CLOUD COMPUTING SERVICES
What is Cloud Computing?
Cloud computing is the delivery of computing services—including servers, storage, databases, networks, software, analytics, and intelligence—over the Internet ("the cloud") to offer faster innovation, flexible resources, and economies of scale. You typically only pay for the cloud services you use, which helps reduce operational costs, run your infrastructure more efficiently, and scale as your business needs change.
Cloud Computing Services Features and Benefits
Although cloud services may vary in their details, the definition of cloud computing identifies the basic functions and benefits that are common to all clouds.
From the perspective of service users, cloud computing services have the
following main features:
Hosted and maintained by the provider
A cloud hosting provider
buys, hosts and maintains the necessary hardware and software in its own
facility. Users of the service avoid the capital expenditure and maintenance,
worries that they would have if they developed the service themselves
on-premise.
Self-service via the web interface
Users of the Service can
initiate specific features of the Services and increase or decrease the level
of use of the Services through the web interface with little or no interaction
with the Service Provider.
Pay as you go
Service users pay only for the
amount of service they use. This can lead to substantial cost savings compared
to the traditional approach of developing on-premises IT capacity focused on
peak utilization scenarios and then underutilizing that capacity most of the
time.
Almost unlimited scalability
Cloud computing service
providers usually have the infrastructure to deliver their services on a
massive scale. For users of cloud services, this means that the cloud can
easily adapt to business growth or periodic peaks in service usage.
Cloud Computing Services Types
The wide range of services offered by cloud computing companies can be divided into three basic types:
Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)
Infrastructure as a Service
(IaaS) is a type of cloud computing service that offers basic computing,
storage, and networking resources on an on-demand, pay-as-you-go basis. IaaS is
one of four types of cloud services, along with Software as a Service (SaaS),
Platform as a Service (PaaS), and Server less.
Migrating your organization's
infrastructure to an IaaS solution will help you reduce on-premises data center
maintenance, save money on hardware costs, and gain real-time business
insights. IaaS solutions give you the flexibility to scale your IT resources up
and down based on demand. They also help you quickly deliver new applications
and increase the reliability of your core infrastructure.
IaaS allows you to bypass the
cost and complexity of purchasing and managing physical servers and data center
infrastructure. Each resource is offered as a separate component of the Service
and you pay for a particular resource only as long as you need it. A cloud
service provider like Azure manages the infrastructure while you purchase,
install, configure, and manage your own software—including operating systems,
middleware, and applications.
IaaS Applications
Lift and slide migration
This is the fastest and
cheapest way to migrate an application or workload to the cloud. Without
refactoring your underlying architecture, you can increase scale and
performance, increase security, and reduce the cost of running an application
or workload.
Testing and development
Your team can quickly set up
and tear down test and development environments and bring new applications to
market faster. IaaS enables rapid and economical scaling of development/test
environments up and down.
Storage, backup and recovery
Your organization avoids
storage capital expenditures and storage management complexities that typically
require experienced staff to manage data and meet legal and compliance requirements.
IaaS is useful for dealing with unpredictable demand and ever-increasing
storage needs. It can also simplify the planning and management of backup and
recovery systems.
Web applications
IaaS provides all the
infrastructure to support web applications, including storage, web and
application servers, and network resources. Your organization can quickly
deploy web applications on IaaS and easily scale infrastructure up and down
when application demand is unpredictable.
High performance computing
High-performance computing on supercomputers, computer networks, or computer clusters helps solve complex problems involving millions of variables or calculations. Examples include protein folding and earthquake simulation, climate and weather forecasting, financial modeling and product design evaluation.
IaaS Advantages
Reduces capital expenditure and
optimizes costs
IaaS eliminates the costs of
configuring and managing a physical data center, making it a cost-effective
choice for migrating to the cloud. The pay-as-you-go subscription models used
by IaaS providers help you reduce hardware and maintenance costs and allow your
IT team to focus on core business.
It increases the scale and
performance of IT workloads
IaaS allows you to scale
globally and adapt to peaks in resource demand. This way, you can deliver IT
resources to employees from anywhere in the world faster and increase
application performance.
Increases stability,
reliability and support
With IaaS, there is no need to
maintain and upgrade software and hardware or troubleshoot equipment. With an
appropriate contract, the service provider ensures that your infrastructure is
reliable and meets service level agreements (SLAs).
Improves business continuity
and disaster recovery
Achieving high availability,
business continuity, and disaster recovery is expensive because it requires a
significant amount of technology and staff. But with the right SLA in place,
IaaS helps reduce these costs. It also helps you access your apps and data as
usual during a disaster or outage.
Increases security
With an appropriate service
agreement, a cloud service provider can offer better security for your
applications and data than you would get on your own.
It helps you innovate and get
new apps to users faster
With IaaS, once you decide to
launch a new product or initiative, the necessary computing infrastructure can
be ready in minutes or hours, rather than days or weeks. And because you don't
need to set up the underlying infrastructure, IaaS lets you deliver your
applications to users faster.
Platform as a Service (PaaS)
Platform as a service (PaaS) is
a complete cloud development and deployment environment with resources that
enable you to deliver everything from simple cloud applications to
sophisticated cloud enterprise applications. You purchase the resources you
need from a cloud service provider on a pay-as-you-go basis and access them
over a secure Internet connection.
Like IaaS, PaaS includes
infrastructure—servers, storage, and networks—but also middleware, development
tools, business intelligence (BI) services, database management systems, and
more. PaaS is designed to support the entire lifecycle of web applications:
build, test, deploy, manage, and update.
PaaS allows you to avoid the
cost and complexity of purchasing and managing software licenses, underlying
application infrastructure and middleware, container orchestrators such as
Kubernetes, or development tools and other resources. You manage the
applications and services you develop, and the cloud service provider typically
manages everything else.
PaaS Applications
Organizations typically use
PaaS for these scenarios:
Development framework
PaaS provides a framework on
which developers can build and develop or customize cloud applications. Similar
to creating an Excel macro, PaaS allows developers to create applications using
built-in software components. Cloud features such as scalability, high
availability, and multi-tenancy capability are included, reducing the amount of
coding developers have to do.
Analytics or business
intelligence
Tools delivered as a service
with PaaS enable organizations to analyze and mine their data, find insights
and patterns, and predict outcomes to improve forecasting, product design
decisions, ROI, and other business decisions.
Additional services
PaaS providers may offer
additional services that enhance applications, such as workflow, directory,
security, and scheduling.
PaaS Advantages
By providing infrastructure as
a service
PaaS offers the same benefits
as IaaS. But its other features—middleware, development tools, and other
business tools—give you additional benefits:
Reduce coding time
PaaS development tools can
reduce the time needed to code new applications with pre-coded application
components built into the platform, such as workflow, directory services,
security features, search, and so on.
Add development capabilities
without adding staff
Platform as a Service
components can provide your development team with new capabilities without
having to add employees with the required skills.
Develop more easily for
multiple platforms
Some service providers provide
you with cross-platform development capabilities such as desktop, mobile, and
browsers, making cross-platform app development faster and easier.
Use sophisticated tools at an
affordable price
The pay-as-you-go model allows
individuals or organizations to use sophisticated development software and
business intelligence and analytics tools that they could not afford to
purchase outright.
Support geographically
distributed development teams
Because the development
environment is accessible over the Internet, development teams can collaborate
on projects even when team members are in remote locations.
Effectively manage the
application lifecycle
PaaS provides all the
capabilities you need to support the entire lifecycle of web applications:
build, test, deploy, manage and update within the same integrated environment.
Software as a Service (SaaS)
SaaS provides a complete software solution that you purchase from a cloud service provider on a pay-as-you-go basis. You lease the use of the application to your organization and your users connect to it over the Internet, usually using a web browser. All underlying infrastructure, middleware, application software and application data reside in the service provider's data center. The service provider manages the hardware and software and, with the relevant service contract, ensures the availability and security of the application and your data. SaaS allows your organization to quickly get an application up and running with minimal upfront costs.
SaaS Applications
If you’ve used a web-based email
service such as Outlook, Hotmail, or Yahoo! Mail, then you’ve already used a
form of SaaS. With these services, you log into your account over the Internet,
often from a web browser. The email software is located on the service
provider’s network, and your messages are stored there as well. You can access
your email and stored messages from a web browser on any computer or Internet-connected
device.
The previous examples are free services
for personal use. For organizational use, you can rent productivity apps, such
as email, collaboration, and calendaring; and sophisticated business
applications such as customer relationship management (CRM), enterprise
resource planning (ERP), and document management. You pay for the use of these
apps by subscription or according to the level of use.
SaaS Advantages
Get access to sophisticated applications
You don't need to buy, install, update, or maintain
any hardware, middleware, or software to provide SaaS applications to users.
SaaS makes even sophisticated business applications such as ERP and CRM
available to organizations that do not have the resources to purchase, deploy,
and manage the required infrastructure and software.
Pay only for what you use
You'll also save money because the SaaS
automatically scales up and down based on usage levels.
Use free client software
Users can run most SaaS applications directly from
their web browser without having to download and install any software, although
some applications require plugins. This means you don't need to buy and install
special software for your users.
Mobilize your workforce with ease
SaaS makes it easy to “mobilize” your workforce
because users can access SaaS applications and data from any Internet-connected
computer or mobile device. You don't have to worry about developing
applications for different types of computers and devices because the service
provider has already done so. Plus, you don't need to bring special expertise
to manage the security issues inherent in mobile computing. A carefully
selected service provider will ensure the safety of your data, regardless of
the type of device that consumes it.
Access your app data from anywhere
With data stored in the cloud, users can access
their information from any internet-connected computer or mobile device. And
when app data is stored in the cloud, no data is lost if a user's computer or
device fails.
Serverless
Computing
To understand the definition of serverless computing, it's important to remember that servers still run code. The name serverless comes from the fact that the tasks associated with provisioning and managing the infrastructure are invisible to developers. This approach allows developers to focus more on business logic and bring more value to the core business. Serverless computing helps teams increase productivity and bring products to market faster, allowing organizations to better optimize resources and focus on innovation.
Serverless Computing Benefits
No infrastructure management
Using fully managed services allows developers to avoid administrative tasks and focus on core business logic. With a serverless platform, you simply deploy your code and it runs with high availability.
Dynamic scalability
With serverless computing, the infrastructure dynamically scales up and down in seconds to meet the demands of any workload.
Faster time to market
Serverless applications reduce operational dependencies in each development cycle, increasing the agility of development teams to deliver more features in less time.
More efficient use of resources
The transition to serverless technologies helps organizations reduce total cost of ownership and reallocate resources to accelerate the pace of innovation.
Serverless Computing Application Patterns
Serverless Kubernetes
Developers bring their own containers to fully
managed Kubernetes-organized clusters that can automatically scale up and down
with sudden changes in traffic on peak workloads.
Serverless workflows
Serverless workflows use a low/no code approach
that simplifies the orchestration of combined tasks. Developers can integrate
different services (either cloud or on-premise) without coding these
interactions, maintaining sticky code, or learning new APIs or specifications.
Serverless application environment
In a serverless application environment, both the
back-end and front-end are hosted on fully managed services that handle
scaling, security and compliance requirements.
Serverless API Gateway
Serverless API Gateway is a centralized, fully
managed entry point for serverless backend services. It enables developers to
publish, manage, secure and analyze APIs on a global scale.
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