Cloud Computing - Part One
Cloud
computing, which extends the enterprise beyond the traditional data
center walls is quietly winning over CIOs across the world. Cloud
computing not only offers a viable solution to the problem of
addressing scalability and availability concerns for large-scale
applications, but also displays the promise of sharing resources to
reduce cost of ownership. The concept has evolved over the years
starting from data centers to present day infrastructure
virtualization. Although Cloud Computing is bringing about major
changes in the way traditional IT infrastructure is being managed, it
is still not mature enough for wide spread adoption in the IT industry.
We will try and look at a few aspects of Cloud Computing such as:
1. What is cloud computing?
2. Advantages of cloud computing
3. Concerns related to cloud computing
4. Factors which can accelerate wide spread adoption of cloud computing
In part one of this two part blog post we will cover:
1. What is cloud computing?
2. Advantages of cloud computing
1. What is Cloud Computing?
A commonly found definition of cloud computing is:
A set of disciplines, technologies, and business models used to render IT capabilities as on-demand services.
A
frequently asked question is about the origin of the term ‘cloud’. In
most documents related to the internet it is common practice to
represent the internet as a diagrammatic representation of a cloud, due
to the distributed nature of internet. Cloud computing also has a
similar distributed nature and hence the term ‘cloud’ was adopted.
Cloud computing is also often referred to as ‘the cloud’.
The common characteristics of cloud computing includes:
(a)
Shared Infrastructure: As per the cloud business model, the cloud
service provider invests in infrastructure necessary to provide
software, platforms and related infrastructure, as a service to
multiple consumers. Hence the service providers have a financial
incentive to leverage the infrastructure across as many consumers as
possible.
(b)
On-demand self-service: On-demand self-service is the cloud customer’s
ability to purchase and use cloud services as per need. For example, as
the number of users supported by the customer's application increases,
the customer can add more storage space or processing power as per
need. When the enhanced computing power/storage is no longer needed,
the customer can scale down as well. Thus the cloud computing’s ability
to quickly provision and deprovision IT services creates an elastic and
scalable IT resource. It is a pay-as-you-go model where the customers
pay only for the services that they actually use.
As
an added advantage, it is also possible for cloud vendors to provide an
application programming interface (API) that enables the customer to
programmatically (or automatically through a management application)
scale-up or scale down cloud services.
(c)
Consumption based pricing model: As explained at (b) above, the
customers pay only for the services they actually use, resulting in per
hour or per GB (Gigabytes) prices. For example, CPU (Central Processing
Unit; refers to computing power) time can be billed in minutes or an
hour during which the CPU is actually is in use. Data storage can be
charged on the basis of GB stored. Data Transfer also can be billed on
the basis of MB (Megabytes) or GB. In practice, it is also common for
vendors to vary the pricing model for data storage and data transfer
based on the geographic proximity of customers to the vendor’s data
centers.
2. Advantages of Cloud Computing
Some of the key advantages of cloud computing can be listed as below:
(a)
Simplifies and optimizes IT resources: In the current IT scenario, many
organizations own and operate all of the IT resources for meeting their
business objectives. Such organizations are often forced to install,
maintain and upgrade complex solutions integrating different
applications, operating systems, servers, networks and storage, to meet
ever growing business needs. This drives up the IT operational costs
and prevents IT organizations from focusing on strategic business
initiatives. This in-house management of IT resources also results in
large capital expenditures which return little value to the business.
In
future, as cloud computing gains acceptance, organizations can reduce
the size and complexity of internal IT operations by shifting
non-strategic, but essential IT resources to a cloud computing
platform. Internal IT resources can then focus on more important,
higher level projects which can drive core business initiatives.
(b)
Cuts costs and moves CAPEX to OPEX: Complex internal IT infrastructures
consume a lot of electric power and also need operational personnel to
monitor and manage expensive and underutilized IT equipment on a 24x7
basis. Also, in the case of some business scenarios, highly intensive
computing power and storage capacity is required only for a few hours
or days per month. Capital expenditure (CAPEX) is often more tightly
controlled by finance departments than operational expenditures (OPEX).
Moving
to the cloud helps IT organizations release the work-load on their
already strained data centers. Cloud computing’s on-demand, consumption
based pricing model can help IT organizations defer large capital
expenses or even avoid costs altogether.
Another
classic case is the Test Hub that software development companies employ
to simulate real-world scenarios. In Test Hubs, the IT resource
configurations are often much larger and complex then typical
development environments. Cloud computing provides a quick and
cost-effective way to boost computing power and data storage to
simulate real world scenarios in Test Hubs.
Since cloud computing expenses get classified as operational expenditure there is less budgetary controls as explained above.
(c)
Improved IT Resource Management: IT resource procurement model in
typical organizations is often an inefficient supply chain. The
procurement cycle starts with System Administrators predicting and
factoring usage patterns into buying decisions to ensure sufficient
capacity to satisfy growth over time. The procurement process should
also allow for contingencies like delayed delivery of equipment,
non-working equipment delivered, slow budgetary approvals and poor
forecasting. In effect, more resources than is needed are purchased and
the operating resources are underutilized.
Cloud
computing’s on-demand, pay-as-you-go consumption based procurement
model enables IT organizations to efficiently mange their IT resources
and ensure better return on investment.
(d)
Inexpensive Disaster Recovery: Building data centers with enough
redundancy for disaster recovery can be an expensive proposition. Using
an out of the region co-location facility is also difficult with out
incurring high costs. Hence many organizations have poorly tested or
even non-existent disaster recovery plans.
Here
again, cloud computing services provides a viable alternative to
increase business continuity by disaster planning without incurring the
high costs as mentioned above.
This concludes part one of this two part blog post on “Cloud Computing”. In part two of this post, we will look at:
3.Concerns related to cloud computing
4.Factors which can accelerate wide spread adoption of cloud computing
~ Sunish