Month: August 2012

The Desire for Cloud Computing: my article is out in the Journal of Information Technology.

Dr Will Venters3 Comments

For the past few months I have not been writing much on this blog as I have concentrated on my academic writing. The first output from this project is now available:  A critical review of cloud computing: researching desires and realities via Journal of Information Technology – Table of Contents.

Through a review of literature and from evidence based on interviews with around 50 industry players, we identify a set of “desires” for those seeking to go to the cloud (split into two dimensions technological desires, and service desires:

The technological dimension of cloud desire

Equivalence:  The desire to receive a technical service which is at least equivalent (in terms of security, latency and availability) to that experienced when using a locally running traditional IT systems.

Variety:  The desire to receive a service which provides variety corresponding with the use for which the service will be put.

Abstraction:  The desire to receive technical services which abstract away unnecessary complexity for the service they provide.

Scalability: The desire to receive a service which is scalable to meet demand.

The service dimension of cloud desire

Efficiency:  The desire to receive a service that helps users be more efficient economically.

Creativity:  The desire to receive a service which aids innovation and creativity.

Simplicity:  The desire to receive a service which is simple to understand and use.

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A critical review of cloud computing: researching desires and realities

Will Venters and Edgar A Whitley

J Inf Technol advance online publication, August 14, 2012; doi:10.1057/jit.2012.17

Abstract | Full Text | PDF | Request Permission

Abstract:

Cloud computing has become central to current discussions about corporate information technology. To assess the impact that cloud may have on enterprises, it is important to evaluate the claims made in the existing literature and critically review these claims against empirical evidence from the field. To this end, this paper provides a framework within which to locate existing and future research on cloud computing. This framework is structured around a series of technological and service ‘desires’, that is,  characteristics of cloud that are important for cloud users. The existing literature on cloud computing is located within this framework and is supplemented with empirical evidence from interviews with cloud providers and cloud users that were undertaken between 2010 and 2012. The paper identifies a range of research questions that arise from the analysis.

Latest Article | Interventionist grid development projects: a research framework based on three frames

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My latest research article has just been published. This one focuses on Grid computing within large project:

Will Venters, Avgousta Kyriakidou-Zacharoudiou, (2012) “Interventionist grid development projects: a research framework based on three frames“, Information Technology & People, Vol. 25 Iss: 3, pp.300 – 326

Abstract:

Purpose – This paper seeks to consider the collaborative efforts of developing a grid computing infrastructure within problem-focused, distributed and multi-disciplinary projects – which the authors term interventionist grid development projects – involving commercial, academic and public collaborators. Such projects present distinctive challenges which have been neglected by existing escience research and information systems (IS) literature. The paper aims to define a research framework for understanding and evaluating the social, political and collaborative challenges of such projects.

Design/methodology/approach – The paper develops a research framework which extends Orlikowski and Gash’s concept of technological frames to consider two additional frames specific to such grid projects; bureaucratic frames and collaborator frames. These are used to analyse a case study of a grid development project within Healthcare which aimed to deploy a European data-grid of medical images to facilitate collaboration and communication between clinicians across the European Union.

Findings – That grids are shaped to a significant degree by the collaborative practices involved in their construction, and that for projects involving commercial and public partners such collaboration is inhibited by the differing interpretive frames adopted by the different relevant groups.

Research limitations/implications – The paper is limited by the nature of the grid development project studied, and the subsequent availability of research subjects.

Practical implications – The paper provides those involved in such projects, or in policy around such grid developments, with a practical framework by which to evaluate collaborations and their impact on the emergent grid. Further, the paper presents lessons for future such Interventionist grid projects.

Originality/value – This is a new area for research but one which is becoming increasingly important as data-intensive computing begins to emerge as foundational to many collaborative sciences and enterprises. The work builds on significant literature in escience and IS drawing into this new domain. The research framework developed here, drawn from the IS literature, begins a new stream of systems development research with a distinct focus on bureaucracy, collaboration and technology within such interventionist grid development projects.