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Subscription Computing
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Subscription Computing The provision of a computing infrastructure as a service, rather than as a collection of components, is coming to be known as "subscription computing." Subscription computing relocates much of the responsibility for selecting, procuring, configuring and maintaining a computing infrastructure to a remote provider. This relieves users from these tasks and the need to maintain the skills to do them. Subscription computing begins a fundamental and desirable shift in the way many users of information technology will view their computing infrastructure, but that there remain significant technical challenges to the full realization of such a service. 
The figure shows a subscription computing service provider communicating with customer premises equipment using a broadband VPN. The server collection consists of Web servers, application servers, and optional support servers such as for DNS and DHCP. The Web servers provide content for self-help, the helpdesk, FAQ, hints and tips, tutorials, and links to other useful resources. The application servers host applications and services provisioned by the service provider. The support servers provide the infrastructure-related support services such as name resolution, address translation, authentication, and VPN capability.
To reduce costs associated with onsite visits, remote management of computers on customer premises is key for any successful subscription computing provider. The technology for remote management includes ability to remotely monitor computers, diagnose problems and take over the operations of a particular system to help users when necessary. Technical challengesSubscription computing is conceptually easy to do, but quite complex in practice. Various techniques and technologies can be employed to reduce the need for human labor including the ability to act proactively and effectively to resolve problems before they are even perceived by the customer. A high degree of personalization of the service is required (e.g., support of customer-specific software) but although acquiring and exploiting knowledge of the customer and user behavior is very advantageous in optimizing the service, this knowledge must never compromise the privacy of the customer. Perhaps the greatest challenge of subscription computing service provision is maintaining the security and integrity of the customer's data, lowering costs of service and maintaining service quality as the service scales to millions of users.We are building the Automation Controller and the Intelligent Content Manager to address the operational issues of subscription computing service provision. |
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