Articles about Cloud

The cloud is increasingly popular with businesses because of its flexibility and low infrastructure costs, however, it does present risks when compared to running systems in house.

A new product from California-based Skyhigh Networks is aimed at quantifying the risks associated with public cloud services and takes the guesswork out of understanding and managing them.

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When it comes to invoicing and accounting packages for smaller enterprises QuickBooks  is one of the first names that comes to mind

Now analytics specialist InsightSquared has launched a SaaS package for QuickBooks that lets users have immediate access to financial dashboards and reports, in addition to sales & marketing data.

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Effective financial planning and budgeting is essential for all businesses, but the software needed to support it can be expensive.

ERP specialist Oracle has released its Oracle Planning and Budgeting Cloud Service to help businesses harness the power of integrated financial planning cost effectively and fast.

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As businesses move their data to the cloud they can often be caught out by the need to comply with audit and usage reporting requirements.

Cloud security specialist Elastica has a solution to this with its new CloudSOC product which helps companies and employees use the cloud whilst remaining secure and compliant.

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Since the death of Google Reader last year, it seems RSS has been steadily heading towards becoming a paid service. Many of the front-runners in the field, while still offering a free plan, are pushing "premium" access.

Now The Old Reader joins Feedly, InoReader and others in entering this field. The company is promising a number of perks for those who pony up the $3 per month, or $30 per year. Features will include full-text search, faster feed refresh times, six months of post storage and more.

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Social intranet cloud site Bitrix24 is two years old and has over 100,000 company sign-ups. To celebrate it is giving BetaNews readers the chance to claim a free account with 15 GB of online document storage -- standard free accounts only get 5GB.

Here is how to claim yours.

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Chromebooks may be increasing in popularity, particularly in business, but they still have a long way to go before they catch up with Windows-based laptops. One of the factors holding back Chromebook is, both obviously and ironically, Chrome OS. It is a perfectly capable operating system for anyone locked into the Google ecosystem, but it has one failing -- for many people, at least -- it will not run Windows applications. But all this is set to change thanks to a new venture between Google and VMware.

VWmare is a name long-associated with bringing one platform's apps to another using virtualization, and now it is pushing its DaaS platform (or VMware Horizon Desktop as a Service Platform for Service Providers to give it its full, unabridged title) as a way to bring Windows applications to Chromebook users. As this is something that will be available on a subscription basis, it is likely to appeal to businesses rather than individuals, but it does break down another obstacle for anyone with two minds about Chromebook.

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There's a lot to like about cloud backup and sync -- security, for one, and the convenience of being able to access your files remotely for another. But cloud storage can be an expensive option, which is where Tonido comes in.

It provides a trio of tools -- Tonido Desktop and Tonido Sync for desktop, Tonido Mobile for mobile -- that lets you turn your home storage into a personal cloud. So long as your backup needs are catered elsewhere, you can access, share, stream and -- to a limited degree -- sync data without paying a single cent.

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While several companies have been busy posting new transparency reports, based on recent changes in US law, not everyone has been content with what has transpired. Last week, Twitter stood up and called the reform, essentially, too little and far too late. That sentiment likely echos the feelings of many US citizens.

However, the social service isn't the only one taking this stand. Today it is joined by cloud storage darling Dropbox. "We believe everyone has a right to know how much information the government is seeking from online services. This lets users fight back against improper requests, helps prevent abuses of power, and allows for a more informed public debate", states the company's Bart Volkmer.

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Big data is something that many companies are keen to exploit, but implementing big data solutions involves a number of hurdles.

Open Data Services specialist GoGrid is aiming to make the move to big data easier with its launch of 1-Button Deploy technology.

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We looked at the launch of the Point.io backend as a service (BaaS) platform last year and explained how it could help companies retain control of their data in the era of BYOD.

The company is now making it easier to enable fast, secure data links with the launch of APIdoc, a single point of access for all file sharing and storage technologies.

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The biggest news of the week has to be the appointment of Satya Nadella as CEO at Microsoft, which brought to an end weeks of speculation and rumor. Bill Gates also stepped down as chairman. A leaked version of Windows 8.1 Update 1 appeared online giving us all a sneak peek of what we can expect to see in the upcoming release -- including context menus on the Start screen, a new enterprise mode in Internet Explorer, and different ways of working with modern apps. Ahead of this big release, it was Windows XP that was showing growth rather than Microsoft's latest operating system.

In other Microsoft news, Xbox One's first big update was revealed to be coming up on 11 February. Sony announced that it was selling its VAIO business to enable it to focus its attention on mobile devices. Business and individuals who rely on 37signals' products found that the company was not only changing its name, but also dropping all of its services apart from Basecamp. There was another blow for Bitcoin as the online currency was effectively banned in Russia.

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Actual, real-life meetings are just so passé! In fact I have hardly met up with any of the people I work with in person -- we are living in the digital age, man! But the likes of Skype and FaceTime show that there is still an interest, even a need, for virtual face-to-face time, and this is particularly true for businesses. Conference calls are easy to set up on the phone, but there are times when it really does help to see what’s going on at the other end. Today Google takes the wraps off its solution: Chromebox for meetings.

As you would expect from Google, and probably guess from the name, this is a box running ChromeOS. Powered by a 4th generation Intel Core i7 processor, there are four USB 3.0 ports as well as HDMI and DisplayPort++ connections, and network connectivity is provided by an Ethernet port as well as an 802.11 a/b/g/n WiFi adaptor. Also provided is an HD camera, a mic and speaker combo, and a remote control.

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The name 37signals may not mean much to people outside of tech and business circles. This is a company that produces something that is better known than its own name: Basecamp. The very fact that 37signals is primarily, or even solely, associated with Basecamp seems as good a reason as any to consider a rebrand, and this is precisely what the company is doing. While some people content themselves with blowing out candles on a cake, 37signals celebrates its tenth birthday by renaming itself Basecamp.

But it does not end there. In addition to taking a new name from its popular online collaboration and project management tool, the company is switching its focus so that Basecamp is its only product. The announcement appears on the company's website, explaining that the decision will allow all energies to be channeled into the tool that gained greatest success:

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There was once a time when the popularity of a webpage was measured by the hit counter that was featured prominently on it. Thankfully these days are long gone, but there is a new type of counter.

There are few sites that don’t try to take full advantage of social networks, and many online articles -- including here at BetaNews -- include links to share content on the likes of Facebook and Twitter. It's easy for all to see how many times something has been shared, but this reveals little about the number of actual views this has translated into. But there is one place where the hit counter lives on: YouTube.

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