A thought on anti-virus as anti-bodies

Sooner or later the OS and the virtualization layer will become one and the same. They already perform the same function (brokering limited physical resources amongst multiple applications) and while virtualization is a huge step, it just adds overhead to the equation.

In the future, I think each app will have its own little blended OS/virtualization wrapper and it will be able to move around a cloud environment, using what it needs, but not dependent on any single physical piece of hardware. That presents a problem though of securing it against some of the bad stuff that is sure to affect these systems.

This came up in a conversation with a friend tonight who posed the question of applications that today, while they are not required, sit in a shared OS environment with the application...applications like anti-virus software. It's a good question and if the applications are going to be more self-contained, then I don't think it can be answered from a traditional application programming perspective. I think we have to look at the cloud as more akin to a living biological organism rather than a static collection of manufactured processes and compute systems.

And if that is the direction that the cloud takes, one where the location of an application is much more dynamic than in even a traditional virtual infrastructure, then we need a better way to provide these protective functions as part of the "organism". We need an immune system for the cloud.

The first line of defense is the "skin" encompassing your standard perimeter security items such as filters and firewalls. Other layers of defense would be needed if that first layer is breached, apps that act like white blood cells or anti-bodies. Let them flow through the cloud in search of the virus or malware or whatever bad thing is there and then they can go to work cleaning it up. Of course, we'll still have to inoculate and create new vaccines and we'll need the ability to introduce "cures" for the new "bugs" that show up, against which there is not an existing defense, just like with our own bodies.

I don't know that this "organism" model is where we will end up, but something like it should be our end goal. If not, then we'll ultimately end up confined by a great monolithic structure instead of an organic type of thing that can adapt, self-monitor, and heal itself, or that, at the first sign of new symptoms, can be quickly and effectively treated and innoculated against future outbreaks.

Just my two cents and it is still a little rough, but I think the premise is sound. Feel free to comment.

Cloud Computing, the Tablet, and the Developing World

I love Nicholas Negroponte's One Laptop Per Child organization. As the name states, their mission is:

"To create educational opportunities for the world's poorest children by providing each child with a rugged, low-cost, low-power, connected laptop with content and software designed for collaborative, joyful, self-empowered learning."

One big challenge he is running into is the cost and he sees the tablet as the way to get to his goal of a $100 "laptop". He thinks all of the necessary functionality can fit into the tablet and that it is the ideal platform because it has "no moving parts, not even a hinge." It's perfect.

Except that today's tablet is finitely usable. Like any self-contained computing platform, it is only as good as the technology that is in it and its useful life is limited. What needs to happen is to purpose-build a tablet to tap into the cloud. Think how this could impact, not only Negroponte's children, but numerous others, especially women, in developing nations.

One of the things that I find fascinating (mainly due to my self-absorbed Western perspective) is the rise of the microfinance industry. Here we have people that are starting businesses on as little as $100-200! Compare that to the latest VC-financed enterprise here in the States. Now don’t get me wrong; relative to their annual incomes, that can be a steep price, but entrepreneurs exist everywhere, and few have ever had access to capital to launch. But the microfinance industry (made up of secular and faith-based participants) has opened up tremendous possibilities in those areas where it has been able to gain traction.

When we start to couple cloud-enabled tablets with microfinance opportunities and expand both we give those folks access to information and the means to begin to move out of the abject poverty in which so many of them live. Will we ever totally eradicate poverty? Not in this world. There are too many other factors at work. And neither the cloud or the tablet or even the applications are where they need to be yet. But they will be. And as information becomes more ubiquitous and people have access to means that allow them to act on it, other freedoms and opportunities can follow.

Sure, it's an idealistic view of things, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't give it a try someday.

Into the fray

Well, on my final day of employment at one place and in honor of new (ad)ventures, here is the introductory entry into my new blog site. Since anyone can show up in the blogosphere with their own creation why wouldn't I want to do the same. I hope there will be valuable introspection in the things that I publish around cloud computing from the perspective of the utility model.

I will post non-technical, managerial/executive-level perspectives of things going on in the world of cloud/utility computing and various posts based on my experiences as a senior manager of professional services engineers involved in developing best practices/methodologies and delivery of those technologies, having been involved in "troublesome" projects, and in my new ventures.

For more info on me, feel free to check out my LinkedIn profile.