COMPUTING IN 2011

Computers and computing are going to see sea change in the coming year of 2011.

Google has announced computers without operating system and they may cost even 25% less in India in 2011.

Most of the hardware is going to be cheaper day by day.

The printers – dot matrices, inkjets and lasers – have come down in prices.

They are cheap nowadays compared to the prices of yesteryears.

When I bought a hp inkjet printer eight years ago, it was Rs. 12,000/- but now I can buy one for Rs. 3000/-

This is only an example.

The CDs, DVDs, pen drives and portable hard discs are sold at throw away prices today.

It appears that they are going to be still cheaper in due course of time probably by 2011.

Cloud computing and virtualization are the attractive terms used in the Information Technology arena today.

I was curious to know the meaning of these fancy terms.

Someone said that people can store their data in a common hard disc and download them whenever needed as we do the websites.

Also it is said that every thing will be in on line so there is no need to download and store them in our hard disc and CDs.

It makes much simpler for companies, government departments and even for individuals to compute cheaply provided we have an efficient broadband system.

The broad band is very fast and efficient in advanced countries like the US.

The downloading, uploading and browsing the net are fast to very fast.

Therefore on e of the pre-requisites for cloud computing is going to be a fast broadband network which is unfortunately not available in India and other developing countries at present.’

So cloud computing in India may take long time.

Since data are going to a common pool, in cloud computing, people suspect the safety of their data.

It is also easy for a hacker to reach the central data store easily.

WikiLeaks has already sent out a clear message.

So it is going to be the biggest threat for the progress of cloud computing in future.

However, one of the advantages everyone feels is that organizations need not invest in hard wares and associated establishments and thus can save huge amount of money. 

Amazon, the biggest book seller giant on-line already provides the so-called ‘cloud computing service’ by renting out some of the thousands of computers used to run its online store.

Let us see as we march through 2011, what cloud computing is going to offer and also the innumerable electronic accessories of computers are going to change our way of thinking and life-style.

15 December 2010