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Unrealistic Cloud Expectations and 7 Other Bad Practices

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Cloud Expectations

Now that cloud computing is all the rage, there are plenty of people coming out of the woodwork to say how wonderful it is. Of course, there are also people saying how terrible it is and that it doesn’t do what it’s supposed to. What’s the point?

They ask, because they don’t understand what it is intended for – and they forget that cloud computing is relatively new and still developing. They have unrealistic cloud expectations, and that’s not all. There are plenty of other bad practices that they engage in, too. Here are seven things that make for bad practices and unrealistic expectations when it comes to cloud computing.

cloud computing

  1. Using the cloud, even though you don’t really need it. Don’t do it just because you think it’s cool or it will give you credibility. A lot of people do that, and they’re paying out a lot of money just to say they’re in the cloud – but they’re not doing anything with it. What a waste.
  2. Jumping in too quickly when you don’t know what you’re doing. Anyone with a credit card can immediately be immersed in tons of things they don’t need. All that will get you is a large credit card bill and a lot of confusion – which could even cost you customers.
  3. Expectations that go far and beyond what the cloud is actually capable of doing. A lot of people are guilty of this. They want everything automated and they don’t want to do any work. Life isn’t like that, even in the cloud.
  4. Moving Legacy applications to the cloud, where they clearly don’t belong. Keep them inside the firewall. They aren’t safe floating around out there, and that’s not where they were ever designed to be. You’re just asking for trouble that way.
  5. Expecting full security from the cloud vendor. It’s not the vendor’s job to take care of your security. It’s your job. Make sure you do it well, or you could be hit with a virus or worse.
  6. Underestimating how much work you’ll need to put in. People want convenience, and they want things done for them. To make the cloud work for you, you’ll actually have to work.
  7. Picking the wrong/untalented vendor. If you just choose a random vendor, you might find that he or she really has no clue. After you’ve paid a lot of money and set everything up isn’t the time to find that out. The time to discover a bad vendor is before you sign up, so check the vendor out first.

There are more, of course, but the above seven are probably the worst. If you do them, it’s time to stop. If you haven’t started doing them yet, be sure that you don’t get it in your head that they are a good idea. You have to learn to work with what’s available when you’re involved in cloud computing. More options and opportunities will come along, but being patient can go a long way toward keeping your stress levels low while you’re waiting.

About

Jennifer Williams is a writer, turned traveler, turned blogger who is learning and explorer her new found love for the social media and blogging industry.

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{ 7 Responses }

  1. Dave Herbert says:
    First off cloud is such a joke. I was there when Vmware and EMC marketing bantered about what they should rename virtualization and hosting. Names were tossed about then someone said hey what about cloud... Well the rest is history and now we have this cloudy (excuse the pun) term that is bantered about by marketing and sales types to describe everything and anything. Frankly, as an engineer this is all a joke. Cloud is nothing more than a new name for Hosting or "Outsourcing".. Squeel all you like but thats it in a nutshell. If someone knocks on your door asking if you want cloud computing they are asking if you want to outsource your IT plain and simple.
  2. Mani Viswanathan says:
    In the few years to come, Security will obviously be a concern once all the focus starts shifting towards Cloud Hosting. So, better techniques to safeguards our apps must be brought into place by that time.
  3. Dennis Edell says:
    I still have no clue what clouds are or what they're used for.
  4. Alex says:
    Well, I am glad I don't make rush decision, I don't need any kind of cloud computing or storage yet, but I still wait for the day when Chromium will be out and the entire OS will be on cloud storage and virtually every computer can be your own. Also, I liked an other of google's ideas, they want to implement it in Chromium, and it consists of splitting up your software into chunks spread over a multitude of servers in such a way that no hackers can reconstitute it unless they break all the datacenters (which very very unlikely) and even if they get all the information they will need the users authentication tokens to reconstitute all the packages. (of course all this is rendered useless if they know your user and pass - but you can always choose biometric authentication)
  5. Satisfyingretirement says:
    Whenever anything is the new rage, I suggest extreme caution. We are quick to jump on a new trend or fad without really knowing if it is best in our situation. A timely example: IE 9 has just been released. Over a million people downloaded it the first day this new browser became available. Everyone is aware there will be bugs and lots of patches before IE9 is completely stable. Why not wait a few months? Let others be the first to find the mistakes? Ultimately, it is our responsibility to choose what is best and protect our data and security. Good post. It made me review what I'm using and why. Bob
  6. Andreas says:
    Soon computers without any harddisk and pre-installed software will be available, only with chrome installed, everything else comes from the cloud, photo editing software, music, movies. It will be interesting to see how microsoft deals with this google threat.
  7. Jan Husdal says:
    Thank you for an interesting post. I assume that my use of Amazon as a Content Delivery Network does fall the category of cloud computing, and many of your points hold true even with that small bit of cloud computing. 1 Do I need it? Perhaps. I'm monitoring my site performance every day and if don't see any improvement in post-cloud compared to pre-cloud, I'll pull the plug. 2 Jumping too quickly. No. As I mention in this post, it was a well-thought out decision, or so I thought, at least. 3 Expectations? I have yet to evaluate the results, but so far, it is working as expected. 4 Moving too much? Well, there is the occasional glitch or lag in fetching the content form the CDN that makes me wonder if I would be better off keeping it on my server anyway. 5 Security? No issues so far. 6 There's plenty of work to do. While some content is synced automatically, other content isn't and I can't figure out why. So yes, there is actually more work now than before. 7 Wrong vendor? Nope. Considering the price/performance ratio I think I picked the best option for my blog. Great post. Made me think...The cloud is a great thing to have, but you must use it right, that's true, as with everything else in life.