Containers and the Cloud
One of the hottest trends in technology today is the adoption of “containers,” enabled by products such as Docker, Kubernetes, the Pivotal Container System (PKS), and rkt (pronounced “rocket”). As virtualization abstracts the hardware, “containers” abstract the operating system. Containers solve the problem of ensuring that software runs reliably when moved from one cloud to another. Each cloud can have a different computing environment. The basis of this hot technology can be traced to the development of UNIX in the 1970s. When the chroot system was created, this was the beginning of process isolation—a key to container technology. Imagine “containers” leveraging unending streams of data and AI anticipating when extra power might be needed and sending it to the needed environment before the surge happens—instead of in response to an increase in the workload.
Wearable Technology and the Cloud
Another new idea is “wearable IT,” and Apple is leading that charge. It’s common to see a smart watch or a fitness tracker. Yet, in the absence of cloud computing, the ubiquitous data generated by these devices would be uninteresting. It’s our ability to share the information and see data in different contexts that fuels the use of these applications. Apple has simply added the “cool factor.” In the future, we will see sensors woven into the clothing we wear in order to feed information to the cloud, providing the wearer, as well as the producers, insight into a variety of information streams. The monitoring of step counts and heart beats per minute may one day be supplemented with real-time advice on to how to fine-tune your golf stroke and suggestions on the apparel that most resonates with your daily experience.
Cybersecurity and the Cloud
There are 2.5 quintillion bytes of data created each and every day—and growing—and the number is expanding exponentially. Every device we use to access the cloud is an additional way we could potentially be hacked. What is constant is that the threat vectors for each and every person and organization continues to climb. Security experts continue to warn that it’s not “if your organization will be hacked, but when.” Many times, cybercriminals hack an organization and watch for months to determine optimal circumstances to perform their nefarious acts. Gathering needed information for their purposes is a full-time occupation. Data security requires constant vigilance and analysis of the information available to us. No software solution today offers a complete solution. Yet, much is possible when we build upon the foundation around us. The combination of big data and AI offers the possibility of a proactive solution that evolves much in the same way the threats do.
What’s Ahead
To understand the future, we must understand the decisions we made in the past. The past controls the future. There is much wisdom in Orwell’s words published nearly 70 years ago, and for much of the advances on the horizon, cloud will be the underlying technology that helps to make them possible.