The Future of the Desktop is in the Cloud

When you hear or think about cloud computing, what comes to mind first? For most people, it’s an image of big servers, enterprise databases, and mission-critical applications. That vision isn’t wrong, but it’s certainly incomplete. That’s because the future of the desktop (and by that, I mean the desktop environment, including laptops, notebooks, etc.) is in the cloud. Here’s why, and what it means for your organization.

The release of Windows 7 kicked off one of the computer industry’s “great migrations,” a movement still underway today. Later this year, according to reports, Microsoft will release the first beta of Windows 8, a new hybrid OS that promises to blend mouse and touch-driven computing into a single environment. Windows 8 will reportedly RTM in 2012.

This will result in a new generation of computing devices that function as a laptop one moment and a tablet the next. And it will also result in yet another time-consuming and costly migration for organizations that want to keep their IT environments current.

Both Windows 7 and 8 have received positive reviews from press and IT leaders alike. But no matter what your opinion of these platforms, Microsoft’s support for the 10-year-old Windows XP will end in 2014. No more security patches. No more phone support. No more knowledge base articles.

Choosing a Cloud Vendor

My own experience in IT combined with what I've been hearing from customers in recent pre-sales engagements highlights the need to choose carefully when picking a cloud vendor. Contrary to what the buzz about cloud computing might lead you to believe, cloud providers are not interchangeable.

Unlike buying a server or a new application, choosing a cloud provider means you are engaging with a partner whose services, infrastructure, processes, and procedures will be tightly integrated with your own. Your success or failure will depend on not only the technology behind your cloud provider but also on the consistency and reliability of all aspects of their business operation. A poorly executed manual process on the part of someone in your cloud provider’s data center could bring your business to a crashing halt.

Here are some of the things you should consider when choosing or changing a cloud vendor.

Virtualization is Core to Preparing Your IT Organization for the Cloud

In my work with SHI's strategic consulting practice, I work with a wide range of organizations to help them take advantage of cloud computing.
As part of our dialog we assess the organization's capabilities, their desired future state, and the best practices for deploying the cloud.

This leads to a clearly defined road map for consuming cloud services, applying cloud concepts to the organization's data centers, and addressing architectural application requirements.

I find that the organizations that are most successful in moving to the cloud already have significant experience in virtualization of their servers and applications. Virtualization is at the core of how organizations can make the most of using the cloud. There are several reasons for that, which I will get to in a bit.

First, I've learned that there are three fundamental questions that need to be dealt with in preparing for the cloud.

1. How will you "consume" cloud services?
2. How can you make your data center more cloud-like?
3. How can your applications take advantage of the cloud?