need to plan a lot for scaling up his hosting space/server. Apps would scale up on demand (Economics).
I have been a customer of DASP for many years now. I am building a new app that "may" need to scale up alot in a very short time. I am faced with having to either start small and wait for response time degrade as demand increases, or start paying for a several dedicated servers to make sure my users get the best experience possible. I am guessing this is what will be Azures strongest selling point.

 

Not at most places advertising "cloud."

Which is the main problem, there is no standard for what a host wants to call "cloud" hosting. It means wildly different things depending on who is trying to sell it to you.

 

...I like Bruce's answer ;-)

 

I agree it means different things to developers because they have specific requirements for the applications they want to develop and different meanings for cloud platform vendors because they're all keen to have the edge.

There is no standard across the board yet but I read that some vendors are making an attempt at standardizing with Open Grids' OCCI. If this or some other standard gains traction and is eventually implemented by all serious vendors, hopefully things will get easier for cloud application developers in future.

 

There is more coming from Microsoft than just Azure.
I just did an on-line session with Microsoft Project Labs and the list of "virtual" technologies they're working on is amazing.