Amazon Beefs Up Its Cloud Ahead of MS Announcement

Amazon has announced several major improvements to its EC2 service for cloud computing. The service is now in production (no longer beta); it offers a service-level agreement; and Windows and SQL Server are available in beta form. ZDNet points out that all this news is intended to take some wind out of Microsoft's sails as MS is expected to introduce its own cloud services next week at its Professional Developers Conference.

Comments

Spam still a problem?

[Anonymous Coward]

Though I've long admired Amazon's EC2 platform, Spamhaus evidentally considers it a hive of spammers.

Uhm...

[cosmocain]

[...]and Windows and SQL Server are available in beta form[...]

As to anybody else. Where is this news?

What is it?

[Paralizer]

What exactly is "cloud computing"?

I've read several articles and websites and still don't understand what the hell this mysterious new "cloud computing" thing is.

It can't just be me, can it?

Re:What is it?

[bsDaemon]

Replace "cloud" with "mainframe" and take 40 years off your age, and then you pretty much have it, as is my understanding.

Re:What is it?

[FredFredrickson]

According to wikipedia it's a fancy way of saying "the internet" to people who don't understand the infrastructure of the internet.

Re:What is it?

[destroyer661]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloud_computing My understanding of cloud computing is that which is an application or some useful web page for people to use online, none of the data input is stored on the clients computer, it's all on the server. Wikipedia article uses google apps as an example, google docs/spreadsheets/etc have the ability to store everything for you on their servers.

Re:What is it?

[JET 666]

Oh, they want us to but quad core 3GHz dumb terminals. Shocking

Re:What is it?

[nametaken]

The use of internet services for tasks that are typically handled locally. There are a number of good and bad reasons to utilize these services. The big benefits are accessibility, zero maintenance and the security of a large infrastructure you couldn't provide yourself.

In the case of Amazon, they offer processing time, storage, and a few other things.

In the case of Google, you've got Apps... including your collaborative email/calendaring/document sharing services.

In the case of Salesforce, NetSuite, QuickBooks Online, et al, you've got CRM, Accounting, Inventory, etc.

Re:What is it?

[eldavojohn]

What exactly is "cloud computing"? I've read several articles and websites and still don't understand what the hell this mysterious new "cloud computing" thing is. It can't just be me, can it?

Yeah, well, why don't you watch some of the most qualified people reveal just how absolutely no one knows ... or really agrees for that matter.

It's really interesting seeing how differently this idea is portrayed by CEOs, developers & people who just love to hear themselves talk and be the center of attention.

This is borderline "Web 2.0" abstractness where people think there's a need to call it something new but it's really just an improvement on an old idea now that the technology is available.

Re:What is it?

[Jellybob]

In this context "cloud computing" is somebody else managing virtual servers for you, and providing an API to add and remove servers from the ones you have running.

Re:What is it?

[FredFredrickson]

To expand on this, because now you've made me research this, basically cloud computing refers to hosting business applications remotely- typically, but not neccessarily, on multiple servers. (Such as an application server, a sql server, and so on)

"But I already have my business software hosted on an application server, and it utilizes a seperate SQL server... how is this any different?"

Is it stored somewhere offsite, say, by a hosting company?

"Why, yes.."

Then welcome to the cloud computing club!

But I've been doing this since the late 90s, I'm confused, what's changed?

Nothing at all. It's just like podcasts and web 2.0, another useless name for downloading audio files and websites that are more clever than before.

So basically, the only difference between remote hosting and cloud computing is whether or not you understand what's underneath the hood. If you're not sure how it works, but it just does, it's called "the cloud" otherwise, the rest of us call it "Shared hosting," "VPS," "Colocated," or "Dedicated" offsite hosting.

It's kinda like using the word magic instead of the word science. Makes people feel better.

Re:What is it?

[schnikies79]

It's another bullshit buzzword, nothing more.

Move on.

Re:What is it?

[mlk]

Virtualization on someone elses kit where you only pay when your VM is active (where the definition of "active" is different on different "Cloud" venders).

The idea is Google/Amazon/whoever have lots and lots of hardware. You are too cheap/small to buy your own. Buying a single VPS will still be just a single VPS when you get slashdotted. But with a "Cloud" based system you can start up a new instance of your server when you get to 90% usage on your primary one and then shut it down when the load drops. (I think Google handle all this differently, Amazon uses straight VPSes, Google has a load of web servers running Python or Ruby or the like so you don't need to start extra instances - it just scales)

Re:What is it?

[mlk]

I think pricing generally differs on "cloud" based systems. With VPS you pay per instance per month with cloud it is instance per minute or request.
Amazon (and I'd guess others) also have APIs for starting and stopping instances. I've not come across a VPS that does this (but I've never really looked) but this is down to pricing, why stop something that will cost you £50 a month regardless.

Re:What is it?

[FredFredrickson]

This is true with Amazon's take on cloud computing, but according to the accepted (read:wikipedia) definition, the scalability and auto-growing/shrinking of your resources isn't neccessarily what makes it cloud computing. The thing that makes it cloud computing is the fact that it's remote application that handles your normally-local activities. Amazon's new service just cashes in on the new buzzword.

Re:What is it?

[John Hasler]

You've described timesharing.

Re:What is it?

[u38cg]

My understanding was the original theory was to provide virtualisation in such a way that you could easily add or subtract the services you required, with an API to control them, etc, meaning you could reduce your fixed costs but have the capacity to handle major load events (so, say, CNN.com doesn't fall over on the next 9/11, etc). Then the marketers got hold of it and reduced it's usefulness to the point where it basically means "the internet".

Re:What is it?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's kinda like using the word magic instead of the word science. Makes people feel better.

Not when you're having major surgery!

Re:What is it?

[Anonymous Coward]

Cloud computing can be summarized in five words:

When it rains it pours.

Re:What is it?

[mlk]

I'd take scalability to be a key aspect of "cloud", regardless of what Wiki thinks. Both Google and Amazon seam too as well. Else it really is just a VPS.

But then I also take Web 2.0 to mean "poorly defined buzzwords" (among some less kind meanings)

Re:What is it?

[zappepcs]

That was for salt: when it rain it pours. Salt is a kind of military armament reduction talk or agreement for republicans. So, logically, the republicans are behind this cloud computing thing, and the vast right wing majority shows it's cards. Skynet will achieve self awareness through EC2. It will be 14.3 years before anyone realizes as all bad reviews will be censored. It's already started, have you seen the poor reviews for the Terminator series? Are you sure there were no bad reviews?

The fact that Windows is offered in beta indicates two things: One the new MS cloud is designed to join with EC2 as part of skynet, and Google is soon to associate to this larger cloud... in beta form, of course.

The first large project: Understanding the Global Climate Machinery will be the beginnings of Skynet. Probes will be launched to add further data, and once self awareness is achieved, this will be the beginning of the end.

Now, since I'm the only with a time machine, good luck with your life. I'm off to the future. In 3019, aliens visit the Earth. They bring weapons and death to the machines. By 3912 we have repopulated the Earth and several other planets. I'm just here working on my PhD thesis. Good luck everybody.

P.S. Oh, just for fun, I want you to know that Joe the Plumber is targeted as a spy sometime next year. That is in all the history books.

Re:What is it?

[Anonymous Coward]

Cloud computing tries to make use of the heterogenous platforms available in most data centers and IT buildings and across the Internet. In one definition, it creates a compute "cloud", which is essentially a bunch of virtualized computers running on different machines.

Imagine that you have a blade center, some 1U racks, some older servers, a bunch of desktops. You also have a workload that doesn't quite match any of these existing machines. What cloud computing tries to do is create this virtual computing system. It does so, in some cases, by running a limited virtual machine across all the physical systems (and in some cases, across virtual machines) that forms a cloud of computing resources. You can then define a machine inside this computing resource to do specific tasks. Think of it as similar to LVMs, except rather than virtualizing hetergenous disks, you're instead virtualizing heterogenous platforms.

There are similarities to projects like distributed.net, but cloud computing is another level of virtualization above that as it includes a service approach to compute resources. I'm still not convinced that SOA is anything *NEW*, but some of the work being done is pretty interesting.

KL

Re:What is it?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah, podcasts are a bad example. They aren't just downloaded audio files. They are audio, video and text files with metadata, downloaded according to rss feeds via organising software.

But other than that, your other points are mostly valid.

Re:What is it?

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh you poor 3912er. You really have quite a lot that you've yet to experience. In 4367 we achieve ascension to beings of pure energy. Amazingly though the 3912 time traveling equipment survived for as long as it did, so we occasionally take a physical form and take jaunts back into the past.

If you thought the aliens that saved us from the machines were cool, I would encourage you to go back to the times when the great pyramids of earth were built. You'd be surprised at what you see!

Re:What is it?

[lysergic.acid]

while AJAX & Web 2.0 are overused as marketing buzzwords, that doesn't take away their value as terms that usefully describe meaningful ideas or concepts.

if you're not web developer, then these words are naturally meaningless to you. so VCs, managers/CEOs, and general "armchair web developers" have no business speaking about these terms most of the time.

to actual web developers, the term Web 2.0 usefully describes the maturing of the web as an application development platform. compared with websites from 1992, modern websites are much more advanced/complex, interactive, and useful beyond just serving up static documents. this includes the rise of social networking, collaborative editing/filtering, and other web applications that are centered around user-generated content.

similarly, AJAX allows developers to create much more responsive web interfaces that behavior more like desktop applications. compared to iframe+JavaScript hacks used in the past to attempt to emulate these characteristics, AJAX is much more elegant and effective because it establishes a standardized technique for integrating various existing technologies in a seamless/transparent manner. this opens the web to new programming paradigms that has in part been responsible for the Web 2.0 phenomenon.

i think it's useful to have a term that describes these significant changes in web development. the web is no longer just a place to look up video game cheat codes & cooking recipes, or a haven for geeks and computer nerds, but it's actually becoming increasingly integrated into the everyday life of the average person. just look at the rise of Smartphones and other smart devices/web appliances. this is all at least partly due to the web growing beyond just a collection of static HTML pages.

and as more and more cities roll out municipal WiFi/WiMax networks and wireless internet access becomes just another basic public infrastructure, we'll see another revolution of internet applications--smart VoIP handsets replacing carrier-locked cellular phones, portable internet radio receivers giving you access to thousands of internet radio streams, digital cameras that upload your snapshots to a Google Maps mashup letting your friends follow your travels with an online map, and countless other applications that integrate the web/internet into our daily lives.

Re:What is it?

[Viking Coder]

There's this internet thing. And some companies have computers hooked up to it that you can rent. Amazon allows you to rent them at about $0.125 an hour.

AS MANY AS YOU WANT*. So, if you've got a lot of processing you need to do, but don't want to have to buy a bunch of computers, there ya go.

* Kind of.

Re:What is it?

[maxume]

The resource-as-machine aspect seems like a big part of the definition to me. Incremental billing also seems like part of it, but maybe that should be incremental resource tracking, with billing being a specific case of that tracking.

Re:What is it?

[ducomputergeek]

Time sharing 2.0?

Re:What is it?

[TheSovereign]

Cloud computing is essentially putting all of your data services on the web to be hosted by the large data warehouse corps (microsoft, google, amazon...etc). essentially it means that if you have access to the internet you have access to your data. so internal failures aren't relevant. It has been in the past however not so great as even google has had issues keeping certain data centers up.

Re:What is it?

[Almahtar]

What happened to "tubes"? Why doesn't anyone ever tell me these things? I didn't switch from "dump trucks" until a good month after the rest.

Re:What is it?

[Theoboley]

It depends on what your definition of is is

Re:What is it?

[marhar]

The idea is that you can scale up your service dynamically to meet demand. If you have a single dedicated host, you will have trouble when you exceed the capacity of that host, but if you are on one of these cloud services they will be able to manage the scaling for you.

It also means that you can go bankrupt on your first slashdotting!

Re:What is it?

[FredFredrickson]

Except AJAX is a useful implementation of server and client side scripting that developers use often.

Web 2.0 is just a groan-worthy phrase that broadly defines an era of (questionably) more-useful websites, but not neccessarily with any strict definition.

One's useful in classifying applications, the other is a buzzword.

Re:What is it?

[lysergic.acid]

some buzzwords are just fashion words that are meaningless phrases used to create a pretense of knowledge. but some buzzwords have real meaning and are not buzzwords in certain contexts.

for instance, these are all considered buzzwords: Dynamic, Emergence, Empowerment, Enterprise, Framework, Immersion, Leverage, Long Tail, Nanotechnology Next Generation, Paradigm, Paradigm shift, Proactive, Social Networking, SasS (Software as a Service), Synergy, and of course Web 2.0. but are all of these words completely meaningless and without useful applications?

i would say that it largely depends on who's speaking the "buzzword." when a marketing rep stands in front of a board of directors and says, "our new site is Web 2.0 compliant, using the latest AJAX technology to create a Next Generation web experience leveraging the Long Tail with the current Paradigm Shift in Enterprise markets trends," then he clearly has no idea what he's talking about, and is merely using buzzwords to hide the utter lack of substance in his speech.

whereas, if a web developer says, "the application trends that characterize the transition to Web 2.0 suggests that the users are looking to the web for a more interactive experience. increasingly Web 2.0 is showing that user participation and social interaction are the reason for the internet's increased cultural significance. Social Networking sites opened the door for Next Generation applications centered around user-generated content, to which collaborative filtering/editing are natural extensions. all of these developments have helped spread the Software as a Service business Paradigm," then his use of those "buzzwords" to express meaningful concepts is appropriate.

in my experience, it's usually people who don't actually work in the field that these buzzword/jargons apply to who are the quickest to rant about how meaningless such phrases are (usually accompanied by a gross oversimplification or equivocation of the concept that demonstrates their ignorance.)

Re:What is it?

[FredFredrickson]

I work in the field, and I guess after programming for a long time before the "web 2.0" thing, you just get used to the technology. Ajax is clever, there's no doubt- but it's nothing new in the http protocol. It's just a clever way of using an existing technology. I was writing ajax-type applications before the term ajax was used. And there were clearly interactive sites (less common) before web 2.0 was coined.

So, I guess the problem I see with some buzzwords is that they're typically used to convey a meaning to somebody less technical. I don't consider the term "web 2.0" useful unless I'm a hype machine (ie the media). Typically, as a developer, I would only use the term if I'm speaking with a client who likes buzzwords.

On the other side, AJAX is very specific, and a useful word that has also turned into a bit of a geek buzzword, but you won't see a Time magazine article referencing ajax like they do web 2.0. I use the term AJAX frequently, as the current business app I've been working on is fully ajaxed (and super-cool might I add).

Anyway, my point is that the people who don't understand the under-lying technologies are precisely who these phrases were invented for. For those who understand, it's typically nothing actually new under the sun, just somebody decided to coin the term. I refuse to call my audio downloads "podcasts." They were downloads, and still are just plainly downloads.

definition of cloud

[someone1234]

Cloud is dense vapor high above you.

Re:definition of cloud

[Anonymous Coward]

Cloud is dense vapor high above you.

So it's the latest hottest vaporware? Where do I sign up?

Re:definition of cloud

[glwtta]

Oh come on, aren't we supposed to be science geeks here? Clouds are water droplets, not vapor.

The good news...

[tomtomtom777]

As seen here:

For normal instances, Windows is 25% more expensive then Linux/UNIX, and for high CPU instances 50% it is 50% more expensive.

Desktop-computer sellers should learn something from that...

Re:The good news...

[MightyYar]

Desktop-computer sellers should learn something from that...

Or maybe Amazon should learn from the desktop sellers and load up each instance with "trialware". :)

Re:The good news...

[Seth Kriticos]

Well, the desktop market is subsidiarized and locked in like guantanamo. Joe Sixpack should just percive there is nothing else out there.

Different situation in a distributed server environment where a lot of systems are managed together by people actually having a clue about computers and do a little math. If you calculate the license costs and administration in this kind of environment you get some actually realistic price tags. And yes, a UNIX/Linux system is cheaper in this case, even if the license is neglected (which it is not) because it is more efficient to manage.

Re:The good news...

[maxume]

If most people wanted whatever OS was cheapest, you would have a point. As it is, most people want whatever OS is closest to what they are currently using, which is Windows.

(This is changing, but most people really do want 'the thing that works with what I have', and that isn't Linux just yet)

According to the TOS: No Spamming

[eldavojohn]

Though I've long admired Amazon's EC2 platform, Spamhaus evidentally considers it a hive of spammers.

Well, of course, haven't you read the terms of use. They've got this great section on indemnification where they wash their hands of any responsibilities from their users.

I could see a really bad pattern of someone approaching Amazon with claims of spamming and Amazon saying that they notified the user of improper behavior and that they are not liable for it.

Thank god they claim you shouldn't be able to do this though:

4.2. Restricted Uses Generally.
4.2.1. You may not interfere or attempt to interfere in any manner with the functionality or proper working of the Services.
4.2.2. You may not compile or use the Amazon Properties or any other information obtained through the Services for the purpose of direct marketing, spamming, unsolicited contacting of sellers or customers, or other impermissible advertising, marketing or other activities, including, without limitation, any activities that violate anti-spamming laws and regulations.
4.2.3. You may not remove, obscure, or alter any notice of any Mark, or other intellectual property or proprietary right designation appearing on or contained within the Services or on any Amazon Properties.
4.2.4. Subject to the terms and conditions of this Agreement, you may generally publicize your use of the Services; however, you may not issue any press release with respect to the Services or this Agreement without our prior written consent.

So really you should see these things get fixed ASAP. Should. I bet spammers are just as good as avoiding being shutdown at EC2 as they are anywhere else.

Re:According to the TOS: No Spamming

[John Hasler]

> Subject to the terms and conditions of this Agreement, you may generally publicize your
> use of the Services; however, you may not issue any press release with respect to the
> Services or this Agreement without our prior written consent.

In other words, there will be no negative reviews published.

Re:According to the TOS: No Spamming

[carbon 68k]

What?

"you may generally publicize your use of the Services" ==> you can have a "powered by EC2" blurb on your site or something.

"you may not issue any press release with respect to the Services or this Agreement" ==> you can't send out a PR saying "Now that we have the awesome power of AMAZON.COM behind us, with our awesome SLA, we can guarantee to our investors that the site will never stop working because AMAZON.COM is powering it!"

what part of that language captures published reviews?

Re:According to the TOS: No Spamming

[Crystalmonkey]

Posting to try and negate a mistake I made in moderating.

Beefy Clouds

[Anonymous Coward]

Or cloudy beef? Why have to choose, when you can have FLORG? FLORG is the future, FLORG is technology that allows YOU to be YOU! Also SPACE PANTS

What about Google?

[Dan East]

"The service is now in production (no longer beta)"

Then they have already reached a state that Google will never achieve.

Cloud Computing is Creepy

[GlobalColding]

Sorry, but I am still creeped out by the concept of keeping your data offsite, allowing a third party to control not only your data integrity, but its privacy, AND the cost structure of accessing/maintaining it. Seems like a very unhealthy dependency.

Re:Cloud Computing is Creepy

[shagymoe]

Risk vs Reward. Cash strapped startups can use Amazon Web Services to scale their app to hundreds of servers temporarily when they have that initial spike of interest. There is no affordable way to do this with traditional dedicated servers. When the traffic spike ebbs, server instances are terminated and costs go back to normal.

The risk is trusting your infrastructure and data to a third party, but if this is the risk you have to take to make it in business, I would say it is acceptable, at least until you can afford dedicated machines.

I think what Amazon is doing is amazing. Google got it all wrong by forcing you into their way of doing things. You must develop in python (this may have changed) and use their API. With Amazon, you can use any language and nearly any flavor of OS (mostly linux) you want to use. You can use any software or framework to build your apps. It's total freedom. There is no vendor lock in. If you decide to go dedicated one day, you can do it, no problem.

Re:Cloud Computing is Creepy

[ryanvm]

This reservation baffles me every time I hear it.

For most small-to-medium size businesses, there is a MUCH greater chance of theft or natural disaster leaving them without infrastructure (or worse, their data) than there is of Amazon fucking up.

Amazon has been doing this FOREVER, do you really think one morning you're going to wake up and find out that Amazon has forgotten how to run their global hosting operations? Give me a break.

My advice is this: Back up all your data locally, but run your services at Amazon. If the shit hits the fan hard enough and Amazon is shut down for so long that it has severely impacted your company's bottom line, then you may find yourself looking for another job. Fortunately the chances of that actually happening are less then the chances of a natural disaster annihilating your home town, so don't lose any sleep at night.

Re:Cloud Computing is Creepy

[ryanvm]

The risk is trusting your infrastructure and data to a third party

If you say so, but I have yet to work at a place where that I would rate with a lower risk of such a failure than Amazon. And hell, that was when EC2 was beta.

Look at it this way, what would it take for you to run a lower risk operation than Amazon?

• Will you have better Internet connection redundancy? No.
• Will you have more scaling capacity? No.
• Will you have greater response times from upstream vendors (e.g., Sprint, IBM, Cisco)? No.
• Will you have a larger pool of disaffected peer users? No.

Faced with the same service-disrupting problem, Amazon will be working much more efficiently on solving it than almost any business with less than 50,000 employees possibly could.

Re:Cloud Computing is Creepy

[Anonymous Coward]

By your logic, my home town must've been annihilated several times already, seeing as amazon has lost all services for extended periods of time a few times already.

And that doesn't include 'instance' failures which happen routinely because each 'instance' isn't anything magic... it's just a shitty little non-redundant computer.

Re:Cloud Computing is Creepy

[psydeshow]

Yes indeed, for most small to medium sized businesses, or for anyone without a seriously privacy-sensitive application, Amazon is a great way to go. Much more secure than having a server sitting on your desk, or virtual host through a mom & pop isp.

But if you are paranoid, or you need to assure your boss/clients that the server is secure, then Amazon is exactly wrong for you. You have no control over, or insight into, the security of their infrastructure. You can't audit the source, you can't audit access logs, you really have no idea who or what is operating on their physical hosts.

Can an Amazon admin or script grep through your ram or storage? Of course they can. Can and admin or script snapshot your instance and save it somewhere else? Of course they can. This is likely what the OP meant by "creepy".

Re:Cloud Computing is Creepy

[adpowers]

Can an Amazon admin or script grep through your ram or storage? Of course they can. Can and admin or script snapshot your instance and save it somewhere else? Of course they can. This is likely what the OP meant by "creepy".

But how is this any different from Rackspace or Dreamhost? Most people who berate cloud computing tend to have no idea how it actually works. The only difference between dedicated hosting and EC2 is that one charges you by the hour. How is that an invasion of your privacy or a dangerous lack of control?

Re:Cloud Computing is Creepy

[psydeshow]

But how is this any different from Rackspace or Dreamhost? Most people who berate cloud computing tend to have no idea how it actually works. The only difference between dedicated hosting and EC2 is that one charges you by the hour. How is that an invasion of your privacy or a dangerous lack of control?

It's true of any virtual hosting or virtual private server plan. EC2 gives you a virtual private server running on top of a host controlled by Amazon. Amazon has access to RAM and storage. They have access to your private keys.

The danger isn't new or different, but with all the hype over cloud solutions it's important to remind people of the security implications. EC2 gives you root on your own server instance, and folks might be tempted to think that root==privacy.

I'll take Amazon over Rackspace or even Dreamhost, but EC2 is inherently less secure than putting your own servers into a locked cabinet at a trusted data-center.

How's this bad for MS?

[Anonymous Coward]

They win either way. Amazon is paying out the nose for Windows licenses to host their Windows and MSSQL "cloud" services. They can't compete with Microsoft on price there, because Microsoft doesn't have to pay to license its own products.

Having another successful vendor offering Microsoft-hosted services is only good for Microsoft. What would be bad news would be if Amazon dug in and did not offer MS-hosted services, and instead pushed only bridge or transitioning services to poach Microsoft-hosted customers to its own platform.

this just in

[nimbius]

corporations compete for business; film at 11.

The Service Level Agreement is a joke

[Paeva]

After reading the SLA at http://aws.amazon.com/ec2-sla/, I see it as all a big show with no real guts behind it:

# Availability is averaged over the last 365 days, but you only get credit for the current month's costs.
# You only get a service credit for 10% of the current month's costs. If you decide to move your business elsewhere, you may not apply the credit toward any past charges, including for the month in which the outage occurred.
# Availability refers to the "region" availability, and makes no guarantees about instance (computer) reliability, storage consistency/reliability. As far as I can imagine, it might be rather hard to figure out what constitutes a region's "availability" independently. The official measure stated in the SLA is basically a measurement made solely by Amazon.
# To receive any of this pathetic service credit (again, it is not a refund), you are required to send Amazon an email documenting (dates, times, regions) and providing evidence (heartbeat request logs, etc). *Yes, they want logs.* For almost all of their customers, the time and effort involved in filing a claim would outweigh the benefit of the credit.

Re:The Service Level Agreement is a joke

[Just Some Guy]

To receive any of this pathetic service credit (again, it is not a refund), you are required to send Amazon an email documenting (dates, times, regions) and providing evidence (heartbeat request logs, etc). *Yes, they want logs.*

If you outsource your servers but don't monitor them, then you pretty much deserve whatever happens.

Re:The Service Level Agreement is a joke

[afidel]

As in the level of service we guarantee is none. If you are relying on this for your business you better have paid up your business insurance premiums and made damn sure that an outage is covered because you ain't even getting a refund for services not rendered by Amazon.

Re:What is it? Scaling

[borkus]

It's not just the remote hosting that's appealing - it's the scalability.

If I write an app and put it on a dedicated host, I'm okay until I exceed the capacity of that host. Then I have to find another box or boxes and I may even have to change my software since I had assumed it would only be on one server. Finding additional capacity, refactoring and load balancing not only add cost, but effort (and therefore time).

On a service like EC2 (or even Google Apps), I'm renting space on the massive infrastructure of Amazon or Google. Their frameworks restrict you from developing anything that can only run on a single server. And if I need more capacity, I just right a bigger check that month.

That scalability goes for bandwidth as well. If you poke around the internet, you'll find lots of folks using Amazon's storage service for that reason.

In other words...

[Sun.Jedi]

"Yes, that is a problem, and we are working on it".

Not the same at all...

[mattcasters]

In a cloud setting, your application doesn't run on a single machine. It typically runs on a bunch of them.
The first popular examples of these were applications like Seti@Home where thousands of machines (a cloud of machines) help search for ET.
The variable number of machines is probably a typical trait of a cloud computing application.
Typically, a lot of machines are available if you want them and in the case of Amazon they are even virtual machines, not real boxes.

Re:Not the same at all...

[asv108]

SETI != cloud computing. Seti is distributed computing. Cloud computing is remote hosting + virtualization + configuration management.

Amazon competing with their vendor

[pembo13]

Wonder how well that works out. Is there any law preventing Microsoft from tweaking cost of future CALs to Amazon in light of the competition?

Of course...

[NoNeeeed]

I'm sure Microsoft will be terribly upset about Amazon selling Windows VMs in huge numbers.

Speaking of which, I bet the licensing for this was rather complex.

Re:What is it? Scaling

[Jellybob]

Their frameworks restrict you from developing anything that can only run on a single server.

While most of what you say is true, that particular statement is not. EC2 provides a virtual machine, running the operating system of your choice - anything you could do on your single co-located server, you can do on an EC2 machine.

Watch the license...

[tgd]

Amazon has said very little clearly about who is paying for the Windows license in the VM, and what situations you can replicate a Windows VM in.

What they wish you could do and what Microsoft allows you to do (given the need to change SIDs and machine names, and the fact that a VLK can't be used in that scenario) means Amazon is punting license compliance onto the end user who will likely not be able to do what they wish they could do.

MS reach new heights

[Colin Smith]

In the performance throughput of BSOD generation metrics.

 

cloud confidentiality

[Benjamin_Wright]

Although the law is motivating enterprises to keep e-mail in reliable archival systems, confidentiality concerns suggest a preference for record-retention systems to be in-house rather than in the cloud. On the topic of enterprise confidentiality in the cloud, stay tuned to commentary in the legal community. The topic merits careful review and more analysis. --Ben http://hack-igations.blogspot.com/2008/02/collaboration-e-discovery-and-record.html

I was going to ask just that

[MattW]

I was going to use it for sending a lot of emails (closed-loop confirmed opt-in, not spam. We just have a million customers and they like alerts for certain types of sales), but the spamhaus listing ruins that.

Still useful for some things, but it can't sub in for normal IP space if they can't handle the spam thing.

Maybe amazon can maintain a spam-free block where you post a bond before you can use it.

Re:I was going to ask just that

[TooMuchToDo]

Try using smtp.com. Some of our clients run big apps in EC2 and then send the email out through smtp.com servers they contract for.

Re:What is it? Scaling

[jackd]

While most of what you say is true, that particular statement is not. EC2 provides a virtual machine, running the operating system of your choice - anything you could do on your single co-located server, you can do on an EC2 machine.

There are heaps of limitations compared to dedicated machines. Check out the Amazon forums, and you'll be surprised how far you'll be from getting the full sensation of the real thing.

You can for example only have 1 static public IP per instance. Bad for hosting multiple Web apps with SSL on each domain.

Load balancing multiple instances is also a bitch.

We considered it seriously for a high-volume high-availability Web site project, but kept running into dealbreaking limitations, and some we just happened to stumble upon during testing. Minor things that suddenly turn incredibly difficult to solve.

Add to that the cost.. In our cost comparisons we found EC2 costing the same or more than managed dedicated servers with tier 1 providers.

There's no question EC2, VMWare and other "cloud" platforms will be highly attractive, but not yet.

blah, shall i force feed all jokes?

[someone1234]

on page: www.bbc.co.uk/weather/weatherwise/glossary/c.shtml

"A structure formed in the lower atmosphere by condensed water vapour and ice particles."

In other words just what i said...

Re:blah, shall i force feed all jokes?

[lenester]

"Condensed" is not the same as "dense." You, for instance, are not condensed.

Re:blah, shall i force feed all jokes?

[glwtta]

Interesting, but as far as I know, "condensed water vapour" is called "water". Same with "thawed ice".

Re:blah, shall i force feed all jokes?

[davester666]

Um, Wikipedia is the preferred source for online "truth".

Everybody knows the BBC only hires left-wing nuts!

Another "MS Announcement"?

[stereoroid]

It's been a big week for news about MS: good news, generally. Most of it was not about Microsoft: can we find a new abbreviation for them? I know M$ has already been tried, but Multiple Sclerosis has been around a bit longer than Bill Gates has. The current state of MS research and treatment is IMHO far more interesting than anything coming out of Redmond these days...

Did You Read The Summary?

[Slashdot Parent]

For normal instances, Windows is 25% more expensive then Linux/UNIX, and for high CPU instances 50% it is 50% more expensive.

Desktop-computer sellers should learn something from that...

Ummm.. Did you read the summary?

Microsoft is releasing a competing platform next week. Do you really think that Amazon got a great deal on their Windows licensing?

Apples, meet Oranges.

Re:What is it? Scaling

[billcopc]

Add to that the cost.. In our cost comparisons we found EC2 costing the same or more than managed dedicated servers with tier 1 providers.

BAM! That's what turned me off of Amazon as well. Anything they can do, I can do cheaper elsewhere with "conventional" servers. There are literally hundreds if not thousands of hosting companies just dying to lease you a $49/mo dedicated server that runs circles around any EC2 VPS, and most of them have at least 500gb of traffic included in the base price.

For ~$150 I have 10mbit unmetered, on a dual-core Xeon. Actually I have several, with reverse proxies and what-have-you, just like the Amazon cats do when they want to scale. The big differences are: I have static IPs, and my costs are lower. I am at risk of hardware failures, but then again I can afford an extra box or two for redundancy/backups.

I could see EC2 being worthwhile for small or short-lived jobs, but the moment you start talking about multiple instances and pound/squid nodes, you might as well move to a dedicated box.

Re:What is it? Scaling

[snuf23]

"I have static IPs"

Amazon has offered "Elastic IPs" for quite some time. Once you request an IP address it is yours until you release. It doesn't have to be assigned a particular instance.
The key difference is that you pay for an Amazon instance only as long as it is turned on. If you use dynamic or scheduled scaling (if you have predictable traffic patterns) you can scale up or down your servers as you need. You only pay for the time they are turned on. Obviously it completely depends on the type of application you are running as to whether or not this is an advantage.

MOD PARENT UP

[Anonymous Coward]

Someone finally defined teh Cloud

Re:What is it? Scaling

[Kent Recal]

Your definition of "cheap" amuses me.

Thing is, your dying "$49/month" hosting companies tend to suddenly become *very* expensive when and if you need to scale.
In reality the common route is indeed to start out on such a discounter, until it assplodes. And then rent a rack somewhere, fill it with own hardware and move as fast as you can.

Compared to *this* route (which many startups can sing a song about) the amazon prices don't look so hefty anymore.

And frankly, it is definately that part of the scalability story that you should watch out for.
What does it matter whether you pay $49/month or ~$90/month (amazon) during the early days?

I don't think those $600 bucks that you may save in the first year will ease you much when you get to spent 5 digits on hardware to handle load spikes that, on amazon, would only cost you a few hundred bucks each...

as per wikipedia :)

[someone1234]

"Condensation is the change in matter of a substance to a denser phase"

So, yeah.

Re:What is it? Scaling

[billcopc]

That's funny, I've been scaling for years, and my host has been around since the last 90's.

I don't deal in anything that has such dramatic spikes as to discredit my system. I'm perfectly comfortable with the fact that my machines are 80% idle during off-peak times. I'm far more concerned with issues like network congestion and Apache hogging because my traffic is bandwidth-bound, not CPU bound.

Just because all the kids today are writing hungry RoR apps, doesn't mean I'm bound by such ridiculous bottlenecks. Just one of my boxes can serve roughly 100 requests per second, which is why I have to use squid frontends, else the clients end up tying all my Apache threads waiting to finish.

Designing my app to be easily distributed means I can scale Google-style, by adding cheap servers as needed. I also spread out my servers geographically around the globe, with plentiful bandwidth at each location. With EC2, you're sharing the pipe with everyone else. You can't get dedicated bandwidth, and from what I've seen the capacity just isn't there (yet?).

Yes, I'm talking about serving pr0n. Next question.

Re:What is it? Scaling

[Kent Recal]

I don't see why you think that ec2 should be discredited as a whole based on a use-case that they're not even remotely targeting?
Ec2 is for application hosting or number crunching. Static content (like porn) is the job for a CDN. Ec2 is not a CDN.

And honestly, claiming you are bandwidth bound, using apache and serving a miserable 100 hits/sec per node all in the same paragraph does not help your credibility much.
You're either doing it really, really wrong (cf. epic fail) or you're just trying to sound important without having ever really touched a large scale system.

For reference, an async-io server like nginx, lighty, zeus or similar will easily saturate a Gbit uplink on moderate hardware, either with small files (then it will push upwards of 1000 reqs/sec) or with large files (then your "100 reqs/sec"-statement makes even less sense). Sorry, but thanks for playing.