Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
Typically, such a process involves first selecting the applications and services that will
reside in the public cloud and those that will remain on premises behind a firewall or in the
private cloud. This decision varies from company to company because there are many fac-
tors to consider, including and not limited to core intellectual property, data, the size of the
data, and the client base.
Cloud provisioning also includes processes for interfacing with the cloud applications
and services. The cloud provisioning team needs to see the compatibility of applications and
services and make a decision of how much of the core software infrastructure they need
to re-architect in order to make a fruitful transition. It also entails auditing and monitor-
ing who accesses and utilizes the cloud resources. This process is similar to auditing access
privileges in an internal or VPN network of a company.
Migrating Software Infrastructure to the Cloud
The most common reference to cloud provisioning is when a company seeks to transition
some or all of its existing software infrastructure to the cloud without having to significantly
rearchitect or reengineer the applications and services.
Earlier we discussed advantages like automated provisioning, which is quite simply an
advantage because of the ease, predictability, and speed of preparing a resource for internal
or external use.
The resources that could be provisioned include a virtual data center (Infrastructure as a
Service), a virtual machine (VM) with or without a software stack (Platform as a Service),
or hosted applications and services (Software as a Service). The advantages do not stop
here. Other advantages include what can be done with the infrastructure. Availability can
be enhanced and latency can be controlled by provisioning multiple instances of a service.
Speed of access can be improved by using solid-state drives (SSDs) offered by the cloud pro-
vider. Redundancy can be added by provisioning a service across multiple data centers.
Provisioning represents a delivery stage, and such a delivery system comes with chal-
lenges. One of the key challenges is the integrity of the system, including data and pro-
cesses. Integrity is the key element of whatever is delivered, and this must be checked before
delivery and deployment. Businesses can use VM images to migrate some of their compo-
nents to the cloud. Master images can contain business applications and processes, configu-
rations, and, in some cases, even metadata. These master images need to be protected and
should be deployed intact and in a secure manner.
Cloud Provisioning Security Concerns
One of the critical problems during provisioning and deprovisioning is the reliance
on hypervisors and ensuring process isolation at every stage. After a VM or service is
provisioned, it has to be protected and kept isolated from other tenants and services.
Multitenancy is a critical security concern and is usually controlled and managed by
the service provider.
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