"The promise of cloud computing is here. These pages provide the 'eyes wide open' insights you need to transform your business." --Christopher Crowhurst, Vice President, Strategic Technology, Thomson Reuters A Down-to-Earth Guide to Cloud Computing Cloud Computing: A Practical Approach provides a comprehensive look at the emerging paradigm of Internet-based enterprise applications and services. This accessible book offers a broad introduction to cloud computing, reviews a wide variety of currently available solutions, and discusses the cost savings and organizational and operational benefits. You'll find details on essential topics, such as hardware, platforms, standards, migration, security, and storage. You'll also learn what other organizations are doing and where they're headed with cloud computing. If your company is considering the move from a traditional network infrastructure to a cutting-edge cloud solution, you need this strategic guide. Cloud Computing: A Practical Approach covers: Costs, benefits, security issues, regulatory concerns, and limitations Service providers, including Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Yahoo, IBM, EMC/VMware, Salesforce.com, and others Hardware, infrastructure, clients, platforms, applications, services, and storage Standards, including HTTP, HTML, DHTML, XMPP, SSL, and OpenID Web services, such as REST, SOAP, and JSON Platform as a Service (PaaS), Software as a Service (SaaS), and Software plus Services (S+S) Custom application development environments, frameworks, strategies, and solutions Local clouds, thin clients, and virtualization Migration, best practices, and emerging standards