Enterprises Need Clouds, Not Droplets

I just read an interesting story about the Apache LibCloud project. It’s an interesting development in cloud computing for certain groups. But I don’t think mainstream enterprises aren’t one of those groups. Here’s why. LibCloud, and a lot of other cloud technology providers, are all about providing a la carte menus of commodity-priced, on-demand computing and storage that the customer can assemble into the solution they want. In other words, these providers aren’t actually supplying clouds. They’re supplying droplets of water vapor, requiring the customer to assemble them and turn them into clouds. That’s nuts if you’re the CIO of a business running a dozen critical business applications. If you’re that CIO, migrating to the cloud requires a complete, dependable stack, ready and waiting for your business applications. It requires the same enterprise tested technologies and brands for hardware, VM, networking, etc. that you already use. It requires a bullet-proof enterprise services agreement that actually protects you in case the vendor has a problem, not the “tough luck” click-wrap agreement that some commodity cloud providers force on you. More power to the developers out there who dig LibCloud. But woe betide the CIO who gets caught up in that stuff.