Cloud computing.

[supermouse]

How long will it be before one buys a new computer, connects to the web, logs in and then everything on the computer configures itself? New browser reinstall, bookmarks, refresh rate, wallpaper, installed games, desktop icons, everything else?

Comments

[alexmc]

I'm missing something ....

Technically "Cloud Computing" is about providing computing power as a utility. It isn't about the PC you sit in front of. A related concept is providing software as a service - and this often runs on a cloud.

If you just use Google Mail, Google Calendar, and Delicious for bookmarks, then you already have this.

If you want your new computer to look like your old computer - then Apple do this already - when you buy a new machine it sucks everything off the old machine. (No reason why MS couldn't do it too)

If you run a Debian based Linux then you can easily save a file listing the packages installed and then install those on the new machine.

However these last two things aren't Cloud Computing as such.

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In fact if you run Windows in a big corporate environment then you will have this. As you log in to a new machine it will check and see what software you should have and change all the things you talk about.

Maybe perhaps you are familiar with this sort of thing and are asking when it might be commonplace?

[supermouse]

Thank you for explaining to me what cloud computing is and what Google Mail, Google Calendar and Delicious do. I personally use X-marks for bookmarks, but I do use Google Calendar and Google Mail. There is also X-drive, which is online storage. Here is a wikipedia article which explains what cloud computing is. It turns out that their explanation of cloud computing is the same as my understanding of the comment, but it was kind of you to explain it to me in case I had misunderstood the term. I am sorry if my choice of the title confused you.

[supermouse]

So why am I still having to bash my new machine into shape, and how long, do you reckon, before I just log in and vwoom, it's my computer there in front of me, with all my bells, whistles and little mousie animated pointers?

[alexmc]

Sorry if my response came out worse than it should have. I was just trying to understand

[supermouse]

Accepted. I was asking when the sort of thing you mention for corporate Windows users becomes available publicly, and independent of OS.

[alexmc]

Aha - I incorrectly focussed on Cloud Computing because I've been to a number of Cloud Computing conferences and am going to another in a couple of weeks.

You did come up with a very interesting question. It sounds like a hole in the market which someone could fill.