Explain your IT work to your children and parents in simple terms

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Explain your IT work to your children and parents in simple terms. In this blog post I explain the main concepts of the IT Services industry using simple terminologie. I find this useful when explaining my work to children, parents and grandparents. It is sometimes also useful to explain the IT market when I am discussing it with my clients. Especially when they are in a totally different type of work environment. Please also read the disclaimer at the bottom of this text.

What are IT Services?

IT-services are services that help businesses with their technology needs. This can include things like managing computers and networks, installing software, and providing technical support.

IT-services are important because they help businesses use technology effectively. For example, if a business has a lot of computers, they might need help managing them and making sure they are all running smoothly. An IT-services company can provide this help, which can save the business time and money.

IT-services can also be helpful for businesses that don’t have their own IT team. Instead of hiring and managing their own IT staff, they can use an IT-services company to provide the help they need on an as-needed basis.

Overall, IT services are services that help businesses with their technology needs, which can save them time and money and help them use technology effectively.

What does an IT Services company do?

An IT-services company is a business that provides IT services, like managing computers and networks, to other companies. This is different from a regular company, which might use IT-services, but doesn’t provide them to other businesses.

An IT-services company can help other businesses with a wide range of IT needs. For example, they might manage a company’s computers and networks, help them install new software, or provide technical support if something goes wrong with their technology.

IT-services companies are often helpful because they have specialized expertise and resources that other businesses might not have. This can be particularly helpful for small or medium-sized businesses that don’t have the budget or the need for a full-time IT-team.

Overall, an IT-services company is a business that provides IT services to other companies, which can be helpful because they have specialized expertise and resources.

What is IT Outsourcing?

IT-outsourcing is when a company uses another company to provide IT-services, like managing their computers and networks, instead of doing it themselves. This is different from having an in-house IT-team, which is when a company has its own employees who handle its IT needs.

Outsourcing IT can be helpful for companies because it allows them to access specialized expertise and resources without having to hire and manage their own IT staff. This can be more cost-effective and flexible than having an in-house team.

For example, if a company doesn’t have a lot of IT needs, it might not make sense for them to hire a full-time IT-team. Instead, they can use an outsourcing company to provide IT-services on an as-needed basis. This way, they can get the help they need without having to pay for full-time staff.

Overall, IT-outsourcing is when a company uses another company to provide IT-services, which can be helpful because it allows the company to access specialized expertise and resources without having to manage its own IT team.

What is Cloud Computing?

Cloud computing is a way for people and businesses to use technology services, like storing data and running programs, over the internet. This is different from using a computer or phone that has all the programs and data stored on it, because with cloud computing, the data and programs are stored on servers that are managed by other companies.

This means that people and businesses can access their data and programs from anywhere, as long as they have an internet connection. This is convenient because they don’t have to carry around a physical device, like a laptop or hard drive, to access their information.

Cloud computing is also often more secure than storing data on a personal device, because the servers that store the data are managed by professionals who make sure that the data is safe and backed up in case of any problems.

Overall, cloud computing is a way to use technology services over the internet, which is convenient and often more secure than storing data on a personal device.

What is Data Analytics?

Data analytics is the process of using data, or information, to understand patterns and trends. This can help people and businesses make better decisions by providing them with insights that they might not have seen otherwise.

For example, a company might use data analytics to understand how their customers are using their products. This could help them figure out which products are most popular, and where they can improve their products or services.

Data analytics can also be used to predict things, like how many people will visit a store in the future, or how much money a company will make in a year. This can help people and businesses plan for the future and make better decisions.

Overall, data analytics is the process of using data to understand patterns and trends, which can help people and businesses make better decisions and plan for the future.

What is ERP Software and what does it do?

ERP software, which stands for “enterprise resource planning” software, is a type of program that helps businesses manage their operations. This can include things like keeping track of inventory, managing finances, and planning production.

ERP software can be helpful for businesses because it allows them to keep all of their important information in one place, instead of having it spread across different programs or systems. This makes it easier for employees to access the information they need and helps the business run more smoothly.

For example, if a business uses ERP software to manage their inventory, they can see how much of a certain product they have in stock at any time. This can help them make better decisions about when to order more of that product, and avoid running out of stock.

Overall, ERP software is a program that helps businesses manage their operations, which can make it easier for employees to access important information and help the business run more smoothly.

Full Disclosure – I did not create this text

All text above explaining different aspects of IT Services were created by an AI service called ChatGPT (login here). The whole process of creating this blogpost took me 10 minutes using ChatGPT. In its own words, ChatGPT is:

I am Assistant, a large language model trained by OpenAI. I am a computer program that uses artificial intelligence (AI) to generate human-like text based on the input I receive. My purpose is to assist people with a wide range of tasks, including answering questions, providing information, and generating human-like text.

I operate by analyzing the input I receive and using my training data and AI algorithms to generate a response. My training data comes from a wide variety of sources, including books, articles, and websites, and I use this data to learn the patterns and structures of human language. This allows me to generate text that is similar to what a human might write or say.

Overall, I am a large language model trained by OpenAI, and my purpose is to assist people with a wide range of tasks using artificial intelligence. I operate by analyzing the input I receive and using my training data and AI algorithms to generate a response.

Curiosity drives cloud computing

I like asking questions and I like getting good answers even better. It is because of that, I now have a love / hate relationship with search engines. Most of the time they give me a 50% answer, a kind of direction, a suggestion, a kind of coaching to the real answer. It is like the joke about the consultant; “the right answer must be in there somewhere, because he or she gives me so many responses”.

PH03797IIn spite of all kind of promises, search engines have not really increased their intelligence. Complex questions with multiple variables are still nearly impossible to get answered and the suggestions to improve my question are mostly about my spelling or because the search engine would have liked a different subject to be questioned on.

So nothing really good is coming from search engines then? Well most arguably search engines have brought us cloud computing and a very powerful access to lots and lots and lots of data, otherwise known as ‘the world wide web’.

No wonder I envision that powerful access and cloud computing are the two most important values we want to keep while increasing the capacity and intelligence to do real analytics on large data sets.

In a whitepaper of the Atos Scientific Community, these 2 elements are explored in great depth:

  • Data Analytics needs cloud computing to create an “Analytics as a Service” – model because that model addresses in the best way how people and organizations want to use analytics.
  • This Data Analytics as a Service – model (DAaaS) should not behave as an application, but it should be available as a platform for application development.

The first statement on the cloud computing needs suggests we can expect analytics to become easily deployed, widely accessible and not depending on deep investments by single organizations; ‘as a service’ implies relatively low cost and certainly a flexible usage model.

The second statement about the platform capability of data analytics however, has far reaching consequences for the way we implement and build the analytic capabilities for large data collections.

Architecturally, and due to the intrinsic complexities of analytical processes, the implementation of DAaaS represents an important set of challenges, as it is more similar to a flexible Platform as a Service (PaaS) solution than a more “fixed” Software as a Service (SaaS) application

It is relatively easy to implement a single application that will give you an answer to a complex question; many of the applications for mobile devices are built on this model (take for example the many applications for public transport departure, arrival times and connections).

This “1-application-1-question” approach is in my opinion not a sustainable business model for business environments; we need some kind of workbench and toolkit that is based on a stable and well defined service.

The white paper describes a proof of concept that has explored such an environment for re-usability, cloud aspects and flexibility. It also points to the technology used and how the technology can work together to create ‘Data Analytics as a Service’.


This blog post was previously published at http://blog.atos.net/blog/2013/03/25/watch-this-space-curiosity-drives-cloud-computing/


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Would you like a cup of IT

The change in the IT landscape brought about through the introduction of Cloud Computing is now driving a next generation of IT enablement. You might call it Cloud 2.0, but the term 'Liquid IT' much better covers what is being developed.

In a recently published white paper by the Atos Scientific Community, Liquid IT is positioned not only as a technology or architecture; it is also very much focused on the results of this change on the business you are doing day to day with your customer(s).

"A journey towards Liquid IT is actually rather subtle, and it is much more than a technology journey"

The paper explains in detail how the introduction of more flexible IT provisioning, now done in real time allows for financial transparency and agility. A zero latency provisioning and decommissioning model, complete with genuine utility pricing based on actual resources consumed, enables us to drive the optimal blend of minimizing cost and maximizing agility. Right-sizing capabilities and capacity all of the time to the needs of the users will impact your customer relationship – but, very important, designing such a systems starts with understanding the business needs.

"Liquid IT starts from the business needs: speed, savings, flexibility, and ease of use"

Existing examples of extreme flexibility in IT (think gMail, Hotmail or other consumer oriented cloud offerings) have had to balance between standardization and scale. The more standard the offering, the more results in scaling can be achieved. This has always been a difficult scenario for more business oriented applications. The paper postulates that with proper care for business needs and the right architecture, similar flexibility is achievable for business processes.

Such a journey to 'Liquid IT' indeed includes tough choices in technology and organization, but also forces the providers of such an environment to have an in-depth look at the financial drivers in the IT provisioning and the IT consumption landscape.

"The objectives of financial transparency dictate that all IT services are associated with agreed processes for allocation, charging and invoicing"

There are two other aspects that need to change in parallel with this move to more agility in IT; the role of the CIO will evolve and the SLA that he is either buying or selling will change accordingly.

Change management will transform into Information Management as the use of IT as a business enabler is no longer the concern of the CIO. IT benchmarking will become a more and more important tool to measure the level of achieved agility for the business owners. The focus on the contribution to the business performance will be measured and needs to be managed in line with business forecasts.

The white paper authors conclude that "Business agility is the main result of Liquid IT" – sounds like a plan!

This blog post was previously published at http://blog.atos.net/blog/2013/03/08/watch-this-space-would-you-like-a-cup-of-it/


 

Three reasons to change the Internet now

Times are changing and we all need to adapt. The internet has had a major impact on all of our lives and continues to be a growing force in all aspects of society; in personal interactions, in knowledge management and inthe way we do business.

In a whitepaper by the Atos Scientific Community, this evolution of ‘the net’ is described and put in the context of the additional functionality we now expect from our interactions on the internet. The authors challenge the current technology stack that is making up the many, many connections and network capabilities that have to be served to make the internet do what it is supposed to do.

The topology of the Internet has evolved through economic and technological optimization decisions to a flatter structure where major content providers and distributors get as close as possible to the access networks used by their customers

There seem to be good reasons to have a good look at this technology evolution and make some choices to  continue to enjoy the internet:

  1. Because of the cloud computing trend, more and more traffic is concentrated between several internet powerhouses; Facebook, Amazon, Google and Microsoft. The distributed nature of the original internet simply does not exist anymore.
  2. Because of the huge increase in mobile internet usage, the way that information is accessed, changed and presented is different from the past models – the existing networking functionality is not optimized for this type of usage.
  3. Future scenarios predict that through the assignment of an IP address to about any device you can think of we will create a huge peer-to-peer network, where human interaction will be only a small portion of all connections; “the internet of things”. The current internet technology is not designed for this.

These changes raise some fundamental questions and these are described in more details the paper. Most noticeable the authors bring our attention to the fundamental nature of the internet as it is built at the moment, a decentralized web of processing and access points.

On the long run, the question is raised whether the Internet will durably follow a concentration trend driving it towards a more centralized network or if we will see a new wave of decentralization.”

The whitepaper  dives into the technology of the internet and shows where we are facing potential bottlenecks. 


[This blog post is a repost of http://blog.atos.net/blog/2012/12/03/watch-this-space-three-reasons-to-change-the-internet-now/ ]


 

How big is your robot?

What do you get when you combine cloud computing, social networking, big data and modern day engineering? You get a kick-ass robot. This was my first thought when I finished reading a published whitepaper by the Atos scientific community on the topic of robots.

Central in the paper is the question: “Where is the mind of the future robot?”, and by outlining the concept of a robot that can utilize everything that is available in cyberspace you may find it difficult to answer that question.

Today it is hard to predict where on earth all of the data about you is stored in the cloud and we have never been able to communicate more easily. It is easy to see that robots will be everywhere, able to utilize all available information.
This will lead to a new class in robot persona’s and capabilities.

Once the robot is part of a social network, it could virtually interact with humans as well and thus start truly mimicking human behavior.


When I was (much) younger we had a program on our home computer that was called ‘Eliza’. This program would behave as an electronic psychiatrist. It had some limited learning capabilities and some clever language skills to ‘trick’ you in having an actual conversation.

If you would type things like “I hate talking to a computer”, Eliza would answer with “Hate seems to be important to you, can you explain that?”

If we now multiply the capabilities of this ‘Eliza’ by a thousand or more (using cloud computing scalability) and bring in the analytics of all of your ‘likes’ or ‘diggs’ or even the behaviour of your friends, combined with knowledge about your locations and multiply that by analysing all the things you did 5 years ago, 10 years ago and today …. Well I think you get the picture.

The more a future robot knows or has access to, the more it will be able to fulfil his role in supporting us. This may not sit well with everybody, but if we utilize this capability in a clever way, I believe we can benefit.

Especially if we also take into account that a robot can take different forms, could exist virtually or maybe even be in multiple locations at the same time, with access to the right information and computing power to use that to our benefit. The whitepaper describes some of these scenarios and puts it in the perspective of the role of IT providers and systems integrators.

Based on my reading of the whitepaper I was thinking that maybe the statement ‘I cannot be in two places at the same time’ will soon become a thing of the past.



[This blog post is a repost of http://blog.atos.net/blog/2012/11/26/watch-this-space-how-big-is-your-robot/ ]