Cloud Computing Services provide information technology (IT) as a
service over the Internet or dedicated network, with delivery on
demand, and payment based on usage. Cloud computing services range from
full applications and development platforms, to servers, storage, and
virtual desktops.
Who uses cloud computing services and why?
Corporate and government entities utilize cloud computing services to
address a variety of application and infrastructure needs such as CRM,
database, compute, and data storage.
Unlike a traditional IT environment, where software and hardware are
funded up front by department and implemented over a period of months,
cloud computing services deliver IT resources in minutes to hours and
align costs to actual usage. As a result, organizations have greater
agility and can manage expenses more efficiently.
Similarly, consumers utilize cloud computing services to simplify
application utilization, store, share, and protect content, and enable
access from any web-connected device.
How cloud computing services work
Cloud computing services have several common attributes:
- Virtualization- cloud computing utilizes server and storage virtualization extensively to allocate/reallocate resources rapidly
- Multi-tenancy -resources are pooled and shared among multiple users to gain economies of scale
- Network-access - resources are accessed via web-browser or thin client using a variety of networked devices (computer, tablet, smartphone)
- On demand - resources are self-provisioned from an online catalogue of pre-defined configurations
- Elastic -resources can scale up or down, automatically
- Metering/chargeback -resource usage is tracked and billed based on service arrangement