Key Concepts of Cloud Computing - Literature review Example

?Cloud Computing Introduction Cloud computing refers to computing resources that are highly scalable, offered as external services through the internet on pay-as-you-go basis. The cloud is the internet metaphor, as a symbol that represents network in the entire world in diagrams of computer network. The cloud computing boom over the recent years has led to many new technologies and innovations. Though many have heard about it, very few understand it, its benefits and its risks. This literature review will offer a clear clarification to these issues by giving a more comprehensive definition, and the benefits and risks it can bring to a business. In an attempt of trying to gain a competitive advantage, businesses are eagerly looking for innovative ways of maximizing profits, while cutting down costs. Their growth ambition is normally hindered by money saving pressure. They therefore try new methods and ideas, which they think can produce better results than what they tried yesterday. It is this innovative technologies growing acceptance that has made clod computing to be the IT’s biggest buzzword (Basset 1997, P.13). However, it is very important for any organization to fully understand what, how, why, and from whom ideas, before jumping into cloud computing. Providers of cloud computing are not the same and their services are different in range and quality, and hence, it is advisable that potential users do a thorough investigation into the nature of services they are bound to receive. According to Basset (1997, p.15), the main economic appeal of cloud computing is that it allows customers to only use what they need and only pay for what they use. These resources can easily be accessed at all times from the cloud, from any location, through the internet. It is also called ‘IT on demand’ or utility computing because you simply buy your required IT service, just like any other utility. It makes use of remote servers, which are housed in data centers that are highly secured for data management and storage. Therefore, organizations have no need of buying and looking after their in-house IT solutions. This review aims at assessing the extent to which cloud base computing can replace in-house. Literature Review Key Concepts of Cloud Computing Cloud computing can be seen as a pyramid of three sections. At the apex is cloud application. This is where applications are interacted and run through a web browser, re mote client or hosted desktop. Cloud application removes the install and run application need in the computer of the customer. This removes the need for support, ongoing operations, and software maintenance. Johnson (1998, p.107) asserts that the cloud platform is in the middle, and provides a service framework. It dynamically configures, and reconfigures servers according to the need to cope with decrease or increase in demand. The cloud infrastructure forms the pyramid’s foundation of IT infrastructure via virtualization. It includes, networks, servers and hardware appliances, which act as “web servers”, “cloud centers” or “farms”. Johnson (1998, p.108) concludes that interlinking these with others provides additional capacity and resilience. There are three types of cloud computing namely private, public and hybrid. The public cloud is also called the external cloud and describes cloud computing as often virtualized, dynamically provisioned, and scalable resources that re readily available in the internet, from a third party provider, who is normally off-site, for example ThinkGrid. Private cloud is also referred to as internal or corporate cloud, and denotes a computing architecture that provides a host of private services. It is used by many large companies, but negates many cloud computing benefits, because such companies will still need to buy set up and monitor their clouds. Hybrid cloud combines providers of internal and external resources, thus becoming enterprises’ most popular choice. There are many services that can be achieved via cloud computing by taking advantage e of a cloud model that is distributed. Some of the most popular IT solutions that are cloud based are hosted desktops, email, telephony, cloud storage, and dynamic servers. Hosted desktops eliminate the need desktop PCs that are traditional, in the office, besides reducing service provision costs. Users can easily reach their hosted desk tops through an internet connection, irrespective of their world location, for maximum efficient costs. Hosted emails on the other hand provide organizations with reliable and more secure internet solutions which are also cheap. This allows both big and small organizations to reap the MS Exchange @ accounts benefits, without investing in expensive infrastructure on them (Lovell 2009 p.31). Hosted telephony is a way of carrying services and phone calls through digital internet networks. It is not very different from traditional telephony, though it exactly works normally, but at reduced costs. It replaces expensive installations, handsets, phone systems, numbers and BT lines with an alternative that is simple and cost efficient. Cloud storage has many benefits like CapEx-free costs, removal and anywhere access, thus removing the cost of in-house management and maintenance. Dynamic servers are environment’s next generation servers that are replacing traditional servers. This service allows the user to control processing space and power amount to use, hence you do not pay for a hardware that you don’t need. Lovell (p.36, 2009) believes that dynamic server changes can be made at any time without the cost of moving from server to server. Comparison of Security Characteristics of Cloud Computing with In-House (Normal Office Network) There are many benefits of cloud computing that can make organizations switch from in-house to cloud computing. Cloud computing add capabilities and capacity increase, while not investing in training new personnel, infrastructure or new software licensing (Basset 1997, p.19). Therefore, it saves many companies a lot of money by reduction or removal of capital expenditure. Consequently, customers can reduce expenditure of buying and installing their application or IT infrastructure by moving to cloud computing. Capital expenditure reduces the available working capital for other business investments and operations. On the other hand, cloud computing provides an operational expense that is simple, easy to budget, and prevents money wastage on depreciating assets. Further more, customers do not pay excess in-house capacity in order to meet demand fluctuations. Another benefit of cloud computing over in-house is reduced administration costs. IT solutions can be maintained, managed, upgraded and patched extremely quickly, remotely by cloud computing service providers. Technical support that is provided by reputable providers, round the clock, like ThinkGrid, at no extra charge reduces IT staff burden. Phifer (1996, p.57) observes that they can effectively focus on critical tasks in the business. This reduces additional training and manpower costs. IBM, IT giant, says that cloud computing streamlines the procurement process, besides eliminating computer support and configuration within an organization. Furthermore, cloud computing improves resource utilization by resource combination into big clouds, and delivering resources when they are needed only (Phifer 1996, p. 61). It also saves time where an organization can focus on its business and leave cloud providers to manage the available resources, and still get to your desired destination. Competing power sharing among many tenants improves utilization rates, because servers are never left idle, thus significantly reducing costs but increases application development speed. However, the computer capacity dramatically rises, as there is no need for consumers to change for peak loads. Cloud computing also ensures economies of scale by allowing customers to enjoy economies of scale, just like their providers. Large scale data use of centers operates at higher efficiency levels, and also allows resource sharing among multi-tenant architecture, among different customers. Cloud computing therefore allows the service providers to pass savings to their customers. Scalability on demand is the other benefit of cloud computing over in-house. Flexibility and scalability are valuable advantages provided by cloud computing. This allows customers to quickly react to IT needs, subtracting or adding capacity and users whenever it is required and real need response, as opposed to projected requirements. Even better, it assumes a utility model, where service costs are calculated on actual consumption basis. This offers great benefits to customers through resource elasticity, without large scale premium payments. Additionally, cloud computing allows easy and quick implementation of services, since a company can arrange for cloud computing in minutes and off the ground, without buying software license, hardware, or implementation services. It also offers quality services through a 24/7 customer support as well as immediate emergency response (Zimmerman 2002, p 84). There is also guaranteed uptime thus ensuring that all services and applications are always accessible online. Another main benefit of cloud computing is that it helps smaller businesses to compete with big organizations. In the past, there was marked distinction between IT resources that were available to big and small businesses. Today, cloud computing has allowed big and small business to equally compete in the market (Monroe 1997, p 42). Service renting of IT instead software and hardware investment makes them more affordable, allowing capital to be used in other vital projects. It also offers anywhere access services making it easier to securely access data and applications from through the internet from any location. Monroe (1997, p. 47) says that collaboration in data storage is also possible among multiple users where they can share contracts and calendars. You can therefore access your data even if the internet fails in office or home. This flexibility has reduced overhead, to make your staff happy and meet new regulations. Finally, it offers backup/ disaster recovery. Research conducted by Forrester Research, (p. 57, 2008) shows that 90% of businesses are not well equipped with business continuity plans or disaster recovery systems. This makes them vulnerable to disruptions, which might occur. Providers such as ThinkGrid offers disaster recovery services like cloud backups, ready-to-go desktops incase your business encounters a problem. These allows you to store valuable files from you’re your office network or desktop. These files are available every single day in a week. Many benefits of cloud computing are only one side of the coin. This is because, factors that lead to reduced costs and increased efficiency also increases outside forces, susceptibility. On the other hand, there are high risks for sensitive data, like trade secrets. A survey conducted by Information System Audit and Control Association (ISACA 2005, p. 59) shows that 45% of professionals in IT believe that risks of cloud sourcing are more than benefits. Only 15% of 1,800 IT experts will use this model for low-risk services , while 26% say that they can never go into cloud computing. Robert Stroud, ISACA’s vice president says that the cloud only represents major changes in resource utilization and is therefore surprising to see the concern that IT professionals have about the risks and rewards of cloud comput6ing. However, two independent research studies conducted by ISACA (p. 68) and Forrester Research (p. 109) assess that the driver of risk management in IT is compliance desire with governmental regulations and industries, by managing costs and avoiding negative incidents. This is the best news for cloud computing proponents since it reduces the cloud services risks. Comparison of Storing Data Of-Cloud Computing and In-House Cloud computing has concerns, concerning the security of data that is stored, and can be accessed through the internet. However, good vendors strictly adhere to sophisticated security measures and privacy policies like data encryption (Forrester Research 2009, p117). Therefore, cloud computing vendors provide greater data confidentiality and security than in-house data storage. Though security level offered differs, it is advisable for organizations to access their vendor’s security policies before paying for their services. Technology consulting firm and analyst, (ISACA 2005, p78) outlines seven issues of security to consider before using the services of any vendor. These are privileged user access, regulatory compliance, data location, data segregation, recovery, investigative support and long-term viability. Generally, security of stored data is achieved by storing data in a centralized location. Centers of high data security like of ThinkGrid are better than traditional and in-house systems, because resources of solving security issues are devoted by providers, which is not affordable to many customers. Comparison of Usability of the Two Providers Cloud computing allows easy integration of its services with the existing network of the customer. This makes their services to become a seamless extension of the ones offered by in-house IT department. Infrastructure of cloud computing allows enterprises to achieve efficient use of their existing IT software and hardware investments. Many cloud computing providers ensures their customers end-to-end solutions (Lovell 2009, p. 143,). Forrester Research, Therefore, if a company to evaluate migrate and move to cloud computing, it can be simply and quickly, hand in hand. Conclusion Business growth leads to growth in IT. The development speed and scalability that cloud computing offers means that the IT provision can be expanded to meet the increasing requirements, which can also be scaled down, according to the needs. Security is enhanced with flexibility, response of IT services that are cloud based and resilience. This means that business can easily and quickly change according to the changing business environment. Cloud computing reduces waste of time and resources, thus effectively allowing businesses to increase profits at low costs. Adopting cloud computing helps organizations to enjoy a healthy survival, when the economic climate is tough, by equipping the organization with the most innovative business tools and accessibility to advanced technologies, only at a fraction of purchasing cost and operating a similar system in-house. When evaluated alone, cloud computing provides substantial benefits, which is not always they case, since it also has some risks. Its easy adoption and lack of requirement for in-house IT staff has made it very popular to small firms that that cannot afford to run their servers 24/7. Centralization poses a lot of concerns on risk matters, just like any other new technology. Therefore, it is the responsibility of organizations to weigh both the benefits and risks associated with cloud computing and decide whether to adopt it or stay with in-house system. References Basset, B. (1997). Cloud Computing: An Adam Compilation. Kansas City: Andrews McMeel Publishing.  Forrester Research, (2008). Privacy in the Cloud. Washington DC; Harvard University Press.  Information System Audit and Control Association. (2005). Risks and Benefits of Cloud Computing. Princeton NJ; Princeton University Press. Johnson, K. K. (1998). All About Cloud Computing. DesMoines, Iowa: Ortho Publishing Group.  Lovell, R. (2009). Cloud Computing: The Benefits it can Bring to a Business. Washington DC; ThinkGrid Publishers. Monroe, C. (1997). What are the risks and Benefits of Cloud Computing? Michael Friedman Publishing Group Inc. Phifer, L. (1996). Cloud Computing and In-House Systems. Which is the Best for Prospective Businesses? Chicago, Chicago University Press. Zimmerman, N. (2002). Cloud Computing; What Investors should Know. Taunton; Taunton Press. Read More