RELATED TERMS: Computer Science
Cloud Computing describes the idea that computer applications run in ‘the cloud’, that is, on someone else’s server accessed via the Internet. Instead of running program applications or storing data on your own computer, these functions are performed at remote servers which are connected to your computer through the Internet.
For example, Google operates several well-known cloud computing services. It offers its users such applications as e-mail, word processing, spreadsheets, and storage, and hosts them “in the cloud”, in other words, on its own servers, not yours.