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Cloud computing
Cloud computing is computing in which large groups of remote servers are networked to allow the
centralized data storage, and online access to computer services or resources. Clouds can be
classified as public, private or hybrid.

Cloud computing

Cloud computing is computing in which large groups of remote servers are

networked to allow the centralized data storage, and online access to computer
services or resources. Clouds can be classified as public, private or hybrid.

Cloud computing is the result of evolution and adoption of existing technologies

and paradigms. The goal of cloud computing is to allow users to take benefit from
all of these technologies, without the need for deep knowledge about or expertise
with each one of them. The cloud aims to cut costs, and help the users focus on
their core business instead of being impeded by IT obstacles.

The main enabling technology for cloud computing is virtualization. Virtualization

software separates a physical computing device into one or more "virtual" devices,
each of which can be easily used and managed to perform computing tasks. With
operating system–level virtualization essentially creating a scalable system of
multiple independent computing devices, idle computing resources can be
allocated and used more efficiently. Virtualization provides the agility required to
speed up IT operations, and reduces cost by increasing infrastructure utilization.
Autonomic computing automates the process through which the user can provision
resources on-demand. By minimizing user involvement, automation speeds up the
process, reduces labor costs and reduces the possibility of human errors.

Users routinely face difficult business problems. Cloud computing adopts concepts
from Service-oriented Architecture (SOA) that can help the user break these
problems into services that can be integrated to provide a solution. Cloud
computing provides all of its resources as services, and makes use of the well-
established standards and best practices gained in the domain of SOA to allow
global and easy access to cloud services in a standardized way.

Cloud computing also leverages concepts from utility computing to provide

metrics for the services used. Such metrics are at the core of the public cloud pay-
per-use models. In addition, measured services are an essential part of the feedback
loops in autonomic computing, allowing services to scale on-demand and to
perform automatic failure recovery.

Cloud computing is a kind of grid computing; it has evolved by addressing the

QoS (quality of service) and reliability problems. Cloud computing provides the
tools and technologies to build data/compute intensive parallel applications with
much more affordable prices compared to traditional parallel computing
techniques.

Grid computing -"A form of distributed and parallel computing, whereby a

'super and virtual computer' is composed of a cluster of networked, loosely coupled
computers acting in concert to perform very large tasks."

Mainframe computer - Powerful computers used mainly by large

organizations for critical applications, typically bulk data processing such as:
census; industry and consumer statistics; police and secret intelligence services;
enterprise resource planning; and financial transaction processing.

Utility computing - The "packaging of computing resources, such as

computation and storage, as a metered service similar to a traditional public utility,
such as electricity."
 Peer-to-peer - A distributed architecture without the need for central
coordination. Participants are both suppliers and consumers of resources (in
contrast to the traditional client–server model).

1 Characteristics

Cloud computing exhibits the following key characteristics:

Agility improves with users' ability to re-provision technological

infrastructure resources.

Application programming interface (API) accessibility to software that

enables machines to interact with cloud software in the same way that a traditional
user interface (e.g., a computer desktop) facilitates interaction between humans and
computers. Cloud computing systems typically use Representational State Transfer
(REST)-based APIs.

Cost reductions claimed by cloud providers. A public-cloud delivery model

converts capital expenditure to operational expenditure. This purportedly lowers
barriers to entry, as infrastructure is typically provided by a third party and does
not need to be purchased for one-time or infrequent intensive computing tasks.
Pricing on a utility computing basis is fine-grained, with usage-based options and
fewer IT skills are required for implementation (in-house).The e-FISCAL project's
state-of-the-art repository contains several articles looking into cost aspects in
more detail, most of them concluding that costs savings depend on the type of
activities supported and the type of infrastructure available in-house.

Device and location independence enable users to access systems using a

web browser regardless of their location or what device they use (e.g., PC, mobile
phone). As infrastructure is off-site (typically provided by a third-party) and
accessed via the Internet, users can connect from anywhere.
 Maintenance of cloud computing applications is easier, because they do not
need to be installed on each user's computer and can be accessed from different
places.

Multitenancy enables sharing of resources and costs across a large pool of

users thus allowing

for:

Centralization of infrastructure in locations with lower costs (such as real

estate, electricity, etc.)

o peak-load capacity increases (users need not engineer for highest possible
load-levels)
Utilization and efficiency improvements for systems that are often only 10–
20% utilized.

Performance is monitored and consistent and loosely coupled architectures

are constructed using web services as the system interface.

Productivity may be increased when multiple users can work on the same
data simultaneously, rather than waiting for it to be saved and emailed. Time may
be saved as information does not need to be re-entered when fields are matched,
nor do users need to install application software upgrades to their computer.

Reliability improves with the use of multiple redundant sites, which makes
well-designed cloud computing suitable for business continuity and disaster
recovery.

Scalability and elasticity via dynamic ("on-demand") provisioning of

resources on a fine-grained, self-service basis in near real-time (Note, the VM
startup time varies by VM type, location, OS and cloud providers), without users
having to engineer for peak loads.

Security can improve due to centralization of data, increased security-

focused resources, etc., but concerns can persist about loss of control over certain
sensitive data, and the lack of security for stored kernels. Security is often as good
as or better than other traditional systems, in part because providers are able to
devote resources to solving security issues that many customers cannot afford to
tackle. However, the complexity of security is greatly increased when data is
distributed over a wider area or over a greater number of devices, as well as in
multi-tenant systems shared by unrelated users. In addition, user access to security
audit logs may be difficult or impossible. Private cloud installations are in part
motivated by users' desire to retain control over the infrastructure and avoid losing
control of information security.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology's definition of cloud

computing identifies "five essential characteristics":

On-demand self-service. A consumer can unilaterally provision computing

capabilities, such as server time and network storage, as needed automatically
without requiring human interaction with each service provider.

Broad network access. Capabilities are available over the network and
accessed through standard mechanisms that promote use by heterogeneous thin or
thick client platforms (e.g., mobile phones, tablets, laptops, and workstations).

Resource pooling. The provider's computing resources are pooled to serve

multiple consumers using a multi-tenant model, with different physical and virtual
resources dynamically assigned and reassigned according to consumer demand.

Rapid elasticity. Capabilities can be elastically provisioned and released, in

some cases automatically, to scale rapidly outward and inward commensurate with
demand. To the consumer, the capabilities available for provisioning often appear
unlimited and can be appropriated in any quantity at any time.
Measured service. Cloud systems automatically control and optimize resource use
by leveraging a metering capability at some level of abstraction appropriate to the
type of service (e.g., storage, processing, bandwidth, and active user accounts).
Resource usage can be monitored, controlled, and reported, providing transparency
for both the provider and consumer of the utilized service.

2 Service models

Cloud computing providers offer their services according to several fundamental

models:

2.1 Infrastructure as a service (IaaS)

In the most basic cloud-service model & according to the IETF (Internet
Engineering Task Force), providers of IaaS offer computers – physical or (more
often) virtual machines – and other resources. (A hypervisor, such as Xen, Oracle
VirtualBox, KVM, VMware ESX/ESXi, or Hyper-V runs the virtual machines as
guests. Pools of hypervisors within the cloud operational support-system can
support large numbers of virtual machines and the ability to scale services up and
down according to customers' varying requirements.)

IaaS clouds often offer additional resources such as a virtual-machine disk image
library, raw block storage, and file or object storage, firewalls, load balancers, IP
addresses, virtual local area networks (VLANs), and software bundles. IaaS-cloud
providers supply these resources on-demand from their large pools installed in data
centers. For wide-area connectivity, customers can use either the Internet or carrier
clouds (dedicated virtual private networks).

To deploy their applications, cloud users install operating-system images and their
application software on the cloud infrastructure. In this model, the cloud user
patches and maintains the operating systems and the application software. Cloud
providers typically bill IaaS services on a utility computing basis: cost reflects the
amount of resources allocated and consumed.

2.2 Platform as a service (PaaS)

In the PaaS models, cloud providers deliver a computing platform, typically

including operating system, programming language execution environment,
database, and web server. Application developers can develop and run their
software solutions on a cloud platform without the cost and complexity of buying
and managing the underlying hardware and software layers. With some PaaS offers
like Microsoft Azure and Google App Engine, the underlying computer and
storage resources scale automatically to match application demand so that the
cloud user does not have to allocate resources manually. The latter has also been
proposed by an architecture aiming to facilitate real-time in cloud environments.

Platform as a service (PaaS) provides a computing platform and a key chimney. It

joins with software as a service (SaaS) and infrastructure as a service (IaaS), model
of cloud computing.

2.3 Software as a service (SaaS)

In the business model using software as a service (SaaS), users are provided access
to application software and databases. Cloud providers manage the infrastructure
and platforms that run the applications. SaaS is sometimes referred to as "on-
demand software" and is usually priced on a pay-per-use basis. SaaS providers
generally price applications using a subscription fee.

In the SaaS model, cloud providers install and operate application software in the
cloud and cloud users access the software from cloud clients. Cloud users do not
manage the cloud infrastructure and platform where the application runs. This
eliminates the need to install and run the application on the cloud user's own
computers, which simplifies maintenance and support. Cloud applications are
different from other applications in their scalability which can be achieved by
cloning tasks onto multiple virtual machines at run-time to meet changing work
demand. Load balancers distribute the work over the set of virtual machines. This
process is transparent to the cloud user, who sees only a single access point. To
accommodate a large number of cloud users, cloud applications can be multitenant,
that is, any machine serves more than one cloud user organization.

The pricing model for SaaS applications is typically a monthly or yearly flat fee
per user, so price is scalable and adjustable if users are added or removed at any
point.

Proponents claim SaaS allows a business the potential to reduce IT operational

costs by outsourcing hardware and software maintenance and support to the cloud
provider. This enables the business to reallocate IT operations costs away from
hardware/software spending and personnel expenses, towards meeting other goals.
In addition, with applications hosted centrally, updates can be released without the
need for users to install new software. One drawback of SaaS is that the users' data
are stored on the cloud provider's server. As a result, there could be unauthorized
access to the data. For this reason, users are increasingly adopting intelligent third-
party key management systems to help secure their data.

3 Cloud computing types

3.1 Private cloud

Private cloud is cloud infrastructure operated solely for a single organization,

whether managed internally or by a third-party, and hosted either internally or
externally. Undertaking a private cloud project requires a significant level and
degree of engagement to virtualize the business environment, and requires the
organization to reevaluate decisions about existing resources. When done right, it
can improve business, but every step in the project raises security issues that must
be addressed to prevent serious vulnerabilities. Self-run data centers are generally
capital intensive. They have a significant physical footprint, requiring allocations
of space, hardware, and environmental controls. These assets have to be refreshed
periodically, resulting in additional capital expenditures. They have attracted
criticism because users "still have to buy, build, and manage them" and thus do not
benefit from less hands-on management, essentially "[lacking] the economic model
that makes cloud computing such an intriguing concept".

3.2 Public cloud

A cloud is called a "public cloud" when the services are rendered over a network
that is open for public use. Public cloud services may be free or offered on a pay-
per-usage model. Technically there may be little or no difference between public
and private cloud architecture, however, security consideration may be
substantially different for services (applications, storage, and other resources) that
are made available by a service provider for a public audience and when
communication is effected over a non-trusted network. Generally, public cloud
service providers like Amazon AWS, Microsoft and Google own and operate the
infrastructure at their data center and access is generally via the Internet. AWS and
Microsoft also offer direct connect services called "AWS Direct Connect" and
"Azure Express Route" respectively, such connections require customers to
purchase or lease a private connection to a peering point offered by the cloud
provider.

3.3 Hybrid cloud

Hybrid cloud is a composition of two or more clouds (private, community or

public) that remain distinct entities but are bound together, offering the benefits of
multiple deployment models. Hybrid cloud can also mean the ability to connect
collocation, managed and/or dedicated services with cloud resources.

Gartner, Inc. defines a hybrid cloud service as a cloud computing service that is
composed of some combination of private, public and community cloud services,
from different service providers.[64] A hybrid cloud service crosses isolation and
provider boundaries so that it can‘t be simply put in one category of private,
public, or community cloud service. It allows one to extend either the capacity or
the capability of a cloud service, by aggregation, integration or customization with
another cloud service.

Varied use cases for hybrid cloud composition exist. For example, an organization
may store sensitive client data in house on a private cloud application, but
interconnect that application to a business intelligence application provided on a
public cloud as a software service. This example of hybrid cloud extends the
capabilities of the enterprise to deliver a specific business service through the
addition of externally available public cloud services.

Another example of hybrid cloud is one where IT organizations use public cloud
computing resources to meet temporary capacity needs that cannot be met by the
private cloud. This capability enables hybrid clouds to employ cloud bursting for
scaling across clouds. Cloud bursting is an application deployment model in which
an application runs in a private cloud or data center and "bursts" to a public cloud
when the demand for computing capacity increases. A primary advantage of cloud
bursting and a hybrid cloud model is that an organization only pays for extra
compute resources when they are needed. Cloud bursting enables data centers to
create an in-house IT infrastructure that supports average workloads, and use cloud
resources from public or private clouds, during spikes in processing demands.

Other clouds

3.4 Community cloud

Community cloud shares infrastructure between several organizations from a

specific community with common concerns (security, compliance, jurisdiction,
etc.), whether managed internally or by a third-party, and either hosted internally
or externally. The costs are spread over fewer users than a public cloud (but more
than a private cloud), so only some of the cost savings potential of cloud
computing are realized.

3.5 Distributed cloud

Cloud computing can also be provided by a distributed set of machines that are
running at different locations, while still connected to a single network or hub
service. Examples of this include distributed computing platforms such as BOINC
and Folding@Home. An interesting attempt in such direction is Cloud@Home,
aiming at implementing cloud computing provisioning model on top of voluntarily
shared resources.

3.6 Inter cloud

The Inter cloud is an interconnected global "cloud of clouds" and an extension of

the Internet "network of networks" on which it is based. The focus is on direct
interoperability between public cloud service providers, more so than between
providers and consumers (as is the case for hybrid- and multi-cloud).
3.7 Multicolor cloud

Multicolor is the use of multiple cloud computing services in a single

heterogeneous architecture to reduce reliance on single vendors, increase flexibility
through choice, militate against disasters, etc. It differs from hybrid cloud in that it
refers to multiple cloud services, rather than multiple deployment modes (public,
private, and legacy).