Cloud Computing

My last post leads me neatly on to this one which is all about computing in the clouds. The reason my mind and brain are focusing in this direction is that I have recently signed up to use mobile me. Mobile me is Apple's cloud computing application which allows me to back up and store information off my computer. This has the advantage of allowing me to access it from anywhere that I have Internet access. I have to admit I have had a somewhat rocky start with this and have spent many a "pleasant" hour chatting to technical help online. However, they have always managed to help me with my problem and I am now aware of how to overcome any minor issues which occur. One such issue was that of my calendar entries on my IPod touch not appearing on my online calendar. The easiest way is to delete this and re-enter they usually appear within seconds. This happens rarely and is not such a problem that it would put me off using mobile me. Also it took a little while to work out how to open documents from mobile me, but this is now a simple and quick process. One word of warning to all those PC users, of which I am one. If you talk to the technical people at Apple they keep asking you to install outlook. This is a bit difficult if you have Windows Vista as it does not support outlook. So this may be one reason why anyone with windows vista may want to consider using another application rather than mobile me.

However, Cloud computing has uses other than personal. It allows multiple users to access documents online and therefore work on them together. This is very useful if people from different companies, or educational establishments are collaborating on a document. Taking it in to the educational realm, it would also allow students to collaborate on projects. I can also give others access to my photograph gallery, again useful whether you want to share photos with friends or collaborate on projects. It could be argued that Flickr does a similar thing, but this keeps everything in one place and easily accessible.
So what other alternatives are there. You can use google in a similar way, and this is free. I went for mobile me as I am using my Ipod as my diary and this was the best way of backing up the data for my calendar. overall, I am impressed with mobile me. I like the way I can store all my photos and look at them on my IPod, I like the space on Idisk, and overall the calendar is good. Mobile me might not be everyone's cup of tea, but I am certainly finding it useful. My advice is to find one that works for you and use that one. This is as individual as all other computer applications, and should exist to make your own life easier