Data Management in the Cloud

We are in the midst of a computing revolution. As the cost of provisioning hardware and software stacks grows, and the cost of securing and administering these complex systems grows even faster, we\´re seeing a shift towards computing clouds. Clouds are essentially services accessed over a network, and offer developers scalable, robust computing infrastructure on a "pay as you go" basis, with the ability to dynamically adjust the amount of "rented" resources, and thereby, the bill. For cloud service providers, there is efficiency from amortizing costs and averaging usage peaks. Internet portals like Yahoo! have long offered application services, such as email for individuals and organizations. Companies are now offering services such as storage and compute cycles, enabling higher-level services to be built on top. In this talk, I will discuss Yahoo!\´s vision of cloud computing, and describe some of the key initiatives, highlighting the technical challenges involved in designing hosted, multi-tenanted data management systems.