Thursday, May 28, 2015

Cloud Management Technologies: Four Key Trends in 2015

The cloud market is changing. As adoption becomes mainstream, more and more providers are jumping on board to provide a range of services — once Amazon's bailiwick, Tech Target notes that the retail giant is now under challenge from players like Google, IBM and HP while new entrants such as Chinese giant Alibaba look to make their mark. 

All this cloud interest means there are a host of new management technologies in development; here are four key trends to watch this year:

Vertical SaaS

The Software as a Service (SaaS) market continues to grow, and according to Enterprise Irregulars global SaaS revenues are set to reach $106 billion by 2016. However, as discussed by Information Management, there's a shift happening: As-a-service tools are starting to go vertical. Through 2015, expect that all the familiar standards — CRM, ERP, analytics — will continue to see strong growth, but chances are that vendors will take a more focused approach to SaaS moving forward as a way to target specific verticals. These include finance, health care, law and even manufacturing; public and private clouds have matured enough that this kind of specialization is now possible. What's more, the price war between Google, Amazon and other vendors is helping to make these kind of focused deployments even more affordable for companies just starting their transition to the cloud.

Turnkey Migration

According to a recent Search Cloud Computing article, another key trend in cloud management is migration. At a basic level this includes app migration — tools and approaches developed to make moving legacy apps a simpler and more streamlined process. This also extends to migration as a whole; providers are now willing to invest in making cloud migration a “turnkey” process, eliminating the need for lengthy deployments and uncertain timelines. In many cases the success of this trend rests with specialized vendors, for example, hosted PBX providers, which have developed solutions to work across a variety of cloud deployments and legacy systems. The sophistication of cloud infrastructure now makes it possible to deliver solutions which combine easy migration and use.

Off-Site Innovation

Another key trend to expect this year? More off-site innovation. As noted by Forbes, the nature of research and development (R&D) is changing. Companies are no longer dependent on in-house IT professionals to innovate the apps and platforms from end to end; it's now possible to leverage work done by other IT shops to form the basis of new computing solutions. Through 2015, expect the speed and sophistication of this innovation to increase, allowing companies to devote more of their IT budget to refining mission-critical apps and developing niche feature sets rather than starting from scratch with each new software tool.

Security at Scale

The last key trend for 2015 lies with security. Always a hot-button topic around the cloud, Information Age suggests that it's now possible for cloud vendors to get ahead of the security discussion and provide consumers with a new level of confidence. Bottom line? Cloud providers have the scale of resources, depth of knowledge and breadth of skill to create best-in-class security solutions. As more vendors take a proactive approach to cloud security, expect to see this market diversify and innovate, prompting a shift in IT security thinking as a whole. In effect, the right management strategy here can turn the supposed liability of cloud security into an asset, since the scale of provider technology makes it possible to offer much more robust, end-to-end protection.

2015 should be a banner year for management technologies as vendors spend on innovation and companies commit IT budgets to the cloud. Four large trends are already on the horizon: Vertical SaaS, turnkey migration, off-site innovation and an evolved security landscape.
  
This is a Guest Post.


About the Author

Sheldon Smith is the current Senior Product Manager for XO Communications.  In addition to his experience heading up the Hosted PBX and Conferencing products divisions at XO, he also has over 10 years of Department and Process Management experience.

Saturday, May 16, 2015

4 Android Apps that Bring the Cricket Fever to your Smartphone


If there was ever one word that described the passion that drives Indians then that word is cricket. Be it T20, ODI, IPL or a 5 day test match, we cannot miss a single over. We glue ourselves to our TV screens and god forbid if we have to leave the house we need a constant radio commentary to keep us going.

Be it gully cricket or kids playing cricket in the local circuits, since a young age we develop an affinity to this game and we enjoy every format of this game.

Now in a world where we all own smartphones, we can bring the magic of cricket onto our phones so we never have to miss a game or miss details about our favourite team in the IPL or when India plays against other countries.

Download these apps and bring the magic of cricket to your smartphones:

Cricbuzz

This is the No.1 app on the Google Play store for cricket enthusiasts who cannot live without cricket. The app has complete information and lets you know all the details about ICC World Cup. IPL8, ICC World T20 as well as Champions League T20 along with other major cricket tournaments covered.

Now follow your favourite team and get to know about the venues, stadiums and photos from cricket matches along with a detailed view of the games’ statistics. You can change to a number of languages including Hindi, Kannada, Telugu and Bengali amongst a few others.

Now get all the live updates and match alerts along with player profiles and their rankings to never miss any information on cricket or your favourite player again. You can also share the enthusiasm amongst your friends on Twitter and Facebook.

If you’re a cricket enthusiast you can purchase cricket related accessories by redeeming exclusive AskmeBazaar Coupons given exclusively by CashKaro and bring home all the goods you need to be the cricket star of your locality. Here you can also avail sports product offers that is extremely affordable and fits your budget.

Star Sports Pepsi IPL

This is the official app for the Star Sports channel which brings to you live scores not only for cricket but also live football, tennis and badminton scores if you’re interested in following other sports as well.

You can catch all the drama unveiling at the IPL and find out which team won and which team got knocked down and support your favourite team and get live scorecard updates, ball by ball commentary, points table update and other important statistics related to the game.

You can now catch full replays in case you happen to miss your match as well as have features like video on demand and get highlights and live streaming of other sports all under one app. This app surely answers all your sports related prayers.

Cricket Companion

This is a great social app that lets you catch up with cricket scores and give you features like Live chat, social media rage and commentary amongst many more features to keep you busy. Share a live virtual stadium with your friends and laugh and cheer with other cricket fans as this app makes it fun to follow cricket.

You can share pictures and files with your friends and always know the latest with access to Facebook, Twitter from within the app itself. Share your emotions with all the other fans when your favourite team wins and even if it loses it doesn’t hurt to share the pain. You can even create a group of your favourite friends to chat with so you never miss out on important cricket gossip.

This app really brings together social media and cricket all together in one app which should keep you occupied and obsessed for hours.

Real Cricket 14

This game is for those who cannot live without cricket- if they’re not watching a match then they’re most probably playing one. Now bring the magic of a cricket tournament to your mobiles with this intensive game in which you can choose from amongst 16 nations and 8 master teams.

The controls are simple and will make you addicted to the game. The graphics too are commendable and the 2D motion shows you every movement in great detail.

This app is definitely one of the best apps to play virtual cricket but one which gives you real time fun.

With the internet advancement, we can get all the detailed news and updates about our favourite teams and players all thanks to these apps which make sure we never have to live a day without our favourite game being a part of it!

Guest Post by Neha Chaudhary