Cloud knocking at CIO's door !

Cloud providers are getting into a new foray of things which from looks, sounds very impressive and game changing trends. I believe there is a new trend of opportunities which is going to squish the way enterprise systems has been used/accessed over few decades. I have tried few of the stuff personally and it has been exciting, with all sort of new ideas and thoughts.

I am going to talk about three very cool stuff which were recently launched by AWS (i.e. Workspace, Workmail & Workdocs). A good chunk of information is already available about these enterprise services.

However I believe it would be better to put across an end user’s point of view after using these services at first hand.

1. WorkSpace - If you have heard about Desktop as a Service (DaaS) or desktop in the cloud, then you can understand it pretty quick. At present there are 3 different (virtual, standard & performance) variants of virtual desktops offered by AWS which are loaded with commonly used applications for e.g. Microsoft Office etc. But good part is that user is allowed to bring in your set of applications to install on top of the base images. The lowest variant of desktop starts at $25 / month.

GameChanger - There are many organization today those are planning or already in progression of adopting virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) on-premise, I believe this is an excellent alternate to that.

Benefits - Quick to start is the biggest plus point I see here. We are in age where all of us need more than one desktop and this is exactly one of the unique differentiator i rate. At low cost one can get a desktop which runs on the cloud and accessible from almost anywhere and there are no string attached, what a great deal.

Limitations - Working on the remote desktop is bit sluggish as screen refresh time is bit high. It uses TCP4172 port which is not always open and one should consult with IT team before going after it. This may require to change / tweak the IT policies in nutshell

2. WorkMail - This is indeed a good option on the likes of exchange & other enterprise messaging systems. Price starts at $4/per users with 50 GB storage can easily offbeat the existing email services provided by other players. In addition it can easily integrate with active directory (AD) & seamlessly work with Outlook to give users enriching experience in terms of reminder, meeting, calendar etc.

Game Changer - Security, integration and compatibility were common challenges for cloud based email services, i recall Gmail doesn’t have all equivalent features of Outlook. Workmail consider to have mitigated these challenges quite a bit, which enabled it to be strong contender in this space.

Benefits - Low cost email solution and offers an enterprise class messaging service. For an organization with a user base of 1000 users, Workmail is going to cost $48,000/year.

Limitations - Workmail claims but there are very high chances that it will not be able offer the extensive flexibilities from user standpoint, only the adoption will tell the success of Workmail.

3. Workdocs / Zocalo - Came across few use case scenarios at work where users ask for a tool which allows them to share files with an ease of drag n drop and without installing any tools or server applications. Zocalo offers a link to  web portal which allows users to upload files which can be synced on a a file server running in a WorkSpace owned by the user. Concept is slightly similar to Googledocs, Box.com or Dropbox.com, I didn’t found a major differentiator here for this service. But in larger scheme of things it fits well and address the need of common repository accessible to all users working on specific project.

Game Changer - No, not really. There are similar products and applications already available in the market place.

Benefits - Cost and ease to use can be plus point, its starts with $5 per month for one user for 200 GB of storage.

Limitation - I believe Workdocs is a must service, if you have signed up for Workspace. I didn’t found any other way to do file sharing among fellow users.

As i conclude my thoughts here, there are many other cloud provider who offers similar set of services. It would be interesting to watch the space for time-being and see how other shape up their services to woo the customers.

Stay tune for more updates in Cloud space.

Brar

Virtual Reality (VR) or Augmented Reality (AR)

Watching a movie in 3D or doing spacewalk are very close experience of virtual reality, you probably have experienced. I came across tons of innovative ideas and apps which take you to even more closer to realities. Ideas such as Google-glass, I believe a great innovation allows you to see through things from someone else’s perspective. I believe this is going to be revolutionary & open the flood gates for many similar devices in the marketplace. From virtual world to the real world, in an augmented way which we call augmented reality (AR). I personally see end less opportunities for AR to change the consumer experiences.

There are multiple apps available in the marketplace for smartphone which when you points towards a building, structure or objects, lists the information of interests relates to it. A fantastic app for a house seeker, by pointing a smartphone towards the building it tells the about the availability of apartments. Before delivering the experience, AR can enables products maker to realize the pain points consumer going through and thereafter design them, the use case can be almost infinite.

The concept of AR is not new as it looks, you may recall the experience of skywalk at air & space museum or flying simulator which gives close feeling of free fall with no gravitational pull. I believe the evolution of technology has enabled to apply the same idea across different places.

Advertiser agencies I believe are the first one’s in commercial space who are going after AR in a big way and producing great applications of all sorts.

Interesting and exemplary ideas of AR, which I came across in recent times.

• Google Glass, a pair of glass but in reality an awesome product which can help user to take pictures, videos, send message and use GPS to
• Ikea digital catalogue (http://www.ikea.com/ca/en/about_ikea/newsitem/2014catalogue), which offer digital content which reveals a decorators paradise in 360/180 view of rooms, and helps user to design his/her own space digitally before put in the order
• TryLive, another similar application which allows user to try on glasses, jewelry, shoes, clothes and home products. This ideal for users who would like to buy online and try out the fitment
• Digital iMirror & expression reading kiosks by different brands installed over at their showrooms..
• AR Business Card, a pretty cool idea of user introducing themselves in a very intuitive way and hopefully an extension of QR code which people use these days on their. http://vimeo.com/4979525

Keep writing thoughts..
Brar

SMAC - A New Wave of Technology for Marketers

For a Marketer,  before the arrival of digital era the marketing wasn't as complex as its now days are, the sheer reason is the limited numbers of channels and mediums to reach the consumers. However with the evolution of internet & cloud which we favorably calls - digital age, the marketing is more exhaustive and intriguing because the channels of marketing are becoming almost limitless.

• Online Presence - Websites, SEO, SEM, Videos, Mobile Apps
• Social Medea tools - Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, FourSquare, Linkedin
• Printmedia, newspaper, TV News, RSS..

Perhaps, this list goes on & on, with every week I see a new social platforms and tools being launched for new age of users

SMAC - Is the new wave of technology targeted for digital marketers. Given stack of technologies encompass the combined use of social, mobile, analytic & cloud computing. I believe the marketers who conceptualize the use of these 4 technologies together as a one stack can drive higher Customer Engagement, Greater Innovation & Exponential Growth in the opportunities unlike in previous waves personal compute & internet revolutions.

These should be also viewed as a set of complementary technologies, where :

Social - Context Comes before the conversation and transpires into  “Engagement”

Mobile - Brings the “Always On” effect with multiple devices; channels

Analytics  Drives “Actionable Insights”

And Last but not least Cloud makes it “Real Time” & “Flexible”

As a marketer you always think through your marketing strategy and all this through with a limited budgets. Technology is the back pockets tools for a marketer of today's times. He banks on it heavily, and effective use of technologies can take marketing efforts to different levels. SMAC will be a great tool set for a marketer to drive his marketing campaign effectively.

Virtual desktops, An idea of office in the box

Desktop virtualization is software technology {Desktop as a Service} that separates the desktop environment and associated application software from the physical client device that is used to access it. Desktop virtualization can be used in conjunction with application virtualization and user profile management systems (Active Directory, LDAP), now termed "user virtualization," to provide a comprehensive desktop environment management system. All the components of the desktop are virtualized, which allows for a highly flexible and much more secure desktop delivery model. This approach supports a more complete desktop disaster recovery strategy as all components are essentially saved in the data center and backed up through traditional redundant maintenance systems.

Typically, software products that deliver desktop virtualization solutions can combine local and remote implementations into a single product to provide the most appropriate support specific to requirements. Virtualization is employed to present independent instances to multiple users and requires a strategic segmentation of the host server and presentation at some layer of the host's architecture. The enabling application software is called a hypervisor. Virtual Desktop Infrastructure is a desktop-centric service that hosts user desktop environments on remote servers and/or PCs, which are accessed over a network using a remote display protocol. A connection brokering service is used to connect users to their assigned desktop sessions. For users, this means they can access their desktop from any location, without being tied to a single client device. Since the resources are centralized, users moving between work locations can still access the same desktop environment with their applications and data. For IT administrators, this means a more centralized, efficient client environment that is easier to maintain and able to respond more quickly to the changing needs of the user and business.

Virtualization Desktop Infrastructure empowers deployment of remote desktop services architectures that provide employees the flexibility to work anywhere, while allowing them to seamlessly access their corporate windows desktop or application environment running in the datacenter from a range of devices. This increases flexibility of access for remote desktops and applications, delivering personalized, consistent, and secure experiences for users, while also improving compliance through centralized control and access to confidential data. VDI facilitates optimal use of hardware and associated applications can be run seamlessly on virtual interfaces.

Conceptual technology stack using VMware vSphere platform showing desktop virtualization. Citrix is another probable choice to setup virtual desktop infrastructure.

Internet of Things

By 2025 almost all household appliances from washing machines to cooking range to cars would be connected with Internet. With this evolution, one thing, which will definitely change for the user, would be their behavior & usage patterns while interfacing with them.

The appliances connected to the Internet can be easily being operate-able by the consumers. This is going to be great user feature and allow remote management of appliance sitting almost anywhere. For manufacture it is equally a great way to remotely manage and provide support/guidance or maintenance services at much effectively at any given hour of the day.

Some other big facet of this whole connectivity and connectedness is, the data stored on these devices, which will be available to manufacture almost near to real-time basis or offline basis.

While some producers have already begun forming on this integration and launched products in the market, others have taken up jumping onto the wagon of smart appliances

For Information technology this is sounding to open new avenues for analytics & big data.

This connected era of the Internet of things would definitely lead to give tremendous push to new ideas & innovations in the near future and will insure a life fully armored with smart appliances

Time to watch & get on to it.

In cloud you do things cloud’s way

In cloud you do things cloud’s way

Lately Amazon, AWS approached us to do a proof-of-concept (POC) on their cloud platform to validate if it is good enough to host an enterprise applications. And I am delighted that this POC on Amazon, AWS has scraped many of our if and but’s about cloud.

To brief about POC, we chose ResutSpace3 as an application to be tested on AWS. And the selection of RS3 was simply for the reason, that we (ISST) hold good experience around its architecture, functionality and infrastructure. In addition, the enterprise class multi-tier architecture with stringent non-functional requirements such as high availability, performance, DR, etc. made it a super fit.

Some of the highlights and our experience about AWS

1. The architecture portability from the way it’s currently implemented in Physical infrastructure to cloud infrastructure was easy and smooth. Almost all dedicated components such as Firewall, LB were easily replaced by virtualised components on AWS platform except storage, where we need do some tweaking
2. In less than weeks’ time, entire public infrastructure was up and running. [Important to mention that we had implemented a primary site (US) and DR site (Singapore) on public cloud]
3. The results of all these tests we ran were equally good, and at instance even better. However we couldn’t run comparative performance tests, because testing on live wasn’t allowed for comparisons.
4. And this entire 5 week of POC was done with-in the credit of USD 500 provided by Amazon excluding our efforts.

This implementation has invalidated many of our assumptions that cloud is not feasible for complex architecture implementations. For e.g.
1. Concept of storage or shared storage required to implement a cluster be it a web, application or DB cluster.
2. Storage requirement of single volumes or multiple volumes (in terabytes)
3. Online backups and restore
4. Security controls, logical segmentation of devices etc.

And, finally the important lesson we learned, in cloud you do things cloud way. Architecture on cloud is something needs to be drawn from scratch and not to do a pure one to one mapping.

At times during implementation we felt that there are caveats in cloud, but then we got the answers and ways to resolve it. Our whitepaper is yet to be published by AWS, but this whole activity has given us lots of confidence and knowledge of cloud.

Manpreet

IPractice Team Event 19th May 2011 | “Jim Corbett National Park”

IPractice Team Event | “Jim Corbett National Park”

For a long time, iPractice had planned for an overnight team event, but due to some reasons this idea never saw light. Well, this time with more enthusiastic people on board, leadership agreed for an overnight team event. And after detailed consideration of choices (dehradun,jim corbett, Kanatal etc.), Jim Corbett came out to be the best fit. Our organisers had a tough challenge in hand to arrange logistics and ensure maximum participation, beling this an out of station trip.

As planned, we started from Sapient CG office on Thursday night. The active participation started reflecting even before people got in the bus, in form of stashing away the bottles for the journey, which eventually put us 45 minutes past the schedule. After going through a few more pickup points like Akshardham, Patparganj and Indrapuram Shipra mall on our way to Jim Corbett, it was almost midnight by the time our bus was capacity packed and brimming with enthusiasm of the iPractice team. The total distance of Jim Corbett from Sapient Gurgaon office is approximately 350 KM and our schedule time to reach at destination was 07:00 AM (Friday).

The Delhi Volvo Bus

Our Organisers had hired a bus, popularly known as Delhi Volvo bus, which it actually isn’t, but the bus in no means is less than a Volvo bus, if not more. Soon the air conditioner converted the bus into a virtual icebox, and as planned, our team had an effective counter solution to it in form of Tuborg beer cans. The beer started to flow and so did songs, a session of Antakshri came into being and ran for about 2 & half hours. The songs sung in the Antakshari session were altered down by people as per their convenience, opposite team would pick up their song from any letter in the last song, which resulted in a crazy jugalbandi and loud laughters. Especially the over energetic Rishi Tiwari sung from wherever he loves to and it was difficult to hold him back (blame it on the booze). Rohit sang all home cooked and did good fusion of different songs, we gave him name of famous Band-Baje-Wala. No side won in the Antakshri, In the meantime bus reached at first milestone (“Tadka”).

Tadka is a good Punjabi restaurant after Gajjrola city. The crowd at Tadka seemed like a bus full of urbane Delhi party goers had lost their way and landed up at this quaint dhaba. Pretty girls with low waist jeans and guys with hair plaits was a funny misfit considering the environment of the dhaba. Anyway we had yummy Aloo and paneer pranthas with tea, and journey resumed after a break of about 40-45 minutes. Around, 4 O’Clock, lights went off and most folks went to sleep for rest of the hours, except Bhullar, clicking pictures of snoring one’s. Stinking pair of socks made few one’s sleepless, I heard Wasim yelling about foul smell. We are yet to discover the owner for the same

Infinity Resort

Infinity resort is beautiful private property, full of mango trees spread across 4 or 5 acres of land on the bank of KOSI River with lush green trees all over. There are around 40 rooms with all modern facilities, and magnificent view of river, mountains from balcony. River view definitely is far better if you plan to come post monsoon season. People from different track were put together in every room to induce the openness & interaction. Post check-in, bunch of folks including me couldn’t resist jumping into the pool, and splashed the water as much as we could. Manish arrived in best costume (Jazzy cap, goggles etc.) ended up struggling in shallow water.

Abhishek (4) let everyone know the schedule of breakfast, lunch & dinner. And in next 30 minutes, everyone showed up in resort’s only restaurant though quiet large and has open terrace towards river side. It was a buffet, mix of continental and Indian breakfast, people were understandably hungry which added to the already delicious taste of the food and I am sure everyone enjoyed & stuffed first meal of the day.

Anuj readout the itinerary of activities planned for rest of the day. The entire group was divided in to 4 teams to perform team building activities.

“Treasure Hunt” – This outdoor activity was organised by resort people. As all teams comes together in open ground, separate questionnaire were handed over to each time to answer, along with a target to find maximum hidden eggs. Finding small eggs in the rugged terrain of the large area turned out to be an excruciating search, with people probing the wild weeds with wooden sticks and walking till the banks of KOSI for search of their lucky egg. Team 3 found the most eggs and were closest to answer the questionnaire correctly.

“Tug of the war” – This was the most exhaustive activity, and left good scars of hard work on everyone’s hands or at least for those who made effort to stretch real hard. Team 1 were undoubted winner, they not only exhibit power and co-ordination but shown enough courage to fight three games back to back, many thanks to referee, Anuj Khanna for his wrong decision.

The outdoor activities and scorching heat brought the energy level bit down and next activity (i.e. cricket) was postponed for later. In the meantime folks enjoyed playing cards in their room having another round of Tuborg. Couple of folks, I’ll refrain myself to reveal names; prefer to go for nap. Seems, last night’s outage of RS2 didn’t let them sleep well. We had lunch around 02:00PM and thereafter Anuj & Abhishek called everyone to gather in a large indoor hall for next round of activities. Everyone came down except Deepak, because he couldn’t go against the wish of a nap especially after heavy lunch. Few more guys were towed down to indoor activities, and one of them was Manish. Though he remained half-awake most of the time and his eyes continuously blinked like some traffic signal light.

“Balloon Tower” – This exercise was about building a tower of inflated balloon. A packet of balloon and cello-tape were given to each team. Team 4 showed a creative piece of work and erected tallest tower of balloons. Perhaps controversy erupted because; structure didn’t look like a tower, instead some plant hanging from ceiling. Though verdict is contentious, they still be called winner by Anuj& Abhishek.

“Skit Play” – Each team has been given a different act to play and it was judged by Wasim& Siba. Act of “Ghar Ghar Ki Kahani” played by Team 3 was the most hilarious and won maximum applaud. Rishi Tiwari did an impressive role of “karam jali bahu” with a makeshift sari tied around him, which kept on falling off even after much effort and roused loud laughter and hoots from the crowd. Seems like a regular client of daily soap opera, but the goofs making him inappropriate for the family audience!

Tea session was called out!

While Wasim, Manish, Siba & I stayed back in rooms, few folks went out to play cricket and some were spotted on riverside clicking pictures. Details of the cricket sessions weren’t captured, I guess the game didn’t last enough to finish, someone ran away with either bat or ball. Bhullar didn’t miss the opportunity to get massage in Wild SPA of the resort for barely 1100/-, the retail price was 2500/-, all credit to his negotiation sills! Some team members enjoyed staying in the pool till late evening.

“DJ Night” - iPractice rocked the floor on the beats of Bollywood Indian music. Ashish Gupta’s UP style “Kurta Pyjama” and dancing skills was unmatched. Deepak Khanna looked amazingly fresh and did some steps of Adnan Sami. Bhullar, all-time favorite of ISST didn’t left the floor even for one minute. Wasim learned some Bhangra steps too, although he swiftly blended them in his Luckhnowi style. It was indeed a great-great time and fun on the floor, many other danced on the floor holding cans & bottles.

Famous saying "You're not drunk if you can lie on the floor without holding on", I didn’t found anyone holding the floor. We expect better performance next time :-)

The team also had a birthday cake, no one was sure the reason of its existence but everyone managed to gorge on the delicious treat and the dance resumed.

Dinner was served in the same buffet style at resort’s restaurant till mid night. Team enjoyed the food and had multiple rounds of sweet-dish.

The next biggest activity was jungle safari, planned for early morning (06:00 a.m.). I found people really enthusiastic to go and click pictures of wild animals with their indigenous gear of digital SLR’s, cyber- shots cameras and tripods etc. Let’s see what happen there too.

“Jungle Safari” – Siba’s phone kept on ringing till it died and rang again, and this time it was mine. “Wasim yelled to wake up and get ready for Safari”. While I had different plans, I asked Siba to get ready, which he managed to do so in next 60 minutes. I believe they all left for Jungle Safari around 06:00. I slept for another couple hours and enjoyed the great weather sitting in the balcony of my room. They were back around 09:00, remorse was well shown; they didn’t come across any wild animal, except a dog, which are anyways found in abundance in Gurgaon, and few odd deer barely visible through the thick bushes. The only tiger people saw was on resort’s banners and the Corbett promotional, tees; however they did click pictures of footprints of a tiger which they were not convinced of either. Some said it’s a bluff, nobody knows the truth except the tiger

In the absence of wild animals, what team really enjoyed was the great weather. It was windy and cloudy morning with drizzle and adds to it is a long ride in open jeep. Pictures of safari were awesome, thanks to our photographers Wasim and Shariq.

On return from Safari, team had a breakfast and packed their bag packs. Time has come to say good bye to the beautiful place, I wish if we could have stay longer. In the meantime, Anuj & Wasim settled the payments with resort guys.

Team had about half an hour of shopping extravaganza at some local shop, and people bought tees and other souvenirs with a tiger & Jim Corbett printed on it.

The trip back to Delhi was as equally enjoyable; prolonged feedback session by Wasim, which made people sleep but his periodic anecdotes got people laughing and applauding too, as everybody say that [think twice, before giving microphone to Wasim] and overall general “GUP SHUP” was indeed good fun.

Bus stopped for lunch at some dhaba named “Sughandh”. It was a lucky day for the owner when we consumed almost al this ration for the day. Entire cutlery comes out to feed us, 39 orders of Chach, tandoor wala sweated to deliver166 tandoori roti in 30 minutes. The food tasted best that we ever had it could be the influence of our gastric juice which was longing for food for last 6 hours. I would recommend this over Talka (minus the beautiful crowd) as it was hygienic, simple, and efficient. Post lunch, joke and comic sessions breaked-out. Jokes and stand-up comedy by Himanshu, Pavan, Bhullar & Ashish’s, really made people tumbled from their seats…real ahhh moments.

We were safe and steady back home, exactly after 48 hours of team event.Being the first overnight trip, it had huge challenges in-terms of arrangement for logistics, participation, motivation, coordination, food/drinks, activities and safety etc. Beside the participation by all, the core credit for the success of this event goes to our oragnisers who went extra mile and work untiringly to make it possible.

Big thanks to our organiser –

1. Anuj Khanna (Planning, Procurement, accommodation, food, drinks, activities, finance)
2. Abhishek Singh (Planning, Backup & Standby Strategy, coordination, activities)
3. Sachin Khanna (Budget)
4. Amit Bhardwaj (Transport arrangements)
5. Mohammad Wasim (Photography & Leadership)
6. Shariq Iqbal (Photography)
   
   PS: Sincere apologies, if I missed anyone above)