A - Z of Cloud Computing

Application Programming Interface (API): An API is a set of programming instructions that are released to developers for creation and deployment of applications on cloud services offered by cloud computing providers

Cloud Backup: It is a concept of sending the copies of your data to off-site server for backup storage. Examples: Amazon S3 (Amazon Simple Storage Service), Asigra, EMC's Mozy

Cloud Security Alliance (CSA): It is an organization created to promote security best practices for cloud computing providers.

Elasticity: This refers to the ability of a provider or an application to grow and shrink the IT Infrastructure as needed to meet the demand. It is considered as a key feature because it reduces the need of an organization to carry overhead or spare capacity

Hybrid Cloud: It is a cloud model that combines the advantages of both private and public cloud. Hybrid Cloud is getting popular amongst enterprises who look to maintain the reliability of in house data security still benefiting from the scalability of public cloud

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS): It is a pay-per-use service where the cloud computing provider offers storage space, software and network equipment as resources. Examples are Amazon EC2, Windows Azure

Multi-tenancy: It is an ability of the platform or piece of IT infrastructure to hold more than one application, virtual machine or process at a time, for multiple users

Platform as a Service (PaaS): It is a cloud computing model where the platform is offered to users via Web that can be used for development, deployment and hosting of applications. Examples are Windows Azure, Google App Engine

Private Cloud: It is a cloud model which hosts services to a limited number of people within an organization's firewall.

Public Cloud: It is a cloud model where a 3rd party offers storage and computing power over the Internet in a scalable, pay-per-usage fashion

Scalability: It refers to the ability of a provider or an application to instantly or automatically provision capacity to meet the spikes in demand

Software as a Service (SaaS): It is a cloud model that provides applications to the customers via Web. Examples are Salesforce.com, Adobe

Private Cloud - Needed or not!!!!

With this post I am going to stay technology agnostic. I’m also going to stay clear of marketing terms.

Let’s get something clear. A private cloud does not equal server virtualisation. A private cloud is an extension of server virtualisation. It provides a complex self-service mechanism where non infrastructure administrators can deploy services. In this context and using the ITIL view of things, a service is a business application comprised of things like IIS/Apache, SQL/MySQL, virtual machines with operating systems, application components (Perl/.NET, database schemas, and web content), and additional fabric configurations like load balancers and storage. In other words, a person from the department that manages business applications can deploy the virtual infrastructure that they need to meet a business need without any effort/time required from the IT department that manages the infrastructure.

This accomplishes a bunch of things that the business will care about. But the key piece here is that non infrastructure people are doing the deployment.

Server virtualisation is a subset of the private cloud. You can do server virtualisation without deploying a private cloud.  But you cannot do private cloud without server virtualisation.

Taking all into account (up to now, and this might change) I have one rule to answer the central question of this blog post.

Question: Do I need a private cloud
Answer: Who deploys and manages your applications?

I know, I know. I’ve answered a question with a question. Go read how I briefly described a private cloud. The think you noticed was that the infrastructure administrators were delegating deployment tasks to people who manage applications. That’s the crux. Do those people exist in your organisation?

In a small and some medium organisations, there are a few IT infrastructure administrators who do everything. They manage the firewalls, the run the domain, they do server virtualisation, they run the CRM application (I’m picking on CRM today!), they manage the SQL databases, and so on. There is no one to delegate service deployment tasks to. So what is the point in deploying all the additional infrastructure of a private cloud? There is no valid business reason that I can envision (at the moment). All that small team really needs is their virtualisation management tools, preferably joined by a set of systems management tools (no brands – I said I’d be agnostic).

On the other hand some medium and large organisations do have various different departments that manage various aspects of the business application portfolio. There will also be branch offices where servers have been centralised in a virtual farm. Here there absolutely is a reason to deploy a private cloud. The central IT infrastructure department could employ people to deploy VMs and install things like IIS/Apache or SQL/MySQL all day long. And that still wouldn’t meet the deadlines of their internal customers. Deploying a private cloud would allow those internal customers, who are IT savvy, to deploy their own services in a timely and controlled manner, using policies and quotas that are defined centrally by the business.

The rule of thumb here (at the moment) is that:
If the IT infrastructure team is doing all application deployment/management then thereshould not be a private cloud.
If there are other departments or teams that are doing application deployment/management then there should be a private cloud.

That’s my view on the “Should I deploy a private cloud?” question. I’ll be interested in other opinions. This is early days for this stuff and I figure many of the questions and answers for the private cloud will evolve over the coming years.

Are clouds on your horizon?

Cloud computing has been a hot topic in the IT industry for several years and every time you read a newsletter or industry publication, “cloud” is big in the headlines.Major industry players are now offering mature cloud computing services and products to help enterprise customers implement cloud strategies that can move IT services forward.


Those cloud strategies can vary widely. For example, many enterprises are on a declared trajectory toward an internal (or private) cloud, and many more already use external (public) clouds in some way — from software as a service (SaaS) from providers such as Google or Salesforce.com to infrastructure and platform as a service (IaaS, PaaS) from providers such as Amazon, Rackspace, Microsoft, or Strato. Whatever the approach, an enterprise cloud strategy should be as flexible as the cloud itself. It should leverage public clouds when it makes sense to do so, such as for email, office productivity tools, or CRM tools, and could move sensitive applications and data to private or hybrid clouds when these options are more cost effective.

Public Cloud Benefits

Public clouds — off-premises infrastructures that deliver IT services using Internet standards — are attractive to many organizations for a variety of reasons.
• Rapid time to value: With public clouds, businesses can quickly realize the flexibility and savings of cloud
computing because the infrastructure is already up and running.
• Risk transfer: Businesses that use public clouds transfer the risk and expense of managing the infrastructure to the cloud service provider. Service level agreements become the provider’s responsibility rather than the IT department’s, freeing IT professionals to focus on value-add initiatives.
• Capital savings: Public clouds allow organizations to achieve the benefits of cloud computing without
the capital costs associated with building a private cloud.


Private Cloud Benefits
Many businesses look to private clouds to remedy the real or perceived shortcomings of public clouds.
Benefits of private clouds include the following:
• Greater control: Because the hardware and software that make up a private cloud are on premises,
organizations can more fully control and customize the environment.
• Greater peace of mind: A private cloud often may provide greater peace of mind regarding sensitive
applications and data in part because the hardware is on premises.
• New returns on existing investments: Many organizations look to private clouds as a way to further
utilize current server assets.

Hybrid Cloud Benefits

Organizations can take advantage of the benefits of both public and private clouds when they use a hybrid cloud. With this approach, enterprises keep some data, applications, and services in house while outsourcing others to public clouds — all of which are managed through a common framework in the best implementations.

Start your Cloud journey today!!!!