Cloud computing not new
RIVER BENDER - October, 2010
Lots of hype nowadays about "cloud computing" as if someone like Al Gore just invented it. According to Wikipedia, it is simply computing in which services and storage (mostly the latter) are provided over the Internet instead of in your computer, the Internet being shown as a "cloud" as often depicted on network drawings. Sound familiar? Think "time sharing" if you're an old codger like me.
It is said that the NBCUG e-mail list, recently moved from Always-Online's webmail, where it's been hosted for many years, to Google Groups now enjoys the benefits of cloud computing. Frankly I don't see much difference than when it was at Always-Online. I'm sure Google Groups has some special bells and whistles but so far I haven't seen them.
Where I see cloud computing having an advantage is in archival storage. It seems that no matter what media one chooses to store precious data it eventually beomes obsolete. I've got 5 1/4" floppies and 3 1/2" diskettes and no computer disk drive to display them on. I'm sure eventually storage media such as CDs, DVDs and memory sticks will also be replaced by something better or at least incompatible. Solid state drives (SSD) are already on the way. What to do? Store the stuff on the Internet, ie, in the cloud. Then you don't need to care what media they use for storage so long as you can access it from any computer.
Now let's talk about time-sharing, which in my opinion is cloud computing deja vu we had back in the '60s and '70s. Before microprocessors there were big mainframe computers, mostly by IBM, RCA, Control Data, GE, etc. They were very expensive so the concept of many users dialing in to time-share the computer helped spread the cost. In '74 I was dialing into GE's Mark II computer network and later Mark III using a 1200bps modem at AT&T. This was truly cloud computing because all I had at my end was a TTY machine or a CRT terminal. I wrote my Fortran programs, sent them to GE where they were run on a main frame and the results were sent back to my terminal. I could access GE (the cloud) at work or home with a portable acoustic-coupled terminal.
I think cloud computing is just another story in a long-running argument about whether to create large service centers like we once had with time sharing or have computing resources available among users. Memory is getting awfully cheap. The introduction of microprocessors killed time sharing so cloud computing may be just another episode in a fifty-year-old debate. I recall being excited over Bell Lab's "bubble memory" but as my college professor said "I'll believe it when I see it" and it never happened. We've had a lot of false starts in information technology.
All past computer articles for the River Bender since '98 are at http://pages.suddenlink.net/davew/dwindex.htm.