Information Technology Gurus devised the term 'Cloud' to represent a collection of IT services and hardware which are visible to a user as a vague group of hi-tech paraphernalia localized in 'some' remote location.
A cloud solution is expected to be accessible to an end user over the internet. Interesting enough, something that could be a cloud system to one person could very well be an in-premise system for someone else who may localized in the same same physical location as the physical system. A cloud system is an in-premise system somewhere and hence will have all qualities of an in premise system plus a lot more.
An IT solution in cloud would invariably be accessed via the internet using a web browser or an app on your mobile device.
If one was to visualize an IT cloud in a dream, you would see Technology and Business Processes evaporating into a la-la land and converting into a genie who is at your service, albeit with little bit less than 'Your Wish is my command'! Always remember, what is cloud for you now is still in-premise for someone some where who is now famously called your Cloud Service Provider!!
What does it usually take to build a cloud or if you are still in your dream, what becomes off the technology and Business Processes evaporated into cloud?
Before we jump into building a cloud lets reflect upon some existing cloud implementations that we may already be familiar with. Listed out are a few of those below :
* Google drive @ drive.google.com
* dropbox @ www.dropbox.com
* E-mail services like yahoo @www.yahoo.com, Microsoft E-mail @www.live.com
* Amazon Cloud @ aws.amazon.com
Overall, Most of the cloud services can be categorized into one of the three categories :
1. Social Networking
2. E-Mail
3. Documents and Application Hosting Services
Private Cloud vs Public Cloud vs Hybrid Cloud
Starting off with cloud requires a good understanding of the Private Cloud, Public Cloud and a Hybrid Cloud Solutions. A one line summary of each of them would go as follows.
A private cloud would reside completely within an enterprise' own data center.
A public cloud would reside completely on a Cloud providers infrastructure e.g. Amazon (AWS), Google, Microsoft (Azuer) etc.
A hybrid cloud would have a combination of both of the above. One part of the IT solution would be hosted in the enterprise' own data center while another part would be in a public cloud.
Cloud providers today diversify their services into two key segments: Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) & Platform as a Service (PaaS).
Infrastructure as a Service (Iaas) is a very basic service that replaces an enterprise' In Premise hardware only but adds the ease of scalability, redundancy and utilization based costing right of the bat. It effectively transfers the risk and costs of maintaining a data center to a service provider but stops right there. The onus of all configuration of cloud software, including the Operating system and overlaying applications lies on your enterprise.
Platform as a Service (PaaS) goes a step further and takes over the responsibility of base configuration to the cloud providers. More on PaaS to come in later posts.
Before wrapping up this blog post, lets take a quick look at cloud providers out there in the market.
Open Source Cloud Providers
* Apache Cloudstack stands out as the premiere and free cloud software to to create and deploy cloud services.
* Xen Cloud Platform is an open source virtualization solution. XCP includes tools that are enterprise ready like Xen Hypervisor with Xen API for Cloud, Storage and networking operations.
A cloud solution is expected to be accessible to an end user over the internet. Interesting enough, something that could be a cloud system to one person could very well be an in-premise system for someone else who may localized in the same same physical location as the physical system. A cloud system is an in-premise system somewhere and hence will have all qualities of an in premise system plus a lot more.
An IT solution in cloud would invariably be accessed via the internet using a web browser or an app on your mobile device.
If one was to visualize an IT cloud in a dream, you would see Technology and Business Processes evaporating into a la-la land and converting into a genie who is at your service, albeit with little bit less than 'Your Wish is my command'! Always remember, what is cloud for you now is still in-premise for someone some where who is now famously called your Cloud Service Provider!!
What does it usually take to build a cloud or if you are still in your dream, what becomes off the technology and Business Processes evaporated into cloud?
Before we jump into building a cloud lets reflect upon some existing cloud implementations that we may already be familiar with. Listed out are a few of those below :
* Google drive @ drive.google.com
* dropbox @ www.dropbox.com
* E-mail services like yahoo @www.yahoo.com, Microsoft E-mail @www.live.com
* Amazon Cloud @ aws.amazon.com
Overall, Most of the cloud services can be categorized into one of the three categories :
1. Social Networking
2. E-Mail
3. Documents and Application Hosting Services
Private Cloud vs Public Cloud vs Hybrid Cloud
Starting off with cloud requires a good understanding of the Private Cloud, Public Cloud and a Hybrid Cloud Solutions. A one line summary of each of them would go as follows.
A private cloud would reside completely within an enterprise' own data center.
A public cloud would reside completely on a Cloud providers infrastructure e.g. Amazon (AWS), Google, Microsoft (Azuer) etc.
A hybrid cloud would have a combination of both of the above. One part of the IT solution would be hosted in the enterprise' own data center while another part would be in a public cloud.
Cloud providers today diversify their services into two key segments: Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) & Platform as a Service (PaaS).
Infrastructure as a Service (Iaas) is a very basic service that replaces an enterprise' In Premise hardware only but adds the ease of scalability, redundancy and utilization based costing right of the bat. It effectively transfers the risk and costs of maintaining a data center to a service provider but stops right there. The onus of all configuration of cloud software, including the Operating system and overlaying applications lies on your enterprise.
Platform as a Service (PaaS) goes a step further and takes over the responsibility of base configuration to the cloud providers. More on PaaS to come in later posts.
Before wrapping up this blog post, lets take a quick look at cloud providers out there in the market.
Open Source Cloud Providers
* Apache Cloudstack stands out as the premiere and free cloud software to to create and deploy cloud services.
* Xen Cloud Platform is an open source virtualization solution. XCP includes tools that are enterprise ready like Xen Hypervisor with Xen API for Cloud, Storage and networking operations.
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