Does your workplace make use of cloud computing? (1 Viewer)

[Doug B]

Starting to research cloud computing in earnest for my firm. I was curious to see if any FBGs were already making a lot of use of it already in their workplaces -- and if so, what the experiences have been like? Pros, cons, things not foreseen that ended up being a big deal, etc.

The primary goal here, as it's probably been in a lot of cloud-computing shops, is to make our data accessible from anywhere that's got a web connection. We also have a specific secondary concern about keeping our data accessible in the event of a local natural disaster ... we're hoping cloud computing is a potential solution for that latter issue as opposed to having to maintain physical servers in multiple locations (or paying for a service to do it).

...

If anyone can recommend any good websites or books to read, helpful articles, anything you may have come across ... I would very much appreciate being pointed to them. I only have the broad strokes in my head -- I am trying to learn as much as possible about the nuts and bolts so that I can better inform my coworkers and leads.

 

[AcerFC]

My school uses google for everything. Works great. 

 

[Doug B]

My school uses google for everything. Works great. 

Do people at your school typically download, work/edit, and then upload? Or is it more common to simply work within the Google doc itself via the browser?

...

Also, is simply adopting Google docs and Google storage a legit means of implementing cloud computing? I guess there are many parameters that could affect the answers to the following questions, but:

- Is Google robust enough? I would think for storage, the answer would be "of course".

- Are Google docs quick enough, or do users experience a lot of lags? Reading some old accounts (not of Google docs, though) from 2008-10 that complain about cloud computing being too slow. I may assume that issue is better dealt with today than 8-10 years ago?

- When companies evaluate Google's cloud computing options, what kinds of things are they considering? And what might make a business go elsewhere for their cloud computing support?

 

[AcerFC]

Do people at your school typically download, work/edit, and then upload? Or is it more common to simply work within the Google doc itself via the browser?

...

Also, is simply adopting Google docs and Google storage a legit means of implementing cloud computing? I guess there are many parameters that could affect the answers to the following questions, but:

- Is Google robust enough? I would think for storage, the answer would be "of course".

- Are Google docs quick enough, or do users experience a lot of lags? Reading some old accounts (not of Google docs, though) from 2008-10 that complain about cloud computing being too slow. I may assume that issue is better dealt with today than 8-10 years ago?

- When companies evaluate Google's cloud computing options, what kinds of things are they considering? And what might make a business go elsewhere for their cloud computing support?

I can not answer all of your questions but I will say that I have never downloaded and then uploaded a document. Everything is done within the program itself. 

There has never been lag with students working with each other. Everything is real time and immediate. 

 

[AhrnCityPahnder]

>>primary goal here -- is to make our data accessible from anywhere that's got a web connection

Is it data only?  Or are you running stuff that has to serve content?   IOW, do you need this just to be like a huge dropbox?  or are you trying to set up containers, servers, VM images, etc?

 

[AhrnCityPahnder]

Obligatory

 

[Doug B]

Is it data only?  Or are you running stuff that has to serve content?   IOW, do you need this just to be like a huge dropbox?  or are you trying to set up containers, servers, VM images, etc?

I think the higher-ups here are conceiving of it as data-only. I am trying to look a little ahead of that, though.

Having said that ... I don't think anyone here is giving up, say, the Microsoft suites on their laptops. But other functions might make more sense run from one or more virtual machines.

 

[Johnny Rock]

Office 365. Checks all your boxes. Lots of different plans based on needs. 1 TB One Drive storage per user. Login from anywhere and all your stuff including email is there. Email is encrypted too which is nice. Collaborative as well with coworkers as needed. Some plans give you Office (up to 5 devices) and you have Cloud versions of Office too which is great for using better-equipped versions from your phone, iPad or other browser device. 

 

[Hooper31]

Do people at your school typically download, work/edit, and then upload? Or is it more common to simply work within the Google doc itself via the browser?

...

Also, is simply adopting Google docs and Google storage a legit means of implementing cloud computing? I guess there are many parameters that could affect the answers to the following questions, but:

- Is Google robust enough? I would think for storage, the answer would be "of course".

- Are Google docs quick enough, or do users experience a lot of lags? Reading some old accounts (not of Google docs, though) from 2008-10 that complain about cloud computing being too slow. I may assume that issue is better dealt with today than 8-10 years ago?

- When companies evaluate Google's cloud computing options, what kinds of things are they considering? And what might make a business go elsewhere for their cloud computing support?

We're a Google school as well. Hard for schools to not go this route. It's free. Even if they did try to charge us schools would pay. Too good of a deal.

Robust? Not so much in computing power, but storage isn't a problem. I have my AP students type up their test corrections and quite often they have to use equation editor. Equation editor in Google Docs is lame by comparison to its counterpart in Word. At times hard to work with. Not the most intuitive. I'm the outlier there. For the vast majority of students Google Docs work fine. Further, they can submit their work with the click of a button instead of having to print papers. 

Lag hasn't been a problem as far as I know. 

 

[Doug B]

Office 365. Checks all your boxes. Lots of different plans based on needs. 1 TB One Drive storage per user. Login from anywhere and all your stuff including email is there. Email is encrypted too which is nice.

Just e-mail is encrypted, or all other data, too?

 

[Ron Swanson]

We've been in the cloud for years.  Wouldn't have it any other way.  We are 100% natural disaster proof and can load balance across our geography instantly.  Hugely convenient during recent Hurricanes. We started about 10 years ago with G-mail and have built it from there.  We own no servers today. Accounting, CRM, Phone System, Helpdesk, File Storage, Fleet Management, and Logistics are all cloud-based. I can and often have run the company from a chromebook and internet connection.

 

[RUSF18]

Work for a large banking/financial services company. We've been with AWS for a few years now, and this summer we're ditching all Microsoft products and moving to G-Suite. Dreading that part of it, but love cloud computing in general.

 

[Doug B]

Work for a large banking/financial services company. We've been with AWS for a few years now, and this summer we're ditching all Microsoft products and moving to G-Suite.

Hate to ask a dumb question ... but are Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft products associated in any way?

 

[Doug B]

We've been in the cloud for years.  Wouldn't have it any other way.  We are 100% natural disaster proof and can load balance across our geography instantly.  Hugely convenient during recent Hurricanes. We started about 10 years ago with G-mail and have built it from there.  We own no servers today. Accounting, CRM, Phone System, Helpdesk, File Storage, Fleet Management, and Logistics are all cloud-based. I can and often have run the company from a chromebook and internet connection.

This sounds like a bigger deal than the educational use of Google Docs and such that other posters outlined upthread. Does your workplace deal with and pay Google directly for the various services, or is there a third-party go-between? My assumption is all THAT (bolded) is not free (though I know, of course, that G-Mail is).

 

[Doug B]

Something else I am curious about is whether or not your workplaces went through middlemen (e.g. outsourced IT personnel) to arrange the cloud computing systems? Or else were there already sufficiently-knowledgeable folks on staff who felt comfortable making the arrangements?

My current workplace keeps using third parties for their various IT needs ... and I'm wondering if I can just take on the cloud-computing set-up myself. If it were just setting up DropBox or using Google Docs, that wouldn't be a problem to handle. Getting into a more comprehensive system, though, could have some pitfalls -- for instance, I'd have a very hard time predicting cost. Just don't have enough information yet.

 

[Ilov80s]

My school uses google for everything. Works great. 

Same, can’t imagine life without it 

 

[Ilov80s]

Do people at your school typically download, work/edit, and then upload? Or is it more common to simply work within the Google doc itself via the browser?

...

Also, is simply adopting Google docs and Google storage a legit means of implementing cloud computing? I guess there are many parameters that could affect the answers to the following questions, but:

- Is Google robust enough? I would think for storage, the answer would be "of course".

- Are Google docs quick enough, or do users experience a lot of lags? Reading some old accounts (not of Google docs, though) from 2008-10 that complain about cloud computing being too slow. I may assume that issue is better dealt with today than 8-10 years ago?

- When companies evaluate Google's cloud computing options, what kinds of things are they considering? And what might make a business go elsewhere for their cloud computing support?

Robust for storage? Yeah for sure.

Google Docs is very similar to Word IMO. Sheets is very similar to Excel, Slides is just like PowerPoint.

Its quick, lag is not an issue.

Not sure what you mean with the last question. 

 

[Ilov80s]

Also most of the work is done in the browser but you could download things and work on them, then used load them back.

 

[Ilov80s]

Something else I am curious about is whether or not your workplaces went through middlemen (e.g. outsourced IT personnel) to arrange the cloud computing systems? Or else were there already sufficiently-knowledgeable folks on staff who felt comfortable making the arrangements?

My current workplace keeps using third parties for their various IT needs ... and I'm wondering if I can just take on the cloud-computing set-up myself. If it were just setting up DropBox or using Google Docs, that wouldn't be a problem to handle. Getting into a more comprehensive system, though, could have some pitfalls -- for instance, I'd have a very hard time predicting cost. Just don't have enough information yet.

We have our own IT department but ofcourse we have a lot more users then you would. If you were using Google, I think it’s doable without any outsourced IT. How tech savvy are you staff?

 

[Johnny Rock]

Just e-mail is encrypted, or all other data, too?

Everything as far as I know. https://support.office.com/en-us/article/encryption-in-office-365-0a322724-08ca-43db-b69a-afbfa20484cd 

Many here are touting Google which is great for school but I think it sucks for work and I bet the majority of the business world feels the same. That would be a huge paradigm shift for a firm if you’ve been using MS Office.

Our company doesn’t have a dedicated IT staff that handled our migration. We use an outside managed services company for bigger IT things like VPNs, large servers, BDR, backups, testing, etc. They have the benefit of having lots of clients on these products and knowing the pitfalls of the switching process. Setting it up right to utilize all the tools is important and I’m sure it could get frustrating fast if users are encountering lots of issues and roadblocks. It depends on how complicated your company is, how many users and your expertise.

 

[Ron Swanson]

Something else I am curious about is whether or not your workplaces went through middlemen (e.g. outsourced IT personnel) to arrange the cloud computing systems? Or else were there already sufficiently-knowledgeable folks on staff who felt comfortable making the arrangements?

My current workplace keeps using third parties for their various IT needs ... and I'm wondering if I can just take on the cloud-computing set-up myself. If it were just setting up DropBox or using Google Docs, that wouldn't be a problem to handle. Getting into a more comprehensive system, though, could have some pitfalls -- for instance, I'd have a very hard time predicting cost. Just don't have enough information yet.

You really need an internal champion for each app.  And for some more comprehensive apps like an accounting system or CRM you'll probably want a consultant at least for the implementation. Box, Dropbox, gsuite you can probably do yourself.

 

[Ron Swanson]

This sounds like a bigger deal than the educational use of Google Docs and such that other posters outlined upthread. Does your workplace deal with and pay Google directly for the various services, or is there a third-party go-between? My assumption is all THAT (bolded) is not free (though I know, of course, that G-Mail is).

We deal direct with Google. We pay about $50 a year per user for their Suite of apps. The others aren't from Google and aren't as cheap.  The savings with them is in the admin/hardware area. And convenience. You should expect the top level accounting and CRM packages to cost about the same license wise as on premise. 

 

[Ilov80s]

Everything as far as I know. https://support.office.com/en-us/article/encryption-in-office-365-0a322724-08ca-43db-b69a-afbfa20484cd 

Many here are touting Google which is great for school but I think it sucks for work and I bet the majority of the business world feels the same. That would be a huge paradigm shift for a firm if you’ve been using MS Office.

Our company doesn’t have a dedicated IT staff that handled our migration. We use an outside managed services company for bigger IT things like VPNs, large servers, BDR, backups, testing, etc. They have the benefit of having lots of clients on these products and knowing the pitfalls of the switching process. Setting it up right to utilize all the tools is important and I’m sure it could get frustrating fast if users are encountering lots of issues and roadblocks. It depends on how complicated your company is, how many users and your expertise.

I’m curious why you say that? When we went to Google, we had to leave Microsoft. It’s like my every school on Google has gone through the same migration.

 

[Johnny Rock]

I’m curious why you say that? When we went to Google, we had to leave Microsoft. It’s like my every school on Google has gone through the same migration.

Business still largely runs on Microsoft. That’s just my experience. I do use Chrome as my default. While I use Google Sheets, Docs and Drive some for personal use, it’s less refined than Office imo. Then you have Calendar, Enterprise email, PowerPoint. 

 

[Osaurus]

Most of what I do is cloud-based.  I’ve used AWS and other platforms as well over the years.  I like the flexibility, but don’t like giving up certain controls.

 

[ffldrew]

I work for a Amazon Premier Business Partner that for what you are asking is what we help businesses do - let me know if you have a question. We work on small business to major worldwide entities moving databses, ERP packages, applications, application development on serverless environments, DevOps, BigData projects - just got blessed by AWS for Machine Learning Competency. We even manage the environment in the cloud for you.

As far as a DR strategy it is very capable - much of the failover and availability standards are built into the back end of the product/feature set - thru region, availability zones, autoscaling. There are all sorts of decisions you can make to provide that restore your environment in a few minutes - the security and SLA that you want is only a matter of what you want to pay for it.

The features and capabilities at AWS are breathtaking.

 

[Ilov80s]

Business still largely runs on Microsoft. That’s just my experience. I do use Chrome as my default. While I use Google Sheets, Docs and Drive some for personal use, it’s less refined than Office imo. Then you have Calendar, Enterprise email, PowerPoint. 

Google has calendar, gmail and slides. I agree that there are more slick features on the MS products but that’s it. Are you saying the other businesses you work with all use MS and that you need to send them MS files?

 

[Ilov80s]

The big question I have is what do you plan to use the cloud for?

I know you said to make files available through the web. But what kind of files? Why? What will people do with those files?

 

[ffldrew]

You can sign up for a one-year free account at Amazon that gives you a lot of the free-tier capabilities for that time - more than enough to test things out. You won't get access to a 64way server with terabytes of storage - but you can learn a lot about a particular feature set to see if it works for your world.

From the comments - are you looking at moving backend server applications - like database, Erp apps, line of business apps, web servers, commerce site?

Or do you want to develop newer serverless applications where you just deploy code and the underlying scalibility is taken care of for you?

We also hook people up with Amazon Workspaces which is like a laptop in the cloud. You can have a full function Windows laptop available anywhere as long as you have a browser. The power is in the cloud - you can connect with zero clients, tablets, phones or older PC/Macs with a lightweight client. If you need more memory, disk or CPU - you shut it down - change the type and reboot. Workdocs is Amazons Google/Dropbox tool.

There are lots of things to read about - if you let me know the use cases you might be considering I'll point you to some things.

After you set up an account - Amazon has a calculator where you enter the things you want and it will give you some decent estimates on what your spend will be.

 

[ffldrew]

Hate to ask a dumb question ... but are Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft products associated in any way?

They are in the sense that you can run Microsoft Applications - like MSSQL, Exchange, etc on Amazon servers - they are just virtual Windows servers - there are caveats in all of this of course - and licensing/cost - not sure why anyone runs their business apps on Windows servers - there aren't many in my world.

 

[AAABatteries]

We use AWS extensively - both IaaS (server) but also utilizing their full suite of services to go serverless.  I’m not a cloud expert but here’s a few thoughts:

- try and start from the ground up; meaning make sure your network and supporting infrastructure services are in place before you start migrating servers and applications

- look in to cost-savings with features like auto-scaling, reserved instances and autoparking your servers

- don’t underestimate your TCO for running on premise vs. moving to the cloud - it’s been my experience that companies don’t truly know how much it is costing them to run their business (IT spend) and make poor decisions based on a lack of good information 

- make sure that you understand that if you start using cloud services from a vendor you get somewhat tied in to it - example - if you need a RDBMS you could go with MSSQL or Oracle but you could also use Amazon Redshift - the first two are more easily moved down the road but Redshift can be cheaper and more easily expanded - but you can’t move to Redshift at Google or Amazon cloud - you’d have to move the data to a different RDBMS 

 

[Johnny Rock]

Google has calendar, gmail and slides. I agree that there are more slick features on the MS products but that’s it. Are you saying the other businesses you work with all use MS and that you need to send them MS files?

Unless it’s a sole proprietor-type business like a mom and pop plumber, electrician or landscaper, no larger business uses gmail. Would they have no domain then? Google has its place. Do we even know what type of business the OP works at and how many employees they have?

 

[Ilov80s]

Unless it’s a sole proprietor-type business like a mom and pop plumber, electrician or landscaper, no larger business uses gmail. Would they have no domain then? Google has its place. Do we even know what type of business the OP works at and how many employees they have?

There are lots of massive companies using Google. Whirlpool for example. Just because it doesn’t say @gmail.com doesn’t mean it’s not a Gmail account. You can get your own domain for your business. 

 

[ragincajun]

Box

 

[Doug B]

We have our own IT department but ofcourse we have a lot more users then you would. If you were using Google, I think it’s doable without any outsourced IT. How tech savvy are you staff?

 Not very savvy at all. There's never been internal IT staff of any kind here ... not even "that one nerdy kinda guy".

 

[Doug B]

You really need an internal champion for each app.  And for some more comprehensive apps like an accounting system or CRM you'll probably want a consultant at least for the implementation. Box, Dropbox, gsuite you can probably do yourself.

Agree with the bolded, now that I've spent the day researching options.

 

[offdee]

Same, can’t imagine life without it 

New job 2 yrs ago and fought GSuite at first, but now couldnt imagine working without it.  The sharing of Google docs and multiple people all inside it and editing at the same time, instant saving of changes, etc can't be beat.  Everything i get in excel or word i instantly drag to my Google drive and convert it (conversions are seamless, including all excel formulas). Able to log into email and access all docs on my Google Drive over the web from home computer and not have to log into some work VPN is glorious.  

 

[Doug B]

I work for a Amazon Premier Business Partner that for what you are asking is what we help businesses do - let me know if you have a question.

Thanks   Will take you up on that.

 

[Doug B]

I know you said to make files available through the web. But what kind of files? Why? What will people do with those files?

Still in research mode ... figuring some of this out on the fly. My initial thoughts are that they basically want storage and retrieval, but do not (yet) want to replace Microsoft Office applications currently being used on people's laptops in the physical office.

 

[Ilov80s]

Still in research mode ... figuring some of this out on the fly. My initial thoughts are that they basically want storage and retrieval, but do not (yet) want to replace Microsoft Office applications currently being used on people's laptops in the physical office.

Dropbox is all you really need then imo. There’s no point to Google Suites unless you want to use their applications (which I recommend for all the reasons @offdee said and more). 

 

[Doug B]

Do we even know what type of business the OP works at and how many employees they have?

Construction management consultancy, with a good amount of grants administration work. ~20 employees with plans to scale up to 40-50 over the next 2-3 years.

No real relational database in place ... a lot of different kinds of data stored in a semi-organized system of files and folders on Windows machines. Booty load of Excel files, Access "databases", and PDFs.

 

[Doug B]

Gotta be honest about Google Docs:

I'm sure it's just a matter of acclimatization ... but I greatly dislike the look/feel of working with Google spreadsheets versus Excel. Could get used to it, I'm sure.

 

[offdee]

Gotta be honest about Google Docs:

I'm sure it's just a matter of acclimatization ... but I greatly dislike the look/feel of working with Google spreadsheets versus Excel. Could get used to it, I'm sure.

Its really not that much different. Convert a couple excel docs into spreadsheets and you'll see pretty much the same functionality except with all the sharing and multi-user benefits. Trust me, i at first felt the same way, but once i embraced it (aka forced to use by my manager), I quickly realized how much nicer it is.  One caveat is that the more other people you work with use it to collaborate the better.  If youre the only one using and others you work with dont go in and embrace it as well, then yeah, it greatly diminishes the advantages

 

[Doug B]

One caveat is that the more other people you work with use it to collaborate the better.  If youre the only one using and others you work with dont go in and embrace it as well, then yeah, it greatly diminishes the advantages

Good to know ... thanks.

When you're talking about "collaboration" ... are you talking about simultaneous (or near-simultaneous) editing by multiple users? Or something more specific?

 

[offdee]

Good to know ... thanks.

When you're talking about "collaboration" ... are you talking about simultaneous (or near-simultaneous) editing by multiple users? Or something more specific?

Yep...talking about simultaneous editing by multiple users. Such an advantage to all sit in a working meeting (even if you're sitting side by side) and all able to make edits to the same doc and see the changes being made real time.    You can give others just "view" or "comment only" abilities if you don't want certain people (or anybody) messing with your doc as well.

 

[Hawks64]

Good to know ... thanks.

When you're talking about "collaboration" ... are you talking about simultaneous (or near-simultaneous) editing by multiple users? Or something more specific?

Yep...talking about simultaneous editing by multiple users. Such an advantage to all sit in a working meeting (even if you're sitting side by side) and all able to make edits to the same doc and see the changes being made real time.    You can give others just "view" or "comment only" abilities if you don't want certain people (or anybody) messing with your doc as well.

Office 365 has the same thing as well, and being less technical without IT it might be more beneficial to stick with Office and go to O365.

 

[Psychopav]

We're a Google school as well. Hard for schools to not go this route. It's free. Even if they did try to charge us schools would pay. Too good of a deal.

Robust? Not so much in computing power, but storage isn't a problem. I have my AP students type up their test corrections and quite often they have to use equation editor. Equation editor in Google Docs is lame by comparison to its counterpart in Word. At times hard to work with. Not the most intuitive. I'm the outlier there. For the vast majority of students Google Docs work fine. Further, they can submit their work with the click of a button instead of having to print papers. 

Lag hasn't been a problem as far as I know. 

Sad that Word equation editor was the best choice when I taught calculus 20 years ago. I would have hoped that this type of functionality would be ubiquitous by now. Ah well at least Bill Gates has our back. 

 

[Cold Dead Hands]

I work for a state government. I am lucky to have a flip phone.

 

[Ilov80s]

Sad that Word equation editor was the best choice when I taught calculus 20 years ago. I would have hoped that this type of functionality would be ubiquitous by now. Ah well at least Bill Gates has our back. 

It’s pretty easy to do all forms of math equations and expressions with Google.

Office 365 has the same thing as well, and being less technical without IT it might be more beneficial to stick with Office and go to O365.

I have a hard time imaging something less “technical” than the Google suite.

 

[[icon]]

Work for a pretty big company ($40B annual revenue globally), we use Office 365 with One Drive. While I hate M$ in general, it works extremely well. Collaboration, remote access, etc, is all seamless. 

For smaller companies I guess Google apps could work but From what I understand they’re not on the same level as the full featured MS Office suite. Not a fan. No way our company would operate on them. If they work for you, though, cool  

Accessing any of my files from phone, or any browser is no prob.