Cloud Computing In Todays Organizations And The Future Essay

Cloud Computing In Todays Organizations And The Future - Essay Example Using cloud computing, users can use a wide range of software and data management applications using cloud services. As Schauland (2011) states, â€Å"surfacing in late 2007, cloud computing is used to allow services used in everyday practice to be moved onto the Internet rather than stored on a local computer†. Cloud computing offers a number of considerable benefits to business professionals, such as, cloud-based accounting and billing, project management, website hosting, and document storage. Along with these benefits, cloud computing also provides management services to all small and large companies, such as, customer relationship management and database management services. â€Å"Cloud computing provides computation, software applications, data access, data management and storage resources without requiring cloud users to know the location and other details of the computing infrastructure† (Singh, Kharbanda, & Kaur, 2012, p. 945). Companies just need to contact cloud services providers to get these services. Some of the main companies that provide cloud services to individuals and companies include Cisco, Windows, Google, and Salesforce.com. All of these companies are highly professional and provide various cloud computing services to users all over the world. In this paper, we will discuss the ways cloud services providers help small and large companies in carrying out their IT related business activities. Description of Cloud Computing Within AT&T NextGen Inc. is a software company that uses AT&T for cloud computing services. AT&T is an American telecommunication company which also provides cloud computing services to businesses to manage their business operations. For example, NextGen uses cloud computing for customer relationship management because of which the company is enjoying increased customer satisfaction and retention levels. AT&T also manages database application and operating system software of the company. Some other services that NextGen gets from the cloud services provider include data management by AT&T internet data center, data security, audit controls, network management, storage infrastructure and server management, self-service computing, and web portal. The company pays monthly bill to AT&T on per use basis through credit card. There are no upfront charges or termination fees which shows the consumer-orientation of AT&T cloud services. The ready-made hosted inf rastructure of AT&T cloud services provides a number of considerable benefits to NextGen some of which include quick response to business needs, reliable data management, improved customer service, reduced need of long implementation cycles for employees, and reduced capital expenditures. NextGen uses Linux operating system for management of computer processes and Apache version 2.4 as the web server. Apache is the world’s most efficient and customizable HTTP server application. For secure data management, the company uses My SQL which provides scalable and reliable performance to users. The network structure being used by the company is simple. The company used wireless access point which has provides simple configuration options to the users, for example, allowing or restricting broadcast SSID to associate, enable or disable