Computing shifted from expensive, time-shared mainframes and minicomputers rented under a utility model to distributed x86 machines that often acted as minicomputers, clusters, or supercomputers. Grid computing combined compute and storage resources globally and helped form the foundation for modern cloud architectures. The combination of timesharing heritage and grid principles produced a utility-style, on-demand model of infrastructure. That intentional convergence of technologies and business models culminated in the commercial launch of Amazon Web Services in March 2006. The modern conception of cloud reflects both historical practices and new distinctions in scalability and distribution.
For example, no one talks about minicomputers anymore, even though for the better part of a decade, most of the companies in the world had minicomputers for their "data processing" and not the big, expensive behemoths known as mainframes. So, to a certain extent, most of the x86 machines sold in the past three decades qualified as "minicomputers" individually and as "clusters" when they shared workloads and as "supercomputers" when they distributed a workload across their memories
Because of the huge expense of computers in the 1960s and 1970s, mainframes and minicomputers were time-shared machines, and capacity was often rented out under a utility model. Such were the roots of cloud computing as we have come to know it. In that sense, cloud is a trip back to the future, although with some important distinctions. The advent of grid computing - where compute and storage resources were lashed together on a global basis - is the second big part of the foundation of cloud computing.
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