Cloud Computing has been around for a while and has seen gradual acceptance in the IT mainstream market. Starting with the initial expectation that cloud computing will help the SME sector get access to quality software at reasonable prices, it has entered even the realms of the big-ticket multi-billion dollar enterprises. However, the cloud computing terminology has grown increasingly complex over the last couple of years. Almost every software products and services firm has claimed some form of cloud computing platform / product offering. And as with the typical Marketing efforts, the terminology has become ever so complex that you are not sure what you are eventually buying into.
For ease of reference, I thought of putting together a quick guide to the typical terminologies in this field –
The Definition
Cloud computing is a model for enabling convenient, on-demand network access to a shared pool of configurable computing resources (e.g., networks, servers, storage, applications, and services) that can be rapidly provisioned and released with minimal management effort or service provider interaction.*
Classification
At a very broad level, cloud computing can be divided into the following components*
1. Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) – Cloud based delivery of complete software applications that run on infrastructure the SaaS vendor manages. SaaS applications are accessed over the Internet and typically charged on a subscription basis. For example Salesforce.com
2. Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) – Delivery of a virtualized application runtime platform that has a software stack for developing applications or application services. PaaS applications and infrastructure are run and managed by the services vendor. For example, Google’s App Engine or Amazon’s EC2 services
3. Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) – Delivery of raw, virtualized computing infrastructure such as servers and storage as a service to build applications. IaaS vendors let enterprises customize infrastructure to their application needs. For example Amazon Cloud Front which, is a Web service for Content Deliver.
From an actual delivery perspective i.e. whether you are sharing your cloud resources with other external entities, we can define two broad categories with possible overlapping categories as well:
1. Public Cloud – This is where the cloud resources are shared between multiple external entities. The payment is usually on a usage basis say, CPU hours, GB storage etc.
2. Private Cloud – Dedicated cloud services for an enterprise with better control in terms of security, compliance, scalability and integration capabilities.
Here are some of the references:
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