T5 MBA | CETSOM

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CONTENTS
CLOUD COMPUTING........................................................................................................................ 2
THE HISTORY OF CLOUD COMPUTING............................................................................................. 3
Early 1990s..................................................................................................................................... 3
Late 1990s...................................................................................................................................... 3
Early 2000s..................................................................................................................................... 3
Late 2000s...................................................................................................................................... 4
CLOUD COMPUTING........................................................................................................................ 6
CLOUD COMPUTING ARCHITECTURE............................................................................................... 7
........................................................................................................................................................ 7
FRONT END.................................................................................................................................... 7
BACK END...................................................................................................................................... 7
DISADVANTAGES OF CLOUD COMPUTING........................................................................................ 9
COMPANIES IN CLOUD................................................................................................................... 10

CLOUD COMPUTING

Cloud computing is a type of internet -based computing that provides shared computer
processing resources and data to computers and other devices on demand. It is a model for
enabling ubiquitous, on-demand access to a shared pool of configurable computing resources
(e.g., computer networks, servers, storage, applications and services),which can be rapidly
provisioned and released with minimal management effort. Cloud computing and storage
solutions provide users and enterprises with various capabilities to store and process their data
in either privately owned, or third-party data centers that may be located far from the user
ranging in distance from across a city to across the world. Cloud computing relies on sharing of
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resources to achieve coherence and economy of scale, similar to a utility (like the electricity grid)
over an electricity network.

Advocates claim that cloud computing allows companies to avoid up-front infrastructure costs
(e.g., purchasing servers). As well, it enables organizations to focus on their core businesses
instead of spending time and money on computer infrastructure. Proponents also claim that
cloud computing allows enterprises to get their applications up and running faster, with improved
manageability and less maintenance, and enables information technology (IT) teams to more
rapidly adjust resources to meet fluctuating and unpredictable business
demand. Cloud providers typically use a "pay as you go" model.
This will lead to unexpectedly high charges if administrators do
not adapt to the cloud pricing model.

In 2009, the availability of high-capacity networks,

low-cost computers and storage devices as well as the
widespread adoption of hardware virtualization, service oriented
architecture, and autonomic and utility computing led to a growth in cloud computing.
Companies can scale up as computing needs increase and then scale down again as demands
decrease. In 2013, it was reported that cloud computing had become a highly demanded service
or utility due to the advantages of high computing power, cheap cost of services, high
performance, scalability, accessibility as well as availability. Some cloud vendors are
experiencing growth rates of 50% per year, but being still in a stage of infancy, it has pitfalls that
need to be addressed to make cloud computing services more reliable and user friendly
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THE HISTORY OF CLOUD COMPUTING

The term "cloud" is used as a representation of the Internet and other communications systems
as well as an abstraction of the underlying infrastructures involved.

What we now commonly refer to as cloud computing is the result of an evolution of the
widespread adoption of virtualization, service-oriented architecture, autonomic, and utility
computing. Details such as the location of infrastructure or component devices are unknowns to
most end-users, who no longer need to thoroughly understand or control the technology
infrastructure that supports their computing activities. Following is a brief history of this
evolution:

Early 1990s

Historically, telecommunications companies primarily offered only dedicated, point-to-point data

circuits to their users. Beginning in the 1990s, however, they began expanding their offerings to
include virtual private network services. This allowed the telecom companies to provide the
same quality of service at a fraction of the cost, as they were able to optimize resource utilization
in order to improve the efficiency of their overall bandwidth.

Late 1990s

In these earliest stages, the term cloud was used to represent the computing space between
the provider and the end user. In 1997, Professor Ramnath Chellapa of Emory University and the
University of South California defined cloud computing as the new computing paradigm where
the boundaries of computing will be determined by economic rationale rather than technical
limits alone. This has become the basis of what we refer to today when we discuss the concept
of cloud computing.

During the second half of the 1990s, companies began to gain a better understanding of cloud
computing and its usefulness in providing superior solutions and services to customers while
drastically improving internal efficiencies. In 1999, Salesforce.com became one of the first major
movers in the cloud arena, pioneering the concept of delivering enterprise-level applications to
end users via the Internet. The application could be accessed by any customer with Internet
access and companies were able to purchase the service on a cost-effective on-demand basis.

Early 2000s
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Shortly after Salesforce.com brought this new concept to the worlds attention, Amazon.com
proved it could outlast the dot-com bubble burst with the introduction of its web-based retail
services in 2002. Amazon was the first major organization to modernize its data centers, which
were utilizing only about 10% of their capacity at any given time (which was commonplace at the
time, because companies were worried about sudden spikes in capacity needs). Amazon realized
that the new cloud computing infrastructure model could allow them to use their existing
capacity with much greater efficiency.

Late 2000s

Meanwhile, Google had become a key player in the Internet commerce marketplace. In 2006 the
company launched its Google Docs services, which brought the power of cloud computing and
document sharing directly to end users

CLIENTSERVER MODEL

The clientserver model is a distributed application structure that partitions tasks or workloads
between the providers of a resource or service, called servers, and service requesters,
called clients. Often clients and servers communicate over a computer network on separate
hardware, but both client and server may reside in the same system. A server host runs one or
more server programs which share their resources with clients. A client does not share any of its
resources, but requests a server's content or service function. Clients therefore initiate
communication sessions with servers which await incoming requests. Examples of computer
applications that use the clientserver model are Email, network printing, and the World Wide
Web
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PEER-TO-PEER

Peer-to-peer (P2P) computing or networking is a distributed application architecture that

partitions tasks or workloads between peers. Peers are equally privileged, equipotent
participants in the application. They are said to form a peer-to-peer network of nodes.

Peers make a portion of their resources, such as processing power, disk storage or network
bandwidth, directly available to other network participants, without the need for central
coordination by servers or stable hosts. Peers are both suppliers and consumers of resources, in
contrast to the traditional client server-model in which the consumption and supply of resources
is divided. Emerging collaborative P2P systems are going beyond the era of peers doing similar
things while sharing resources, and are looking for diverse peers that can bring in unique
resources and capabilities to a virtual community thereby empowering it to engage in greater
tasks beyond those that can be accomplished by individual peers, yet that are beneficial to all
the peers

COLLABORATIVE COMPUTING

An interactive multimedia conferencing application that enables multiple parties to collaborate

on textual and graphic documents. Through special software, each party to the call can
contribute to such documents, working together with the other parties. During such a
collaborative session, the original text document is saved, while each party contributes changes
that are identifiable as such, by contributor. When the parties agree to the collaborative edits
and enhancements, the entire text file is refreshed and saved. Similarly, a design or a concept
can be developed graphically and on a collaborative basis through white boarding, much as the
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parties would do on a physical whiteboard in a face-to face meeting. Typically, each party to the
conference has access to a special whiteboard pad and stylus, which is used to draw. Each party
can modify the initial drawing, with each individual's contribution identified by separate color

CLOUD COMPUTING
Cloud computing is a type of computing that relies on sharing computing resources rather than
having local servers or personal devices to handle applications. Cloud computing is comparable
to grid computing, a type of computing where unused processing cycles of all computers in a
network are harnesses to solve problems too intensive for any
stand-alone machine
In cloud computing, the word cloud (also phrased as "the
cloud") is used as a metaphor for "the Internet," so the
phrase cloud computing means "a type of Internet-based
computing," where different services such as servers,
storage and applications are delivered to an organization's
computers and devices through the Internet. Cloud computing
applies traditional supercomputing, or high-performance
computing power, normally used by military and research
facilities, to perform tens of trillions of computations per
second. In consumer-oriented applications such as financial
portfolios, to deliver personalized information, to provide data
storage or to power large, immersive online computer games.
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CLOUD COMPUTING ARCHITECTURE

Cloud Computing architecture comprises of many cloud components, which are loosely coupled.
We can broadly divide the cloud architecture into two parts:

Front End

Back End

Each of the ends is connected through a network, usually Internet. The following diagram shows
the graphical view of cloud computing architecture:

FRONT END

The front end refers to the client part of cloud computing system. It consists of interfaces and
applications that are required to access the cloud computing platforms, Example - Web Browser.
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BACK END

The back End refers to the cloud itself. It consists of all the resources required to provide cloud
computing services. It comprises of huge data storage, virtual machines, security mechanism,
services, deployment models, servers, etc.

WHY CLOUD COMPUTING

MATTERS

For developers, cloud computing provides increased amounts of storage and processing power to
run the applications they develop. Cloud computing also enables new ways to access
information, process and analyze data, and connect people and resources from any location
anywhere in the world. In essence, it takes the lid off the box; with cloud computing, developers
are no longer boxed in by physical constraints.

For IT departments, cloud computing offers more flexibility in computing power, often at lower
costs. With cloud computing, IT departments don't have to engineer for peak-load capacity,
because the peak load can be spread out among the external assets in the cloud. And, because
additional cloud resources are always at the ready, companies no longer have to purchase assets
(servers, workstations, and the like) for infrequent intensive computing tasks. If you need more
processing power, it's always there in the cloudand accessible on a cost-efficient basis.

For end users, cloud computing offers all these benefits and more. An individual using a web-
based application isn't physically bound to a single PC, location, or network. His applications and
documents can be accessed wherever he is, whenever he wants. Gone is the fear of losing data if
a computer crashes. Documents hosted in the cloud always exist, no matter what happens to the
user's machine.

And then there's the benefit of group collaboration, for both individuals and organizations. Users
from around the world can collaborate on the same documents, applications, and projects, in real
time. It's a whole new world of collaborative computing, all enabled by the notion of cloud
computing.

For everyone concerned, cloud computing does all this at lower costs, because the cloud enables
more efficient sharing of resources than does traditional network computing. When you tap into
the power of the cloud, you get supercomputing power at PC pricessomething that offers
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particular appeal to individuals and small businesses. And, with cloud computing, hardware
doesn't have to be physically adjacent to a firm's office or data center; cloud infrastructure can
be located anywhere, including and especially areas with lower real estate and electricity costs.

Bottom line? Cloud computing is set to change the way everyone uses computers. End users and
organizations will be able to tap into more computing power at lower prices, and do their
computing from any location in the world. Add to this the untold benefits of enhanced
collaboration, and you see why cloud computing is set to be the "next big thing" in the
computing world. The cloud is comingare you ready for it?

ADVANTAGES OF CLOUD COMPUTING

Cost Savings

Perhaps, the most significant cloud computing benefit is in terms of IT cost savings. Businesses,
no matter what their type or size, exist to earn money
while keeping capital and operational expenses to a
minimum. With cloud computing, you can save
substantial capital costs with zero in-house server
storage and application requirements. The lack of on-
premises infrastructure also removes their associated
operational costs in the form of power, air
conditioning and administration costs. You pay for
what is used and disengage whenever you like - there
is no invested IT capital to worry about. Its a common
misconception that only large businesses can afford to use the cloud, when in fact, cloud services
are extremely affordable for smaller businesses.

Reliability

With a managed service platform, cloud computing is much more reliable and consistent than in-
house IT infrastructure. Most providers offer a Service Level Agreement which guarantees
24/7/365 and 99.99% availability. Your organization can benefit from a massive pool of redundant
IT resources, as well as quick failover mechanism - if a server fails, hosted applications and
services can easily be transited to any of the available servers.

Manageability

Cloud computing provides enhanced and simplified IT management and maintenance capabilities
through central administration of resources, vendor managed infrastructure and SLA backed
agreements. IT infrastructure updates and maintenance are eliminated, as all resources are
maintained by the service provider. You enjoy a simple web-based user interface for accessing
software, applications and services without the need for installation - and an SLA ensures the
timely and guaranteed delivery, management and maintenance of your IT services.
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Strategic Edge

Ever-increasing computing resources give you a competitive edge over competitors, as the time
you require for IT procurement is virtually nil. Your company can deploy mission critical
applications that deliver significant business benefits, without any upfront costs and minimal
provisioning time. Cloud computing allows you to forget about technology and focus on your key
business activities and objectives. It can also help you to reduce the time needed to market
newer applications and services.

DISADVANTAGES OF CLOUD COMPUTING

Downtime

As cloud service providers take care of a number of clients each day, they can become
overwhelmed and may even come up against technical outages. This can lead to your business
processes being temporarily suspended. Additionally, if your internet connection is offline, you
will not be able to access any of your applications, server or data from the cloud.

Security

Although cloud service providers implement the best security standards and industry
certifications, storing data and important files on external service providers always opens up
risks. Using cloud-powered technologies means you need to provide your service provider with
access to important business data. Meanwhile, being a public service opens up cloud service
providers to security challenges on a routine basis. The ease in procuring and accessing cloud
services can also give nefarious users the ability to scan, identify and exploit loopholes and
vulnerabilities within a system. For instance, in a multi-tenant cloud architecture where multiple
users are hosted on the same server, a hacker might try to break into the data of other users
hosted and stored on the same server. However, such exploits and loopholes are not likely to
surface, and the likelihood of a compromise is not great.

Vendor Lock-In

Although cloud service providers promise that the cloud will be flexible to use and integrate,
switching cloud services is something that hasnt yet completely evolved. Organizations may find
it difficult to migrate their services from one vendor to another. Hosting and integrating current
cloud applications on another platform may throw up interoperability and support issues. For
instance, applications developed on Microsoft Development Framework (.Net) might not work
properly on the Linux platform.

Limited Control

Since the cloud infrastructure is entirely owned, managed and monitored by the service provider,
it transfers minimal control over to the customer. The customer can only control and manage the
applications, data and services operated on top of that, not the backend infrastructure itself. Key
administrative tasks such as server shell access, updating and firmware management may not
be passed to the customer or end user.
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It is easy to see how the advantages of cloud computing easily outweigh the drawbacks.
Decreased costs, reduced downtime, and less management effort are benefits that speak for
themselves

COMPANIES IN CLOUD

AMAZON

Founded:

1994

Location:

Seattle

Cloud offering:

Amazon Web Services, a half-dozen services including the Elastic Compute Cloud, for computing
capacity, and the Simple Storage Service, for on-demand storage capacity

CEO:

Jeffrey Bezos, Amazon's founder, was previously a financial analyst.

How Amazon got into cloud computing:

One of the largest Web properties in existence, Amazon always excelled at delivering computing
capacity at a large scale to its own employees and to consumers via the Amazon shopping site.
Offering raw computing capacity over the Internet was perhaps a natural step for Amazon, which
had only to leverage its own expertise and massive data center infrastructure in order to become
one of the earliest major cloud providers.

Who uses the service?

Tens of thousands of small businesses, enterprises and individual user. Prominent customers
include the New York Times, Washington Post and Eli Lilly.
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AT&T

Founded:

1983

Location:

Dallas

Cloud offering:

Synaptic Hosting, an application hosting service that offers pay-as-you-go access to virtual
servers and storage integrated with security and networking functions.

CEO:

Randall Stephenson, appointed in 2007 after three years as AT&T's COO.

How AT&T got into cloud computing:

AT&T's foray into the cloud began in 2006 with its purchase of the US internetworking, an
application service provider with enterprise customers in more than 30 countries. When
announcing Synaptic in August 2008, AT&T said it had combined US technology's five "super
Internet Data Centers" in the United States, Europe and Asia, which will act as regional gateways
to the AT&T cloud network.

Who uses the service?

Synaptic is powering major Web properties such as the official Web site of the U.S. Olympic
Committee.

GOOGLE

Founded:

1998
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Location:

Mountain View, Calif.

Cloud offering:

Google Apps, a set of online office productivity tools including e-mail, calendaring, word
processing and a simple Web site creation tool; Postini, a set of e-mail and Web security services;
and the Google App Engine, a platform-as-a-service offering that lets developers build
applications and host them on Google's infrastructure.

CEO:

Eric Schmidt, former CTO of Sun and former CEO of Novell, took the helm in 2001.

How Google got into cloud computing:

Google Apps was the company's attempt to branch out beyond the consumer search market and
become a player in the enterprise. Google unveiled the enterprise version of Apps in February
2007 in a competitive strike against rival Microsoft, and followed up by releasing App Engine in
April 2008.

Who uses the service?

Lots of small businesses, enterprises and colleges including Arizona State University and
Northwestern University.

MICROSOFT

Founded:

1975

Location:

Redmond, Wash.

Cloud offering:
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Azure, a Windows-as-a-service platform consisting of the operating system and developer

services that can be used to build and enhance Web-hosted applications. Azure is in beta until
the second half of 2009.

CEO:

Steve Ballmer, appointed CEO in 2000 after 20 years with the company.

How Microsoft got into cloud computing:

Microsoft made its name by developing the operating system for home and work computers. But
with all forms of applications moving to the Web-hosted model, it's no surprise Microsoft would
make Windows available over the cloud. Microsoft also provides a set of business services over
the Web, including Exchange, SharePoint, Office Communications Server, CRM and Live Meeting.

Who uses the service: Software companies Epicor, S3Edge and Micro Focus are among the early
customers using Azure to develop cloud apps.

NETSUITE

Founded:

1998

Location:

San Mateo, Calif.

Cloud offering:

A business software suite including e-commerce, CRM, accounting and ERP tools.

CEO:
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Zach Nelson, appointed in 2002 after holding executive positions at companies such as Oracle
and Sun.

How NetSuite got its start:

NetSuite, originally called Net Ledger, was founded by Oracle CEO Larry Ellison and NetSuite CTO
Evan Goldberg to make Web-based applications for small businesses. NetSuite and Oracle had
tight go-to-market partnerships in the company's early years but Ellison's official influence over
the company has diminished since NetSuite went public late in 2007.

Who uses the service: Thousands of small business and enterprise customers worldwide including
Wolfgang Puck Coffee, Wrigley Ville Sports and Isuzu.