NIST Cloud Computing Collaboration Twiki Launches

Today I received my credentials for the NIST Cloud Computing Collaboration Site.


"The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has been designated by Federal Chief Information Officer Vivek Kundra to accelerate the federal government’s secure adoption of cloud computing by leading efforts to develop standards and guidelines in close consultation and collaboration with standards bodies, the private sector, and other stakeholders. Computer science researchers at NIST are working on two complementary efforts to speed the government’s quick and secure adoption of cloud computing.

NIST's long term goal is to provide thought leadership and guidance around the cloud computing paradigm to catalyze its use within industry and government. NIST aims to shorten the adoption cycle, which will enable near-term cost savings and increased ability to quickly create and deploy safe and secure enterprise applications. NIST aims to foster cloud computing systems and practices that support interoperability, portability, and security requirements that are appropriate and achievable for important usage scenarios."

Membership for participation on the this Cloud Computing Wiki site is open to the public. If you want to contribute content to this wiki, please go to NIST Cloud Computing Program website, read the page carefully and follow the instructions. The current working group meeting schedule is provided below.

Complete information on all the working groups is available online at:
http://collaborate.nist.gov/twiki-cloud-computing/bin/view/CloudComputing/WebHome

( Thank you. If you enjoyed this article, get free updates by email or RSS - KLJ )

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NIST Moves Forward on Cloud Computing

Last week the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) held their second Cloud Computing Forum and Workshop. Skillfully shepherded by Ms. Dawn Leaf, the agency’s senior executive of cloud computing, the event reinforced the US Federeal government's move towards the cloud. Of particular note to me was the cloud computing simulation model project, known as Koala, that focuses on the behavior of infrastructure-as-a-service cloud systems. Other highlights included:

• A cloud computing standards panel moderated by Mike Hogan and Teresa Schwarzhoff
• Ms Cita M. Furlani, Director NIST Information Technology Laboratory, view of the cloud
• Jet Propulsion Laboratory's Khawaja S. Shams description of a cloud oriented architecture
• Dawn Leaf's overview of the NIST Cloud Computing Program
• Danielle Kriz of the Information Technology Industry Council presentation on global cloud computing security; and
• Jean-Francois Junger of the European Commision talk on Europe's digital agenda.

NIST also highlighted their work on cloud computing use cases. This set of twenty five use cases is being used to address portability, interoperability and security concerns within the cloud computing community.

I applaud NIST and the Federal CIO Council for their leadership in this area.

( Thank you. If you enjoyed this article, get free updates by email or RSS - KLJ )

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NIST To Hold 2nd Cloud Computing Forum & Workshop

On November 4-5, 2010, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) will hold their second Cloud Computing Forum & Workshop. During this event, NIST will report on the status of federal efforts around cloud computing standards for data portability, cloud interoperability, and security. Additionally, NIST will:

"...[S]ocialize the NIST strategy to collaboratively develop a Cloud Computing Roadmap among multiple federal and industrial stakeholders, and to advance a dialogue between these groups.  To frame the discussions, the United States Chief Information Officer and Director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology will present their vision on the first day (November 4, 2010.) Panel discussions will consider the roles of standard organizations and ad-hoc standards in the cloud; need and use of a reference architecture to support cloud adoption; key cloud computing issues and proposed solutions; security in the cloud; and international aspects of cloud computing. Breakout sessions on the following day (November 5, 2010), designed to actively engage stakeholders, will discuss these issues, and develop a series of next steps for the effort in cloud computing standards."

Workshop goals include:

• Public Announcement and initiation of the strategy to develop a Cloud Computing Roadmap.
• Engagement with interested parties on development of a neutral cloud computing reference architecture and taxonomy.
• Defining Target USG Cloud Computing Business Use Cases.
• Public Announcement of access to the Standards Acceleration to Jumpstart the Adoption of Cloud Computing (SAJACC) portal.

Day 1 will consist of a series of opening remarks from Dr Patrick Gallagher, NIST Director; Vivek Kundra, US CIO; Cita Furlani, NIST ITL Director; and panel discussions on cloud security, standards roles, international aspects, and the role and use of a neutral reference architecture/taxonomy. Day 2 will consist of a series of breakout discussions on these topics and more.

Registration is available at http://www.nist.gov/itl/cloud/cloudworkshopii.cfm

Reporters interested in attending should contact Evelyn Brown,  evelyn.brown@nist.gov, (301) 975-5661.

( Thank you. If you enjoyed this article, get free updates by email or RSS - KLJ )

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Federal Cloud Computing Roadmap

ServerVault, a long time provider of IT hosting services to the Federal government, has been discussing cloud computing quite a bit with their current (and future) customers.  The repetitive nature of the many varied conversations led John Curan, ServerVault EVP, COO and CTO, to put together a standard briefing on the subject. His "Federal Cloud Computing Roadmap" puts forth a possible answer to:

"What set of actions by the cloud computing industry (and related parties) would allow Federal agencies to gain the benefits of cloud computing while maintaining compliance with Federal IT policy?"

By referencing FISMA, OMB guidance and FIPS Publication 199, he clearly lays out the Federal CIO's dilemma when it comes to cloud computing.  It a good read and is probably very similar to the process that NIST is currently going through as they draft their Cloud Computing Security Publication. NIST's Perspectives on Cloud Computing and Standards should make your reading list as well.

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