Title: Cloud Computing - In A Nutshell
1 Cloud Computing - In A Nutshell
2Materials Extracted From the Following Books
- Cloud Computing A Practical Approach
- By Anthony T. Velte, Toby J. Velte, Robert
Elsen - Cloud Computing Principles, Systems and
Applications - By Nick Antonopoulos and Lee Gillam
- Cloud Computing Principles and Paradigms
- by Rajkumar Buyya, James Broberg and Andrzej M.
Goscinski - Cloud Computing Strategies
- by Dimitris N. Chorafas
3Part IV Planning for the Cloudand Cloud
Resources Caveats
- Topic 13 Migrating to the Cloud
- Topic 14 Best Practices and the Future of Cloud
Computing - Topic 15 Ten Swell Client Computing Resources
- Topic 16 Ten Cloud Dos and Donts
4Topic 13 Migrating to the Cloud
- Cloud Services for Individuals
- The most basicand the easiestway to move to the
cloud is at an individual or small business
level. There are a growing number of popular
applications out there, and they tend to be free
or offered at a very low cost. Lets take a look
at some services that you may or may not have
heard of, and talk about how they can help you. - Take, for instance, Gmail. Its a free, online
web mail application. And probably the reason you
signed up for it is the reason many of us doits
convenient to be able to check your email from
any computer.
5The Most Popular Cloud Applications
- Apple Mobile Me (http//www.me.com/)
- Google Docs (http//docs.google.com.ezproxy.kcls.o
rg/) - Adobe Acrobat (http//www.acrobat.com/
- Jooce (http//www.jooce.com/)
- Evernote (http//www.evernote.com/)
- Microsoft Live Search (http//www.live.com/)
- Twitterfone (http//www.twitterfone.com/)
- Blist/Socrata (http//www.socratablist.com/)
6The Most Popular Cloud Applications
- Picnik (http//www.picnik.com/)
- Adobe Photoshop Express (http//www.photoshop.com/
express) - G.ho.st (http//g.ho.st/)
7Skytap Virtual Lab
Cloud-based virtualization solution company
Skytap (formerly known as illumita) offers Skytap
Virtual Lab, a virtual lab automation solution
available as an on-demand service over the
Web.
8Customers using Skytap are able to access the
following
- Virtual infrastructure on-demand
- Automated setup and tear-down of environments
- Skytap Library
- Collaboration in a virtual environment
9Skytap Migration API
- The Skytap API enables customers to blend
Skytaps cloud-based Virtual Lab platform with
their existing on-site IT infrastructure. Rather
than using cloud resources in a silo, Skytaps
Web Services API and one-click VPN functionality
allows organizations to create a hybrid IT
model whereby cloud resources can be used as an
extension of existing on-site IT environments.
10Cloud Services Aimed at the Mid-Market
- Force.com
- The Force.com Migration Tool is more of a
roll-up-your-sleeves-because-youre-going-to-get-y
our-hands-dirty thing, compared to being able to
point and click your way through a GUI. The
Force.com Migration Tool is an Ant library that
lets you migrate metadata (code and settings)
from your organization to Force.coms cloud.
11 Force.com
- The Force.com Migration Tool is especially
useful in these scenarios - Development projects When you need to populate a
test environment with large amounts of setup
changes. If you were to make these changes using
a web interface, it would take a large amount of
time. - Multistage release processes Most development
processes run in iterative cycles of building,
testing, and staging before they are released to
a production environment. Scripted retrieval and
deployment of your components makes this process
easier and cleaner. - Repetitive deployment using the same parameters
You can retrieve all your organizations
metadata, make changes as needed, and deploy that
metadata. If you need to do it again, you just
have to call the same deployment target.
12Force.com Apps
- The following are some of the (currently) most
popular apps on - Force.com
- Appirio Calendar Sync for Salesforce.com and
Google Apps - Gmail to Salesforce.com browser button for
Firefox - Lead and opportunity management dashboards
- Appirio CRM Dashboards for Salesforce.com
Google Apps - Sales Activity Dashboard
- VerticalResponse for AppExchange
- Appirio Search for Salesforce.com Google Apps
- Salesforce.com for Google AdWords
- Astadia Report Collaboration for Google
Spreadsheets - Conga Merge
13Enterprise-Class Cloud Offerings
- Moving to the cloud gets more complex as your
organization grows in size. Enterprise-class
organizations should follow the same sorts of
guidelines as the mid-market groupthat is, try
out new things, figure out what to move, and then
move over timebut their scope is entirely
different. For instance, part of your migration
might include moving a branch offices
application to the cloud.
14MS Exchange
- A cornerstone of most enterprises is the
Microsoft Exchange service for email. Microsoft
now offers Exchange Online and Microsoft
SharePoint Online for businesses of all sizes.
These subscription services offer businesses a
new way to purchase, deploy, and manage the
industry-leading email and calendaring solution,
and the industry-leading solution for portals and
collaboration.
15MS Exchange
- Between July 2008 and November 2008, more than
1,500 companies have enrolled in the Microsoft
Partner Program for Microsoft Online Services,
with 100 more joining every week. These companies
are realizing a wide range of revenue opportunity
that spans reselling, migration, customization,
consulting, training, support and application
development, and integration services.
16VMotion
- The main tool for migrations in VMwares arsenal
is VMotion. VMware says that VMotion leverages
the complete virtualization of servers, storage,
and networking to move an entire running virtual
machine instantaneously from one server to
another. The entire state of a virtual machine is
encapsulated by a set of files stored on shared
storage, and VMwares vStorage VMFS cluster file
system allows both the source and the target
VMware ESX server to access these virtual machine
files concurrently. ns.
17VMware vCenter Converter
- VMware offers its vCenter Converter to migrate
physical servers to virtual servers. The
application can be run on a number of different
types of hardware and supports most versions of
Microsoft Windows operating systems.
18Hyper-V Live Migration
- Migration is accomplished through Live Migration,
a tool part of Windows Server 2008 R2. Live
migration utilizes the integrated hypervisor
technology and high-availability features of the
server operating system so that customers can
move running applications between servers to
accommodate changing, dynamic computing needs
across a datacenter. In addition to other
features, the next version of Microsoft Hyper-V
Server will have live migration capabilities.
19Topic 14 Best Practices and the Future of Cloud
Computing
- So now youve moved to the cloud, and you want to
ensure a continued good experience. There are a
myriad of things you should address when seeking
to optimize your cloud efforts, ranging from the
technical side to the human side. In this - chapter, well look at optimizing your cloud
experience and talk about what things you can
adjust and what tools you can use to tweak them.
20Analyze Your Service
- Once youve selected a cloud vendor, you should
perform some tests and make sure youre still
getting what you are paying for. In this section,
well talk about some tips and techniques for
checking up on your vendor to make sure
everything is still up to par.
21Establishing a Baseline and Metrics
- Here are some variables to check
- Connection speed The speed at which you connect
to the vendors cloud. - Datastore delete time How long it takes to delete
the datastore. - Datastore read time How long it takes to read
data. - Deployment latency The amount of latency between
when an application is posted and ready to use. - Lag time How slow the system is.
22Tools
- The market hasnt been saturated with performance
monitoring tools for cloud computing yet. There
are only a couple, but look for the market to
broaden in the months and years to come. Here is
a rundown of some tools you can use to check your
cloud performance.
23Hyperic HQ
- Hyperic Inc offers its Hyperic HQ 4.0, the latest
version of its systems monitoring and management
application. The release addresses the needs of
businesses embracing Amazon cloud services to
create scalable IT deployment strategies. Hyperic
HQ enables the modern enterprises to monitor
their Amazon Web Services securely alongside
internal infrastructure. It is also the first
enterprise-class monitoring and management
software offered for deployment and payment
directly through Amazon Web Services.
24Hyperic HQ
- Hyperic HQ 4.0 was designed to address
next-generation monitoring and management to help
enterprises adopt cloud computing strategies, by
better equipping operations teams to perform
repetitive management tasks more efficiently.
Traditionally, installing a new server and
deploying it into production was a lengthy
process that took place over days or weeks. Now,
with cloud providers like Amazon offering the
ability to rapidly deploy servers in minutes and
pay by the hour, companies need a way to ensure
consistent monitoring oversight of their web
operations that is just as fast and flexible.
25Hyperic HQ for EC2
- Also part of the 4.0 release Hyperic HQ
Enterprise 4.0 is available as a fully configured
system on Amazon Web Services. An Amazon Machine
Image (AMI) preconfigured for Amazons Elastic
Block Storage (EBS) is available. The
distribution will be available directly on
Amazons DevPay service for an initiation fee and
a monthly charge based on the amount of
management data being collected to the HQ Server.
This is a familiar arrangement to businesses
looking to embrace the cloud there will be no
contract term and users will simply pay for how
much value they are deriving from the Hyperic HQ
Enterprise application. - Hyperic HQ 4.0 is available at www.hyperic.com.
Hyperic HQ for EC2 is available through Amazon.
26CloudStatus
- Hyperic also offers a free cloud monitoring tool,
CloudStatus. Their most recent addition to the
tool is continuous monitoring of Google. Google
App Engine is the second significant cloud
service to be monitored by CloudStatus, which
launched in June 2008 with support for Amazon Web
Services.
27CloudStatus
- Hyperics free CloudStatus service delivers
real-time, independent insight into the health
and performance of the App Engine, giving users a
greater level of confidence in the reliability,
availability, and scalability of web applications
running on Googles infrastructure.
28Cassatt
- Cassatt Corporation offers several products to
help internal cloud computingan IT approach that
delivers the benefits of cloud computing using
the resources that organizations already have
inside their datacenters. - To address these problems, the Cassatt offerings
help customers implement cloud-style computing
environments using their existing systems, inside
the firewalls of their datacenters without having
to modify their current hardware or software. The
resulting internal cloud can provide the same
operational efficiency, fault tolerance, and
energy savings promised by external clouds, but
without the worries over security, compliance,
lack of control, or the need or delay required to
change or replace their current applications.
29Best Practices
- When you plan to move to a cloud solution,
there are good ways to go about making the change
to ensure an optimal experience while paying less
than a colossal price. It starts with your
analysis and selection of a vendor, and continues
with your day-to-day usage of that service. - A. Finding the Right Vendor
- B. Phased-in vs. Flash-cut Approaches
- C. Be Creative in Your Approach
30A Finding the Right Vendor
- You have to weigh such issues as
- Does the provider support me the way I need
support? - Are they easy to work with?
- Will they charge me a crippling amount of money?
- What is their support like?
- What is their track record for uptime?
- Can they give me some references?
31B Phased-in vs. Flash-cut Approaches
- IT administrators tend to be control freaks, and
the thought of giving control of their systems to
someone else is difficult. One of the mental
hurdles to overcome is being willing to give up
physical control of some of your systems. And
while you dont need to put everything on the
cloud (nor should you), use a phased-in approach,
rather than moving everything, all at once. -
32C Be Creative in Your Approach
- Just because a cloud is normally used one way,
doesnt mean you cant think outside the box. For
example, S3 is normally considered a way to store
server data, but theres nothing saying you cant
use it for general backup purposes. - Also, if your organization has busy times during
the year, you can use the cloud to supplement
your need. For example, if you get really busy
during Christmas, using cloud computing means not
having to buy servers to simply deal with demand.
Have prebuilt image instances that you can use
whenever you want to add capacity.
33Future How Cloud Computing Might Evolve?
- As cloud computing changes, so must your
relationship with it. In this section well look
into our crystal balls and see where it might go.
Well also look at the opinions of researchers
who get paid lots of money to make the right
predictions.
34Researcher Predictions
- Gartner sees cloud computing as an evolution of
business that is no less influential than
e-business. Gartner maintains that the very
confusion and contradiction that surrounds the
term cloud computing signifies its potential to
change the status quo in the IT market. - Gartner defines cloud computing as a style of
computing where massively scalable IT-related
capabilities are provided as a service using
Internet technologies to multiple external
customers. -
35Salesforce.com and Customer Service
- Cloud evolution will not just take place in a
technical realm. Also affecting how cloud
services will change is how customers interact
with the cloud. Salesforce.com is addressing
customer service needs with its Service Cloud
program. - Built on the Force.com platform, the Service
Cloud transforms customer service through the
power of cloud computing, and brings together
industry-leading cloud computing platforms like
Google, Facebook, and Amazon.com to capture every
conversation and leverage every community expert
in the cloud.
36The Service Cloud
- The Service Cloud is the first customer service
solution that empowers companies to join and
manage all service conversations happening in the
cloud, said Marc Benioff, chairman and CEO of
Salesforce.com. This has been made possible
through the emergence of native cloud computing
platforms like Force.com that are built to
harness the power of other clouds like Facebook,
Google, and Amazon.com.
37The Service Cloud
- The Service Cloud is made up of six main
components around the knowledge base to gather,
distill, and disseminate the expert knowledge
found in the cloud to customers, agents, and
partners - Community
- Social
- Search
- Partners
- Phone, email, and chat
- Force.com
38Community
- Developing an online customer community is an
integral part of the Service Cloud. The Service
Cloud represents a fundamental shift in how
companies approach their online presenceits not
just a place to post information, but a community
where customers can interact with each other and
have conversations with the company at large.
Companies can easily set up and maintain an
interactive cloud community for their customers
by leveraging new Salesforce.com technologies
such as Salesforce CRM Ideas and Force.com Sites
as building blocks.
39Social
- The Force.com platform enables the Service Cloud
to connect to leading social networking sites
such as Facebook, community forums, blogs, and
more. Through these connections, companies will
be able to funnel this information directly into
their knowledge base. The Service Cloud ensures
that the companys knowledge base has the most
up-to-date support information sourced from
community experts.
40Search
- More times than not, customers begin with a
Google search to find answers to their questions.
By creating an active online community with the
Service Cloud, companies can ensure that their
site is one of the top results returned in a
customers search. It is through the power of
Force.com Sites that the expert knowledge of the
community is made available in search engine
results.
41Partners
- Using the Service Cloud, companies can now share
all of the information in the knowledge base
quickly and easily with their partners. Cloud
computings unique model has enabled
Salesforce.com to easily and securely connect
separate Salesforce CRM deployments, allowing
companies to share cases, contacts, and company
information, without the need for complex
integration software.
42Phone, Email, and Chat
- The Service Cloud will give agents access to
knowledge in the cloud, regardless if they use
phones, email, or chat to service customers. By
providing the contact center with the same
knowledge found in the community, the Service
Cloud ensures that the quality and cost of
service across every channel is strengthened by
the expertise of the community.
43Force.com
- The Service Cloud utilizes the latest Force.com
capabilities, including Force.com Sites,
Force.com for Facebook, and more to uniquely join
together knowledge and conversations regardless
of where they take place online. The Service
Cloud also taps into the power of more than 100
customer service extensions on the Force.com
AppExchange for areas like chat, field service,
and CTI. Additionally, customers using the
Service Cloud gain all the benefits of the proven
security, reliability, and scalability of
Salesforce.coms trusted global infrastructure.
44Responding to Change
- Keep up on apps. You have the ones that you want,
and they were serving your organization well, but
its worth it to see what others are developing.
For instance, if you go to Force.com, you can
search through apps that others have shared. You
may find one that does the job better than the
one youre using now, or you may discover an
application that does the job in a different way. - On a deeper level, analyze the applications to
see if there is some fundamental, philosophical
change to understand how apps are revolutionizing
your industry.
45Get Ready
- Cloud computing is in its infancy. Think of it
like the Internet back in 1995it wasnt very
glamorous, somewhat clunky, but still useful. As
more people have gotten their hands into it, it
has evolved and changed (and will continue to do
so). Look for more evolution of cloud computing
and look for more ways that it can benefit your
organization.
46Topic 15 Ten Swell Client Computing Resources
- National Institute of Standards and Technology
- CloudCamp
- SaaS Showplace
- TechTarget
- The Cloud Standard Wiki
- Finding OASIS
- The Eclipse Foundation
- The Cloud Security Alliance
- Open Cloud Manifesto
- Vendor Sites
47National Institute of Standards and Technology
(NIST)
- NIST is a U.S. government agency that focuses on
emerging standards efforts. This organization has
done a considerable amount of work defining and
providing good information on cloud computing.
Check out their website at - http//csrc.nist.gov/groups/SNS/cloud-computing/in
dex.html.
48CloudCamp
- Through a series of local CloudCamp events,
attendees exchange ideas, knowledge, and
information in a creative and supporting
environment, advancing the current state of cloud
computing and related technologies. To become a
member, simply register online. - Check for a Cloudcamp near you at
- www.cloudcamp.com.
49SaaS Showplace
- The SaaS showplace was started by Jeff Kaplan,
president of THINKStrategies, a SaaS consulting
firm. The firm provides a consistently updated
list of up-and-coming SaaS vendors. See a listing
at www.saas-showplace.com/home.html.
50TechTarget
- TechTarget.com (www.techtarget,com) is a
comprehensive online resource for all sorts of
IT-related information, providing links to IT
communities that focus on different areas of
interest. - SearchCloud.com, for example, is a TechTarget
site with lots of information about products,
services, and software vendors targeted at the
needs of chief information officers and senior IT
executives.
51The Cloud Standard Wiki
- The single place gives you access to lots of
groups working on cloud standards. Check out
their site at - http//cloud-standards.org/wiki.
52Finding OASIS
- OASIS, the organization for the advancement of
Structured information Standards
(www.oasis-open.org) is a global consortium
forcued on the creation and adoption of standards
for electric business.
53The Eclipse Foundation
- The Eclipse Foundation is a open-source community
focused on providing a vendor-neutral open
development platform and application framework
for building software. The EcLipse platform is
written in Java and runs on most popular
operating systems, including Linux, HPUX, AIX,
Solris, QNX, Mac OS X, and Windows. Check out the
Eclipse Foundation at www.eclipse.org.
54The Cloud Security Alliance
- The Cloud Security Alliance was established to
promote the use of best practices for providing
security assurance within cloud computing, and to
educate people about the uses of cloud computing
to help secure all other forms of computing.
Check out their Web site at www.cloudsecurityallia
nce.org.
55Open Cloud Manifesto
- Open Cloud Manifesto is a community of more than
250 vendors intended to establish a core set of
principles for cloud standards. The group has
published several white papers that are worth
reading. You can find them by clicking the blogs.
Wikis, and More links at www.opencloudmanifesto.or
g.
56Vendor Sites
- All the major cloud computing vendors provide
great resources online. Please check out vendors
such as Google, VM ware, EMC, Amazon, IBM, HP,
Cisco, and Oracle.
57Topic 16 Ten Cloud Dos and Donts
- Dont Be Reactive
- Do Consider the Cloud a Financial Issue
- Dont Go It Alone
- Do Think about Your Architecture
- Dont Neglect Governance
- Dont Forget about Business Process
- Do Make Security the Centerpiece of Your Strategy
- Dont Apply the Cloud to Everything
- Dont Forget about Service Management
- Do Start with a Pilot Project
58Dont Be Reactive
- Many businesspeople who want to save money fast
are tempted to throw out the data center and put
all computing into a public cloud. It isnt a
thoughtful approach. In the end, you might decide
which capabilities that you should put into the
cloud, but you need to do your homework first.
For example, do you have compliance issues to
consider? What is the difference in cost between
a public, private, hybrid, or even a traditional
data center? You need to make sure that all the
possible impacts have been considered before you
spring into action.
59Do Consider the Cloud a Financial Issue
- Before you jump in, do the math. How large is
your company? Whats the nature of your computing
environment? How many applications do you
support? How much does your current environment
cost? Are there applications that can cost
effectively be moved to a Software as a Service
model?
60Dont Go It Alone
- Most companies need help, so dont go into this
alone. Talk to your peers who have done some
early cloud projects. Consult with systems
integrators, technology companies, and other
consultants who have solid experience with best
practices. Some cloud Web sites and organizations
have great ideas and collaboration opportunities.
61Do Think about Your Architecture
- Just because youre thinking about moving into
the cloud doesnt mean architecture is no longer
important. In fact, its more important than
ever. Youll probably have business services that
are designed for reuse that should be stored in a
private or public cloud that need to be designed
for reuse. You will likely have a hybrid
environment that needs to be well planned to
conform to your companys service level agreement
and performance requirements.
62Dont Neglect Governance
- If you dont pay attention to compliance and
governance, youre putting your company at risk.
For example, some countries require that your
customer data never is stored outside of its
territory. You still have to comply with
government regulations. These issues dont
disappear into a cloud.
63 Dont Forget about Business Process
- Start with the business process that you want to
automate with your cloud initiatives. If you
havent figured out how business processes will
be managed in this new distributed world, your
business could be at risk.
64Do Make Security the Centerpiece of Your Strategy
- Pay close attention to the security implications
of moving to the cloud. You still need a
well-planned - Security strategy.
65Dont Apply the Cloud to Everything
- Not everything belongs in a cloud. For example,
your data center might have a large, complex, and
customized application used by a dozen people.
Its critical to your business. You have no
economic or business reason to move that
application to the cloud.
66Dont Forget about Service Management
- Its easy to make the assumption that if
something is in the cloud, you dont have to
worry about managing it. This isnt true.
Although many cloud providers allow you to have a
portal view of their own service levels, its
your responsibility to keep track of any service
you have put into either a public or a private
cloud. Because many companies inevitably have a
hybrid environment, you need to manage your
overall service level.
67Do Start with a Pilot Project
- Start with a pilot project. For example, you
night want to start with a Software as a Service
platform. You might use a public cloud for
testing a new application before it goes into
production. This gives you a feeling for what it
means to give up this level of control.