In this video, were going to talk about Cloud Services - what are they, how do you compare
them, how do you pick one, why are they important to you and to your business.
Good day Dan, how are you?
Good, thanks Tim.
So, I think you are a good person, someone who runs an IT company, to ask my questions
about cloud services.
Lets just start with what are they, and why are they called Cloud?
Isn't that a puffy thing up in the sky?
Well, it is that, but it's also that the Cloud is a term we used to say that the data that
we have sits on somebody else's computer.
So we use the Cloud when we copy our files.
We use the Cloud when we tag videos of our kids and we upload it to the iCloud, and we
use the Cloud in business when we do backups of our data.
Alright, so Clouds actually means a large group of computers
possibly sitting in a room somewhere.
That's what we're talking about.
That's it, yeah.
That's just at the other end of a wire or at the other end of the internet somehow.
Yeah, absolutely.
So, there are different kinds of clouds.
I think you've mentioned to me, there's public and there's private.
How do the different kinds of Clouds compare?
You have public cloud which is generally available to anybody with a phone and credit card.
So, public clouds are run by the large companies like Microsoft and Apple and Amazon who run
these large data centers all around the world.
And then you have private clouds that are run by smaller IT companies like us that offer
more of a boutique solution to what customers need to run their business.
Okay, so one is kind of a massive and general one, one is specific and sort of caters to
an individual business.
That's right.
And when you use private cloud like we have, it's much more customized, mold to what the
business wants ones rather than just being lumped
into a bucket of what public cloud offers.
In saying that, we use a combination of public and private cloud to deliver what we call
a hybrid solution.
So it's a solution for the business that uses that best out of both.
Yeah that sounds, that makes total sense.
You know, rather than pick one over the other, get the best of both worlds.
Absolutely.
Can you give me a quick story, an example of maybe migrating a company from a server
that was sitting under a desk somewhere which on my understanding is "old hat" to cloud
services that have helped them out in a big way.
Yes, so we do those kinds of migrations fairly often.
So, businesses traditionally would have that server that sits in a cupboard and more and more
these days, they don't wanna replace that service.
That's when they come to us and say, "can we use the cloud?"
So we will migrate the business in, so instead of them having to replace that server, we'll
take them away from that and we'll copy their data into a data centre somewhere and we'll
make sure they've got good fast reliable access to that data.
So these are cloud centres, these data centres you're talking about, I'm just being curious
about them, is that something where I could, let's say sign up for a service with you guys
and then drive down the road to a data center in Sydney and actually walk in and see just
a rack and rack of computers, or is that something I have to stay away from?
So once you sign up to a service with cloud provider like us, you generally don't ever
see where that data sits.
I mean you're welcome to come and do a tour of a data centre but these places are just
rows and rows of servers and hard drives and the data centres are so secure that generally
people can't just turn up and have a bit of a tour through them without the proper authorisation.
Can't just sneak in?
You can't just go in there and hope that you can see your data.
Identify the individual rack.
Every movie that I see, you can just put on a hat pretending to be a telecommunications
company and sneak in, that doesn't work.
Not these days.
Alright, so what sorts of companies should be signing up for cloud services?
Is it everybody from a one-person operation to a thousand-person?
What kind of company profile should be interested in this?
Absolutely any business starting out should be looking at how they can use the cloud to
run their business.
So, 5 or 6 years ago you would have had to buy that server that sit-sat in the corner
of the room to run your business but nowadays, you can just subscribe to a cloud service
and pay 10, 20, 50, a couple of hundred dollars to start out so that you can start your business.
So a business starting out should definitely look at starting out in the cloud.
But as well as that any business that's been around for a few years, several years, should
be looking at ways that they can use the cloud to deliver efficiencies in their business
and just make sure that their data and their applications are accessible to their staff
no matter where they sit.
So from a data point of view that makes sense,
from a flexibility point of view it makes sense.
What are my chances of getting hacked if my data is not sitting in a cupboard that I can
actually sort of see their computer?
Better or worse.
Your chances of being hacked in a data centre are no better or no worse as to having the
data sitting on your computer in your office and it just depends on what security you have
whether you set up in a data centre or whether you setup in home.
So just making sure that your data is always secure is the best thing that matter where
it sits.
No matter where it is.
And then I think you've spoken to me about backing up as well as an important part of
what should be going on.
Yes, so, data security making sure that the data is secure by passwords and firewalls
is important as well as that making sure the data is backed up.
Not only backed up on in one location, backed up in different locations as well.
So, if something happens in that one location, like there's a flood, or a fire, or something
happens to that building where your data is, at least your data is backed up in a completely
separate location so you've got the ability to restore that data and to run your business
again if you need to.
Alright, good, any other important factors about cloud services I haven't covered that
we should think about?
Any business starting out really should look at how they can use the cloud to be able to
get better efficiencies in their business.
I think that's the key take out point, is preferably for a business now, they should
say, "how can I use the cloud?"
Alright, terrific, thanks very much!
For those of you who'd would like to find out more or potentially sign up through saberVox
for cloud IT services please reach us online at sabervox.com.au