Books: Web 2.0 Architectures and Cloud Application Architectures

I am excited about the upcoming release of two books on Web 2.0 and Cloud Application Architectures by O'Reilly.

Web 2.0 Architectures (estimated release in May 2009)
What entrepreneurs and information architects need to know

Using several high-profile Web 2.0 companies as examples, authors Duane Nickull, Dion Hinchcliffe, and James Governor have distilled the core patterns of Web 2.0 coupled with an abstract model and reference architecture. The result is a base of knowledge that developers, business people, futurists, and entrepreneurs can understand and use as a source of ideas and inspiration. Featured architectures include Google, Flickr, BitTorrent, MySpace, Facebook, and Wikipedia.

Cloud Application Architectures (estimated release in April 2009)
Building Applications and Infrastructure in the Cloud

This book by George Reese offers tested techniques for creating web applications on cloud computing infrastructures and for migrating existing systems to these environments. Specifically, you'll learn about the programming and system administration necessary for supporting transactional web applications in the cloud -- mission-critical activities that include orders and payments to support customers.

The second book is available online at O'Reilly as a Rough Cuts Version so you might already had a chance to check it out. If so, do you like it?

Comments

[Anonymous]

Hi,

what book would you recommend as a first read for a manager on Cloud Computing? And what are the best cloud computing books for those interested in development and design with technical background?

Thanks!

[geekr]

http://highscalability.com/scalability-perspectives-1-nicholas-carr-big-switch">The Big Switch by Nicholas Carr is a good introduction book on the subject of cloud computing and utility computing. The upcoming O'Reillly Web 2.0 Architectures book could also be interesting for business readers.

I cannot recommend a specific technical book now. You might want to check out the http://highscalability.com/book-store">HighScalability book store for specific topics.

[Craig]

Sun's http://www.sun.com/offers/details/cloud_computing_primer.html">Cloud Computing Primer is a good Getting Started Guide for an introduction.
It covers Cloud Computing at a Higher Level, Why Cloud Computing?, Cloud Computing Defined as well as Technologies and Trends Relevant to the Cloud.

Cloud computing is a popular buzzword—but what does it really mean, and why should you care? Get this free guide to cloud computing and let us help you make sense of the hype. You probably know generally how cloud computing provides an economical, scalable and flexible approach to your IT infrastructure, but you probably don't know exactly how it works. We'll take you inside the cloud and show you how virtualization and software deployment work in this environment. We'll explain the differences between public, private and hybrid clouds. We'll walk you through a variety of ways to take advantage of cloud computing and help you identify key questions you should be asking to figure out the best approach for your business.

[Tom]

A related http://www.cloudave.com/link/an-interview-with-george-reese-about-his-new-cloud-computing-book">Interview with George Reese About His New Cloud Computing Book: Cloud Application Architectures.

[Andrew7]

What are the best cloud programming books? Which one of them would you buy to learn about AWS and Google AppEngine?

[Anonymous]

Hi,

do you know these cloud computing books? Are they worth buying?
-Cloud Computing: Web-Based Applications That Change the Way You Work and Collaborate Online by Michael Miller
-Dot Cloud: The 21st Century Business Platform Built on Cloud Computing by Peter Fingar
-Cloud Computing: Technologies and Strategies of the Ubiquitous Data Center by Curtis Franklin Jr.

Thank you!

[Martin As]

The book by Fingar is incredibly timely, for it's not about techie stuff, it's about Business! powerful screencast too .... www.mkpress.com/cloud
--best
--Martin

[geekr]

Hi Martin,

thank you for the comment and the interesting screencast! http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0929652495?ie=UTF8&tag=innoblog-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0929652495">Dot Cloud: The 21st Century Business Platform Built on Cloud Computinghttp://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=innoblog-20&l=as2&o=1&a=0929652495" width="1" height="1" border="0" alt="" style="border:none !important; margin:0px !important;" /> has got a five star review on Amazon:

“We are witnessing a seismic shift in information technology,
the kind that comes around every decade or so,
and it will have a huge impact on business, especially in today’s dire economy,”
says business strategy expert and former CIO, Peter Fingar.

I think I'll order it :) Be aware though that "this is not a technical book about Cloud Computing technologies; it’s a business book."

BTW Web 2.0 Architectures and Cloud Application Architectures has been finally released!

[geekr]

If you are interested in cloud computing business models I recommend the book "Cloud" by Timothy Chou available on http://www.lulu.com/content/paperback-book/cloud-paperback-edition/6051465">lulu.
Based on a series of lectures at Stanford University this book discusses cloud computing from a business perspective. It serves as an excellent, easy-to-read, introduction to cloud computing for anyone who builds, sells or purchases applications or infrastructure delivered as a cloud service. The book is full of examples and stories from many of the leaders in the field.

"Cloud" discusses seven clear business models from the traditional to hybrid and software as a service.

[Anonymous]

Cloud Application Architectures by George Reese is the best book on the subject so far. Just have a look at these reviews on amazon.com:
* Even Grizzled Veterans Benefit: I think the most important aspect of the book is that it lays out best practices that I'm leveraging now to scale my large web applications, tighten up my security and automate disaster recovery. It's clear that the author has spent a great amount of time thinking about these issues and has the hardcore experience backing his advice.
* A very good book on cloud computing: A very refreshing take at a topic that was always unclear in my head no matter how much I tried to read about it. In this book, the author does not try to impress you with buzzwords and try to establish how great cloud computing is, instead he just lays out his knowledge in a very clear and practical manner. In the very first chapter itself you get a very clear idea of what cloud computing is about. I am also thankful that the author did not try to start from the history of the internet and the web :-)
* Thank You, Reese and O'Reilly, for Your Impeccable Timing: mainstreaming of cloud computing. Reese, an experienced O'Reilly author and recognized cloud computing practitioner, delivers a highly readable volume that cuts through all the cloud computing hype to provide real clarity for anyone wanting to better understand this often confusing and frequently derided term. He gives solid, practical advice on how to benefit, today, from this powerful new set of technologies. Cloud computing is a tsunami headed toward old-school corporate computing. Doubters beware. Reese and his O'Reilly editors do a brilliant job covering the bases for anyone "who designs, builds, or maintains web applications that may be deployed into the cloud." But the book's appeal will extend much wider than that -- not only to anyone who manages such technologists, but into C-level suites as well. And I don't just mean the CIO's office. It is an excellent companion purchase to Nicholas Carr's "The Big Switch," delivering the knowledge you and your people need to take the next step -- to actually implement cloud computing.

[Anonymous]

FYI: Here is the table of contents of Cloud Application Architectures by George Reese:

Chapter 1. Cloud Computing
Section 1.1. The Cloud
Section 1.2. Cloud Application Architectures
Section 1.3. The Value of Cloud Computing
Section 1.4. Cloud Infrastructure Models
Section 1.5. An Overview of Amazon Web Services
Chapter 2. Amazon Cloud Computing
Section 2.1. Amazon S3
Section 2.2. Amazon EC2
Chapter 3. Before the Move into the Cloud
Section 3.1. Know Your Software Licenses
Section 3.2. The Shift to a Cloud Cost Model
Section 3.3. Service Levels for Cloud Applications
Section 3.4. Security
Section 3.5. Disaster Recovery
Chapter 4. Ready for the Cloud
Section 4.1. Web Application Design
Section 4.2. Machine Image Design
Section 4.3. Privacy Design
Section 4.4. Database Management
Chapter 5. Security
Section 5.1. Data Security
Section 5.2. Network Security
Section 5.3. Host Security
Section 5.4. Compromise Response
Chapter 6. Disaster Recovery
Section 6.1. Disaster Recovery Planning
Section 6.2. Disasters in the Cloud
Section 6.3. Disaster Management
Chapter 7. Scaling a Cloud Infrastructure
Section 7.1. Capacity Planning
Section 7.2. Cloud Scale
Appendix A. Amazon Web Services Reference
Section A.1. Amazon EC2 Command-Line Reference
Section A.2. Amazon EC2 Tips
Appendix B. GoGrid
Section B.1. Types of Clouds
Section B.2. Cloudcenters in Detail
Section B.3. Comparing Approaches
Section B.4. What's Right for You?
orm:knowledge-test B.5.
Appendix C. Rackspace
Section C.1. Rackspace's Cloud Services
Section C.2. Fully Integrated, Backed by Fanatical Support
orm:knowledge-test C.3.

[geekr]

Web 2.0 Architectures: What entrepreneurs and information architects need to know is finally shipping. Let us know how do you like it!

[Anonymous]

Best books on cloud computing? NOT this one: Cloud Computing Best Practices for Managing and Measuring Processes for On-demand Computing, Applications and Data centers in the Cloud with SLAs (it is about ITIL v3)

[geekr]

Table of Contents (Web 2.0 Architectures: What entrepreneurs and information architects need to know):

Chapter 1. An Architect's View of the Web
Section 1.1. Looking for Web 2.0
Section 1.2. Capturing Web 2.0 Knowledge with Patterns and Architecture
Chapter 2. A Different View of the Internet
Section 2.1. Best Practices for Forensic Architecture
Section 2.2. Internet Aspects
Chapter 3. Dissecting Web 2.0 Examples
Section 3.1. DoubleClick and Google AdSense
Section 3.2. Ofoto and Flickr
Section 3.3. Akamai and BitTorrent
Section 3.4. MP3.com and Napster
Section 3.5. Britannica Online and Wikipedia
Section 3.6. Personal Websites and Blogs
Section 3.7. Screen Scraping and Web Services
Section 3.8. Content Management Systems and Wikis
Section 3.9. Directories (Taxonomy) and Tagging (Folksonomy)
Section 3.10. More Hints for Defining Web 2.0
Chapter 4. Modeling Web 2.0
Section 4.1. A New Client/Server Model for Web 2.0
Section 4.2. Time Magazine's Person of the Year: You (and Web 2.0)
Chapter 5. A Reference Architecture for Developers
Section 5.1. About Reference Architectures
Section 5.2. The Web 2.0 Reference Architecture
Section 5.3. Architectural Models That Span Tiers
Section 5.4. Consistent Object and Event Models
Chapter 6. From Models to Patterns
Section 6.1. A Metamodel for Architectural Patterns
Section 6.2. The Pattern Presentation Template
Chapter 7. Specific Patterns of Web 2.0
Section 7.1. The Service-Oriented Architecture Pattern
Section 7.2. The Software as a Service (SaaS) Pattern
Section 7.3. The Participation-Collaboration Pattern
Section 7.4. The Asynchronous Particle Update Pattern
Section 7.5. The Mashup Pattern
Section 7.6. The Rich User Experience Pattern
Section 7.7. The Synchronized Web Pattern
Section 7.8. The Collaborative Tagging Pattern
Section 7.9. The Declarative Living and Tag Gardening Pattern
Section 7.10. The Semantic Web Grounding Pattern
Section 7.11. The Persistent Rights Management (PRM) Pattern
Section 7.12. The Structured Information Pattern
Section 7.13. Summary
Chapter 8. Where Are We Going from Here?
Section 8.1. Web 2.0 Offshoots
Section 8.2. A Timeless Way to Build Software 2.0
Section 8.3. The Timeless Way of Building Software: Inspiration for the Next Generation of Web Software
Section 8.4. Creating Open Services That Last (and That Anyone Can Use)
Section 8.5. Web 2.0 into the Uncertain Future

[Adam]

I am looking for a book for implementing private cloud with vmware or xen. Can you help me?

[Anonymous]

Have a look at the VMware Cloud Operating System and Cloud Computing & vCloud pages:
http://www.vmware.com/technology/cloud-os/
http://www.vmware.com/solutions/cloud-computing/

Transform your IT infrastructure into a private cloud—a pool of virtualized resources within a datacenter, or internal cloud, federated on-demand to external clouds—delivering IT infrastructure as an easily accessible service.

This cloud model enables IT to best align the service level agreement and the infrastructure to the needs of the business and the applications. This gives IT the cost savings seen from external clouds, with the security, compatibility and control needed for the enterprise.

[Anonymous]

Additional resource: http://www.cloudbook.net/cloud-computing-use-cases">Cloud Computing Use Cases

A white paper produced by the Cloud Computing Use Case Discussion Group
The Cloud Computing Use Case group brought together cloud consumers and cloud vendors to define common use case scenarios for cloud computing. The use case scenarios demonstrate the performance and economic benefits of cloud computing and are based on the needs of the widest possible range of consumers.
The goal is to highlight the capabilities and requirements that need to be standardized in a cloud environment to ensure interoperability, ease of integration and portability. It must be possible to implement all of the use case described in this paper without closed, proprietary technologies. Cloud computing must evolve as an open environment, minimizing vendor lock-in and increasing customer choice.

[MC]

I've been working with Amazon's EC2 environment for nearly a year now. I thought I had a clear understanding of all that involves the Cloud, including spooling up instances, setting up security groups and using off-line storage for backups. However, I never considered many of the issues covered in Cloud Application Architectures: Building Applications and Infrastructure in the Cloud.

I think the most important aspect of the book is that it lays out best practices that I'm leveraging now to scale my large web applications, tighten up my security and automate disaster recovery. It's clear that the author has spent a great amount of time thinking about these issues and has the hardcore experience backing his advice.

[Richard]

Hi Experts,

can you recommend books (published or to be published) about virtual clouds on Amazon?
I am excited about the new Amazon Virtual Private Cloud described here by their CTO Werner Vogels:

Seamlessly Extending the Data Center - http://www.allthingsdistributed.com/2009/08/amazon_virtual_private_cloud.html">Introducing Amazon Virtual Private Cloud

Thanks for the advise.

R