It seems I've been getting links from everywhere the last few months for various Cloud Computing Desktops that have sprung up. I've been trying most of them, not out of necessity but out of intrigue. What do I plan on using them for? Honestly, I don't know, but they sure are neat to try. The three I've tried as of late are g.ho.st, startforce and most recently, iCloud. The advertising associated with the cloud computing desktop environment is "take your desktop everywhere you go", but what about those of us who only go places where they have a desktop? I can see the use one day of a desktop type environment where many of our office apps are run from a desktop, but as john c. dvorak points out on numerous occasions, what happens when the "cloud" goes down either because of network issues or the site itself shuts down completely. Data portability my friends... and none of these sites have it yet. Until they do, i'll continue to run my own version of cloud computing which involves local applications with local data synced over the internet via Live Mesh, xMarks, Lastpass, and finally backed up with services like Mozy. I will say that the Cloud Desktops are definitely a marvel in web programming and so I thought I'd do a quick rundown of my experiences.
Of the three, Startforce appears to function the best and has the cleanest interface, in my opinion. Startforce ran perfectly in Firefox 3.1 beta as well as IE 8 64-bit. It has an impressive MS style Word & Excel apps, mail worked great and IM was a breeze to set up (to note, these type of app testings are the only time my "IM" buddies ever see me on anymore). Of the three I think it has the least amount of apps, but the apps it does have are pretty well polished. Most of the apps seem to pre-launch with a quick command line prompt that oddly resembles a citrix app and lessens the desktop experience a tad. Startforce even went all the way and included various backgrounds as well as a screen saver. I'm thinking the screen saver is just a gimmick, i can't see the real use of it in a cloud desktop. The fact that they built in a Screen Saver but didn't include the most critical app of all office computing, solitaire, is beyond me.
iCloud has a nice start interface and seems the most like a 'true pc' by including such things as a "Command Prompt'. I didn't have much luck getting my mail working, so I can't comment on that. Some windows would not pop up or popped up a little slow. The feature set, while larger than startforce, i don't think has been fully tested. One intriguing feature that might save it is a 'development platform', however I have to be honest in that I didn't use it so i don't know how well it works. I'd be interested in someones experience with that who has actually programming experience.
g.ho.st is a Cloud Desktop i've tried on and off since i first stumbled upon it about 6 months or so back. Of development cycles, it is the farthest along. g.ho.st requires flash and thus does not work in the 64-bit IE 8 but does work great in Firefox and i imagine, but didn't test, IE 32-bit. g.ho.st has a ton of apps including functionality for Pandora & last.fm so you should be able to do just about everything in it that you would do in a standard desktop (short of true gaming). Most of the 3rd party style apps appear to be browser based, so I don't know if that counts as a true application and may affect your usability in an internet cafe style environment. For the record, they use the much praised Zoho office apps.
If you have more to add regarding these Cloud Computing Desktops or any others you have tried, please leave a comment below.
