Cloud Computing -In brief

Posted by Vartika Goyal on July 1st, 2019

An easy answer to the question,”What is cloud computing?” is, services through internet. The word “cloud” refers to a “medium” which is available everywhere in the world and “computing” refers to the “data” which we store on that medium. But Cloud computing in whole can be defined as, the delivery of different services like data storage or software services through internet.

The name of cloud computing defines itself, data in the form of files are stored on cloud-based storage rather than keeping them on one’s computer hard drive. These files or data stored on the cloud database can be accessed from anywhere and at any time according to the requirement. This flexible nature is one of the biggest advantages of cloud computing.

Services of cloud computing includes:

·   Storage and backup of data

·   Analyzing data

·   Creating and testing apps

·   Video and audio streaming

·   Delivering software

These services of cloud computing are used by big corporations, government agencies, small businesses and individual consumers. The increasing numbers of cloud users is because of its advantageous services.

Types of clouds:

1. Private  cloud : This type of cloud infrastructure is owned by a single organization and is managed by a third party.

2. Public cloud : As the name indicates “public” means the cloud which is available for the public.

3. Hybrid cloud : The cloud which is a combination of both private and public. Its services are a combination of both private and public clouds, made available by different providers.

The services of cloud computing are divided mainly in three types, they are:

1.Software-as-a-service (SaaS):

In this service,users are able to access application software and databases. Here, the cloud providers manage the platform that run the application for the users.

SaaS is generally priced as pay-per-use basis. In this user install and run the application on the cloud instead of installing application on their computer’s hard-drive. This saves the excess amount of hardware and software maintenance in computer systems.

 Microsoft’s Office’365 is a prime example of this service.

2. Infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS):

It involves sending everything from operating system to servers and storing it through IP based connectivity. One of the advantages of this type of service is that, clients can avoid the purchasing of servers or software.

IBM cloud is one of the famous providers of IaaS.

3. Platform-as-a-service (PaaS):

PaaS provides the users with a platform to create their own application using the toolkit, programming languages and services supported by the provider. 

This includes platform like Force.com and Heroku.

Characteristics of cloud computing:-

1. Maintenance of cloud computing is easier.

2.Productivity of data can be improved when more than one user to work on the same data at the same time.

3.There is flexibility in using device from anywhere from the web browser.

4. Performance of cloud computing is great as experienced by IT experts. 

5.Cost reduction is claimed by the cloud providers.

6.Cloud Computing system manages resources.

Advantages of cloud computing: 

Cloud-based software provides various benefits to different companies of different scales. The flexible nature of cloud-based software, helps the users to access their data or software from anywhere and on other device.

The one of the biggest clouds, i.e. Google allows its users to check their emails from any device connected to the internet and store the data such as their photographs, files, documents etc. on the cloud, ensuring the availability of their backed up data in case of their hard-drive crash.

The large scale companies benefits from cloud computing highly. Before the concept of cloud computing, companies had to develop an information management system which turned out to be extremely expensive to maintain.

Disadvantages of cloud computing:

Like the two sides of a coin, cloud computing is both advantageous and disadvantageous.

With advantages like efficiency, flexibility comes the disadvantages of security and server fall. Securing their data is the main objective of every individual and company. But the security has always been a main concern with cloud especially when it is related to financial information and medical information. Cloud provides an encryption key to its users for accessing their data, however, in case the key is lost then the data cannot be accessed.

Clouds also give access of our backed up data to the providers, which can be a concern among people.

The future of cloud computing is architecture that will provide network segmentation, data management, data integrity across multiple clouds with more flexibility. Cloud computing is bringing a world of connectivity. After some years people will not talk about routers for connection, everything will be the network.  The IT service centre will be not more after some time, they will become extinct. The future of cloud computing will likely a combination of cloud based software products. The services of cloud computing are great but only up to the time when the speed of internet connection is great.

Cloud computing  Service Provider companies:-

·   Google Cloud Platform

·   IBM Cloud

·   Oracle Cloud

·   Microsoft Azure

·   Amazon Web Services

·   Dropbox

·   Adobe

·   Kamatera

For more information visit: Technology Moon