Cloud computing basically involves computing services delivered via the internet or cloud. These include applications and tools such as storage, servers, software, networking, analytics, and databases. Through the cloud, a company can have flexible resources that can help to lower the cost in maintenance of your IT infrastructure. You just have to pay for the services that you used in the cloud. It is a great option for business entities, companies, or organizations that seek ways to lower costs, be more productive, efficient, and fast, with great security and performance.
Several cloud computing providers exist, and some are Snowflake and Amazon Web Service (AWS). Snowflake vs AWS, these two services have many similarities. Both of them are equipped with a well-conditioned property of managing data, making them a reliable data warehouse cloud computing provider.
Cloud Computing Benefits
Why should I use cloud computing? What are the benefits of it? Cloud computing has various benefits depending on the service used. But, basically, here are some of those benefits:
- The use of cloud service does not require you to maintain your infrastructure. Hence, buying or maintaining your own IT infrastructure requires a lot of money and effort. You do not have to buy servers anymore, update systems or applications, and lay off outdated software or hardware. Therefore, there will be lesser expenses.
- With the use of cloud, computing transaction becomes faster because there is no need for a long process procurement. It not only speeds up the process but at the same time saves money and effort, unlike the traditional process. This gives companies much flexibility with just a little effort and time.
- It can be accessed globally at any time at the right location.
- Cloud computing offers a very reliable service as it makes it easy and not costly to backup data, recover data, and transact business continuously. Through this, data can be copied on different providers on the cloud network.
- The company and IT team become highly productive because managing a data center needs a lot of procurement. This makes data or application management less time consumption, IT team effort in setting up hardware, and making it easier to manage the software that can reduce the time being used. Therefore, the team can do other tasks needed for the company’s success.
- Have a worldwide network of data centers that are always up-to-date, which provide an efficient and reliable service.
- A lot of cloud providers usually include policy, control, and technology set that provides fortitude security that helps guarantee the safety of your infrastructure, applications, and data from outside threats.
- Through cloud computing, data can be accessed by mobile devices such as cellular phones, making it possible for a team or member to have access to the information wherever he is.
- Software updates automatically, so the time for system updates is reduced.
Cloud Computing Types
There are different types of deploying cloud services, such as the public, private, and hybrid cloud, as stated in Azure.
Public Cloud
The public cloud refers to cloud computing delivered over the internet. Among the types of deployment, it is the most popular as it scopes vast options of solutions for organizations’ necessity. The cost of the public cloud is based on the consumption of resources. Services offered by the companies using this may be subscription-based, premium, or even free. The cloud provider developed and maintained which resources are shared in the network by multiple organizations.
Private Cloud
In the private cloud, cloud computing resources are used by a business entity or an organization alone or privately. It can either be situated on the datacenter of the company or hosted by a third party on a private cloud domain. In this deployment type of cloud computing, the infrastructure and services are managed and maintained on a network exclusively. It can be customized based on specific needs like sensitive ones of the organization solely, hence deployed and managed privately it is much expensive than the public cloud.
Hybrid cloud
A hybrid cloud is a cloud infrastructure that combines public and private clouds. Data and apps can be shared among the clouds, which gives a business a more flexible service. For instance, organizations use the public cloud for not sensitive data while the private one for the opposite. It is best for companies that deal with both sensitive data and regular workloads.
Cloud Services Types
There are three main types of cloud computing services which are SaaS, PaaS, and IaaS.
Software as a service (SaaS)
It is a type of service used to deliver software through the internet, on-demand, or pay-as-you-go type or subscription basis. In order to access the application, you have to pay a subscription fee. It also involves licensing the product. In setting up and managing software, the companies are not tasked to so in SaaS. Instead, the cloud provider does the job.
Platform as a service (PaaS)
This type of cloud computing service enables a client to develop, manage and run their software applications by providing them a platform. PaaS provides a platform that enables a developer to create apps without the hassle of in-house installment of infrastructure’s hardware and software. Either of the three computing types can deploy this type of cloud computing service.
Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)
Among the three, IaaS is the most basal service of cloud computing. With IaaS, the cloud provider is responsible for managing the IT infrastructure like the network resources, server, and storage through virtual machines (VMs). It is a self-service type for monitoring, accessing, and managing infrastructure that is paid based on consumption.
Cloud Computing Usage
By simply storing pictures, files, sending email, writing documents, watching TV series or films, you’re already using a cloud computing-made services.
- With the advancement of technology, such as cloud computing, storing, backing up, and recovering your data via the internet is made possible
- Application development becomes easier and manageable
- Data management and analysis across organizations or teams can be done by cloud
- Delivering software update to the customers and clients as needed through a cloud in diversity