Everything you wanted to know about Cloud Computing but were afraid to ask. This book would be more appropriately titled "The Encyclopaedia of Cloud Computing." It covers just about every aspect of Cloud Computing you would be concerned about, from high-level overviews of the different technologies that might be appropriate for upper management, to a very nice series of "hands on" chapters that walk you through experimenting with several of the Cloud Computing options. Whether you need a quick primer on Cloud Computing so you can talk shop with those with more detailed knowledge, or want to get a sense of the benefits of the different technologies and how they fit into the big picture of the data center, this book is an invaluable resource. It gives you the vocabulary and understanding of how all the pieces fit together that websites and technical manuals often miss. A must-buy comprehensive introduction. This book assumes you know nothing about Cloud Computing and quickly reviews some of the buzzwords that frequently get thrown around. It provides a detailed introduction to key topics including Options, and managing a Cloud Computing Project. For business analysts, there is an informative chapter on cost-benefit analysis and several chapters on best practices and pitfalls. With energy costs, flexibility and scalability becoming a major factor in IT budgets, Cloud Computing will become even more widespread in the future. This is the best introductory book for practitioners and delivers a great overview of the complex world of Cloud Computing, it provides a broad and comprehensive view of the complex world of Cloud Computing, covering a large amount of territory. All of the major Cloud Computing technologies are discussed, along with the various drivers for implementing Cloud Computing, and how to manage migrating to a Cloud Computing environment. What makes this book stand out from most other resources on the topic is its tone. You're helpfully guided through the issues and tradeoffs in making a number of decisions on the what, where, when and how of Cloud Computing. This is extremely helpful for an IT manager who needs to come up to speed in a short period of time. This book is a Well-written technical overview with a great business focus, it is written in a conversational style that contains very clear, succinct conceptual information and technical details interspersed with very pertinent and well-focused stories. The writing style and very well organized structural approach to the topics makes this book very readable by technology analysts, CIOs, and technical project managers who need to be able see the big picture of the "forest through the trees" in order to understand the total corporate ROI issues with Cloud Computing technology. Conversely, the book is well suited to industry technologist and software engineers who want to obtain a quick basic working knowledge of the "detailed roots" of Cloud Computing technology but otherwise would never have been exposed to the broader applicability and global consequences of this very fundamental approach. The well-organized structure of the book as independent parts, each containing independent chapters, makes it possible to pick and chose what information or level of technical detail is of interest to the reader while still allowing for interrelated topics to be introduced in the proper logically dependent sequence. Chapters such as "Common Terminology", "Companies involved in Cloud Computing", "Why Cloud Computing?", "Benefits of Cloud Computing", "Cloud Computing Technologies", "Components of Cloud Computing", "Migration to Cloud Computing" and "Contracts, Agreements and Legal Implications" are precisely what CIOs, IT managers, and technologists need to know.