Cloud computing is finally reaching a point of maturity and leaving its early “hype” years behind. Ivo and Vito do a very good job of bringing the topic into a PHP developer’s world in a very concise and objective manner, without leaving important platforms and concepts behind.

From the top the book sets down the glossary and explains very clearly what Cloud computing is and where it stands, which is very important if you are to decide wether its the solution for you or not. It also brings the concept into technical view reviewing the differences between a regular hosting environment and a elastic cloud structure. This is very important to architects building new applications that mean to take full advantage of the cloud. Finally the book overviews a few examples and most importantly a few providers and solutions, such as Amazon, Windows Azure and Google App Engine.

The book was a very pleasant read, not thick and not too thin. It helped me greatly as I prepared to give a presentation on Cloud Computing, allowing me to see different points of view as well as compare other technologies i had not had time or chance to try. I recommend this for any application architect who is thinking if the cloud is the right solution, but even if its not on your mind yet. Its very important to know where the cloud fits in so that when given a choice you will know the cloud is an option to be considered.