Cloud Computing: A Brief Overview
You guys might be hearing the word cloud these days if you are into technology and many are in misconception that some big cloud above in the sky is storing our data, but you know that's quite funny and the strange part is that people who don't have even the slightest idea about it are taking like the real professional people who knows cloud from birth. If you don't believe me then do check out the video: Vishwa Bandhu Gupta Explains Cloud computing and after you are done with the laughs, come back to this article.
Ok, So what exactly is a Cloud
In simple layman's term : Cloud computing is the next stage in evolution of the Internet. The cloud in cloud computing provides the means through which everything - from computing power to computing infrastructure, applications, business processes to personal collaboration — can be delivered to you as a service wherever and whenever you need.
Why do we need it
Because is the business demand. Its a model where everything is avilable everywhere and you not to be worried about the services and data just because you are not having your own device. You just need a device that can connect to the internet and cloud takes the responsibility of providing your data at that place. Because of its elastice nature cloud is becoming important. Means users can request additional resources on demand and just as easily release those resources when they’re no longer needed.
Advantage
The cloud can eliminate many of the complex constraints from the traditional computing environment, including space, time, power, and cost. The end user doesn’t really have to know anything about the underlying technology. He will get the service as per his requirement. He simply requests an amount of computing, storage, software, process, or other resources from the service provider. The simple example of Cloud service is your email account like : gmail.
Difference from Traditional IT Service Providers
Traditional IT service providers operate the hardware, software, networks, and storage for its clients. While the customer pays the licensing fees for the software, the IT service provider manages the overall environment. The service provider operates the infrastructure in its own facilities. With the traditional IT service provider, the customer signs a long-term contract that specifies mutually agreed-upon service levels. These IT providers typicallycustomize an environment to meet the needs of one customer.
In the cloud model, the service provider might still operate the infrastructure in its own facilities (except in the case of a private cloud) however, the infrastructure might be virtualized across the globe, meaning that you may not know where your computing resources, applications, or even data actually reside.
Problems
Yes every system has a problem and its not easy to implement cloud either. There is an inherent conflict between what the business requires and what data center management can reasonably provide. Business management wants optimal performance, flawless implementation, and 100 percent uptime. The business requires new capability to be available immediately, frequent changes to applications, and more accessibility to quality data in real time and at the samy time their organizations have limited budgets.
Finally
Well no one can gurantee that everything will be perfect when you or me get a cloud. The things, unfortunately, are more complicated than that. For example, complex, brittle applications won’t all be successful if they are just thrown up on the cloud. Virtualization adds performance implications. And many of these applications lack an architecture to achieve scale. A database-bound application will remain database bound, regardless of the additional compute resources beneath it.
Closing notes
My idea for writing this article is to get familiar with the term cloud and some of its points rather than diving into the technology part. But i would like to hear about your views and feedback in case you want to know more about the techincal details as the topic is very vast.
Enjoy..
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