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Top 3 things about your data in the Cloud. Part 2 - Infrastructure

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If you read my last post, you know that the first level of defense for protecting your data in the Cloud rests on the Data Center facility.  If you missed it, not to worry... Fox network has just picked up the rights to create a new sitcom based on my posts and it will air right after American Idol.  Imagine the ratings! 

Of course, I'm kidding.  But you can check out Part 1 of this series after you are done here.  Part 2 of this 3 part series of posts that  answers the top 3 things every small business owner should know about storing their data in the Cloud will focus on the Server and Network Infrastructure.  This is probably my favorite topic to discuss with potential customers who ask about their data and storing it in the Cloud.

#2 - Server and Network Infrastructure

This is really where Cloud providers bring value to the table.  The value is twofold; availability of resources and cost.  I'll start with  availability.  Server and Network infrastructure in the Cloud is built in a redundant fashion.  Simply put, this means that there are at least two of everything (I'll explain this highly technical term further down in the post).  And when I say everything, I do mean everything.  AND... when I say at least two, I really mean several layers!  All of this infrastructure is architected with the goal of minimizing and in some cases eliminating single points of failure.  Which in turn equates to increased availability.  Depending on what equipment we're discussing, the redundancy is there "just in case" or in the event one device fails another device will take over that operation.  In other implementations of redundancy, there are "pools" of resources that are all interconnected. In this example, "pooling" resources allows for:

1. load balancing (sharing the workload),
2. aggregation (CPU, Memory, Disk to name a few) and
3. managing failover scenarios (in an automated fashion).

So what does "everything" mean when referring to Cloud infrastructure?  I would categorize the infrastructure this way;

1. LAN/WAN (Routers, Switches, etc.), 
2. Security (Firewalls, Intrusion Detection/Prevention Systems, Anti-virus/Spyware, Spam and Content Filters),
3. Servers (Physical and Virtual), 
4. Storage (SAN, NAS, CAS),
5. Telephony (SIP Gateways, IP Call Processing, etc.).

Now, if you are not sure what some of the equipment is listed above, that's okay... neither do I.  In fact, some of it is made up and there for effect.  Again, I'm kidding.  I wanted to make the point that Cloud providers have enterprise-class infrastructure that for the most part only larger organizations had the capital to build out.  Now, small businesses can leverage this infrastructure through Cloud providers and create a more secure, highly available computing environment.

So how does a Cloud provider build out infrastructure as described above and still offer their services and products at a lower cost than traditional on premise implementations?  They do it by leveraging economies of scale in the form of hardware virtualization and usage based software licensing.

I won't get into the "weeds" technically with server virtualization and how it works in this post.  I will leave that as a future post for one of our architects.  However, I will say that server virtualization is one of the biggest contributors to cloud based computing.  The second biggest factor (in my humble opinion) are new licensing models that cloud providers can subscribe to that allow for software to be "used" rather than purchased.  This usage model perfectly aligns with how Cloud providers are in turn charging their customers.  You could say that virtualization and usage based licensing coming together at the same time is a perfect storm and allows providers to pass along the savings to their customers.  It's beautiful, I know!

Thanks again for tuning in and look for Part 3 in the next post that will discuss the resources that manage all of the infrastructure.  I will talk about both physical resources (highly skilled engineers) and virtual resources like monitoring systems.