The purpose of Part 1 is to explain the Cloud Computing context and to introduce the related issues regarding a company's IS and IT organization. Cloud Computing is a relatively recent phenomenon that is progressively making an entrance in more and more organizations. We present an overview of these emerging technologies along with their various incarnations: IaaS, PaaS, and Saas. Adopting Cloud Computing, or more specifically Google Apps, poses new issues in various domains such as data security, privacy, and reversibility to an existing situation. We shall discuss the impacts of deploying Google Apps companywide. Part 1, more so than the rest of the book, is intended for senior executives. It will also be of some interest to business executives who would like to grasp the ins and outs of Cloud Computing and Google Apps.

Topics addressed include:

The Basics of Cloud Computing (Chapter 1): This chapter discusses the main concepts of Cloud Computing, the economic impact, and Google's vision of the evolution of the IS in the 2010s.

Why Trust Google? (Chapter 2): This chapter describes the new risks implied by the Cloud Computing model and how Google handles them.