Cloud infrastructure management

Cloud computing platforms are divided into 3 categories:-

·         Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS): In infrastructure as a service, users can access    virtual servers using the service provider’s API to start, stop and configure the server

·         Platform as a Service (PaaS): Several software developers create applications using development tools hosted on the cloud.

·         Software as a Services(SaaS): Several users can access and use a single application or service that is hosted in the cloud

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)

·         IaaS delivers computing infrastructure as a service. Instead of purchasing hardware and other infrastructure components, customers use some form of virtualization to access outsourced resources. Because consumption is on and demand basis, costs directly reflect the amount of use.

Characteristics of IaaS.

·         Resources are distributed as a service

·         Allows for dynamic scaling

·         Has a variable cost, utility pricing model

·         Generally includes multiple users on a single piece of hardware

Software as a Service (SaaS

·               By delivering applications as a service, SaaS offers customers pre-packaged/prebuilt applications through a standard web browser. With SaaS, customers can avoid the installation and management of software on their own computers and further benefit from centralized, automatic software updates as well as lower costs.

·         Customers don’t need to dedicate valuable resources to software deployment or management

·         One way to think about these applications in the on-premises platform is to

·         Divide them into two broad categories:

·First, there’s no software to purchase, install, update or maintain, which is handled by the service providers.

·         As well: You can sign up and rapidly start using cloud application and data are accessible from any connected computer No data is lost if your computer breaks, as data is in the cloud The service is able to dynamically scale to the usage needs of your organization.

·         One way to think about these applications in the on-premises platform is to divide them into two broad categories:

• ·         packed applications
• ·         Custom applications

       The heart of cloud computing is all about delivering services and applications that are on demand to the environment. Therefore, cloud computing providers understand that they need to provide their services to a lot of users who have different demands and interests. At the same time, these users expect the services to be provided securely, fast and reliably. Therefore, it is imperative for the cloud service providers to have a cloud computing infrastructure that offers intelligent and dynamic infrastructure. They ensure that they achieve this by employing four core objectives. These objectives are security, scalability, transparency and management.

      Cloud computing comes with its fair share is risks. If the infrastructure of a cloud is compromised, thousands of people would suffer damage that would be too costly to them. If the security is compromised, all the data in the cloud and the services that are enjoyed by the users would be at risk. That is one of the reasons why most organizations opt for secure private cloud instead of public cloud. Therefore, it is the responsibility of the cloud architects to ensure that the cloud model is designed and implemented with security issues being considered a priority. The control node in a mega data center is important since it is the first point of entry into a cloud data center. It provides security starting from layer 2 up to layer 7. The purpose of the control node is to put a stop to potential attacks.

      Scalability is the second objective in cloud computing infrastructure design. Cloud computing service providers obviously build data centers that store very large amounts of data. Scaling application delivery solution is not as easy as it might seem and in most times it is not a crystal clear process. The idea that the service delivery to clients might be interrupted is just unacceptable to cloud service providers. Therefore, they have to ensure that they not only give ability to clearly scale service infrastructure but they must scale the infrastructure as well. That is not an easy task due to the huge amounts of data that cloud infrastructure handles.

       Transparency in cloud computing is very important. Transparency forms the foundation of cloud computing. This is just like virtualization where many resources appear as just a single resource. Therefore, architects of cloud computing infrastructure have to ensure that there is transparent load balancing in order to ensure that there is proper transparent horizontal scaling of services and applications that are in high demand.

      The growth of cloud infrastructure has outpaced the overall growth of IT infrastructure. As mentioned earlier, this has been facilitated by many companies making the decision to move to the cloud. However, it is worth noting that the increase did not happen equally in all corners of the globe. The areas which experienced the smallest growth were Central and Eastern Europe. In these areas, cloud infrastructure sales actually declined. IDC attributed the decline in sales due to the unstable economic and political climate in those areas.

      According to the report, cloud users are still continuing to evaluate on the several approaches of adopting cloud services. Some users prefer to use public clouds, while others are choosing to create their own private clouds or use cloud services offered by third parties. There are other users who are choosing to use hybrid cloud. That shows that the demand for cloud services will still continue to expand as the cloud technology gets better and better. The increasing demand from the end user side of the cloud and expansion in the services that are being offered in the cloud will continue to fuel the growth of the cloud infrastructure.

      Investments are being made on both private and public clouds. However, the investments on the public clouds comprise of two thirds of the total investments. While the sales of private cloud increased by 24.4%, public loud sales increased by 25.5%. Both of these clouds have been growing at relatively the same pace. This implies that clients are open to a huge array of hybrid deployment possibilities.