[ICT] Online Documents & Cloud Computing.

[ICT] Online Documents & Cloud Computing.

1. Cloud computing.

   • A type of online storage.
   • Many organisations are providing facilities for you to store and back up your data onto their computers.
   • Files available to share with others.
   • Data backup is a method of making copies of files. These copies can then be retrieved if disaster recovery is needed.

2. Online documents.

   • Compressing documents.
     • Files may be extremely large, which can cause problems with transmission (delivery) in terms of speed and network usage.
     • To reduce this problem, files have to be compressed (i.e. reduced in size) before transmission and then expanded after transmission.
     • A common method of doing this is to convert them to zip files (.zip format).
     • Zip files are basically stores of data files which may have been compressed.
     • There are many different algorithms for doing the compression – with most compression software supporting several of these.
     • Quite often the zip file will also contain some program code (a sequence of instructions) to allow the files within the zip file to be unzipped (known as self-extracting files).
     • There is a wide range of software available for zipping files, with one of the most popular being WinZip.
   • Controls.
     • Version control – A way of tracking changes to documents and making sure that you are working on the most up-to-date version. Older versions of the document are kept as backup in case the most up-to-date version is lost or becomes corrupt.
     • Locked – When a document is locked, you won’t be able to open it. It will only become unlocked once no users are accessing the document.
     • File permissions – Are access rights granted to special users and groups of users. These rights control which users can view or make changes to the contents of the system.

3. Advantages of using online software.

   • Can access anywhere with an internet connection.
   • Can access via different devices (e.g. smartphone, laptop).
   • Can access on different operating systems (e.g. Windows, Mac).
   • Often have automatic backup.
     • Back up files means that you can save a copy of the file at a known point in time. This means you can always go back to that version if you lost or corrupt the present version.
     • Some software programs will automatically make a copy of the file you have open and are working on at set time intervals.