What are Cloud Servers?
In some respects cloud servers work in the same way as physical servers but the functions they provide can be very different. When opting for cloud hosting, clients are renting virtual server space rather than renting or purchasing physical servers. They are often paid for by the hour depending on the capacity required at any particular time.Traditionally there are two main options for hosting: shared hosting and dedicated hosting. Shared hosting is the cheaper option whereby servers are shared between the hosting provider’s clients. One client’s website will be hosted on the same server as websites belonging to other clients. This has several disadvantages including the fact that the setup is inflexible and cannot cope with a large amount of traffic. Dedicated hosting is a much more advanced form of hosting, whereby clients purchase whole physical servers. This means that the entire server is dedicated to them with no other clients sharing it. In some instances the client may utilise multiple servers which are all dedicated to their use. Dedicated servers allow for full control over hosting. The downside is that the required capacity needs to be predicted, with enough resource and processing power to cope with expected traffic levels. If this is underestimated then it can lead to a lack of necessary resource during busy periods, while overestimating it will mean paying for unnecessary capacity.
With cloud hosting clients get the best of both worlds. Resource can be scaled up or scaled down accordingly, making it more flexible and, therefore, more cost-effective. When there is more demand placed on the servers, capacity can be automatically increased to match that demand without this needing to be paid for on a permanent basis. This is akin to a heating bill; you access what you need, when you need it, and then only pay for what you’ve used afterwards.
Unlike dedicated servers, cloud servers can be run on a hypervisor. The role of a hypervisor is to control the capacity of operating systems so it is allocated where needed. With cloud hosting there are multiple cloud servers which are available to each particular client. This allows computing resource to be dedicated to a particular client if and when it is necessary. Where there is a spike in traffic, additional capacity will be temporarily accessed by a website, for example, until it is no longer required. Cloud servers also offer more redundancy. If one server fails, others will take its place.
Below are the key benefits of cloud servers:
Flexibility and scalability; extra resource can be accessed as and when required
Cost-effectiveness; whilst being available when needed, clients only pay for what they are using at a particular time
Ease of set up; Cloud servers do not require much initial setup
Reliability; due to the number of available servers, if there are problems with some, the resource will be shifted so that clients are unaffected.
For more information on the different version of cloud servers please visit the following pages
What is a Public Cloud?
The most recognisable model of cloud computing to many consumers is the public cloud model, under which cloud services are provided in a virtualised environment, constructed using pooled shared physical resources, and accessible over a public network such as the internet. To some extent they can be defined in contrast to private clouds which ring-fence the pool of underlying computing resources, creating a distinct cloud platform to which only a single organisation has access. Public clouds, however, provide services to multiple clients using the same shared infrastructure.
The most salient examples of cloud computing tend to fall into the public cloud model because they are, by definition, publicly available. Software as a Service (SaaS) offerings such as cloud storage and online office applications are perhaps the most familiar, but widely available Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Platform as a Service (PaaS) offerings, including cloud based web hosting and development environments, can follow the model as well (although all can also exist within private clouds). Public clouds are used extensively in offerings for private individuals who are less likely to need the level of infrastructure and security offered by private clouds. However, enterprise can still utilise public clouds to make their operations significantly more efficient, for example, with the storage of non-sensitive content, online document collaboration and webmail.
The public model offers the following features and benefits:
Ultimate scalability; cloud resources are available on demand from the public clouds’ vast pools of resource so that the applications that run on them can respond seamlessly to fluctuations in activity
Cost effective; public clouds bring together greater levels of resource and so can benefit from the largest economies of scale. The centralised operation and management of the underlying resources is shared across all of the subsequent cloud services whilst components, such as servers, require less bespoke configuration. Some mass market propositions can even be free to the client, relying on advertising for their revenue.
Utility style costing; public cloud services often employ a pay-as-you-go charging model whereby the consumer will be able to access the resource they need, when they need it, and then only pay for what they use; therefore avoiding wasted capacity
Reliability; the sheer number of servers and networks involved in creating a public cloud and the redundancy configurations mean that should one physical component fail, the cloud service would still run unaffected on the remaining components. In some cases, where clouds draw resource from multiple data centres, an entire data centre could go offline and individual cloud services would suffer no ill effect. There is, in other words, no single point of failure which would make a public cloud service vulnerable
Flexibility; there are a myriad of IaaS, PaaS and SaaS services available on the market which follow the public cloud model and that are ready to be accessed as a service from any internet enabled device. These services can fulfil most computing requirements and can deliver their benefits to private and enterprise clients alike. Businesses can even integrate their public cloud services with private clouds, where they need to perform sensitive business functions, to create hybrid clouds
Location independence; the availability of public cloud services through an internet connection ensures that the services are available wherever the client is located. This provides invaluable opportunities to enterprise such as remote access to IT infrastructure (in case of emergencies etc) or online document collaboration from multiple locations.
What is a Private Cloud?
A private cloud is a particular model of cloud computing that involves a distinct and secure cloud based environment in which only the specified client can operate. As with other cloud models, private clouds will provide computing power as a service within a virtualised environment using an underlying pool of physical computing resource. However, under the private cloud model, the cloud (the pool of resource) is only accessible by a single organisation providing that organisation with greater control and privacy.
The technical mechanisms used to provide the different services which can be classed as being private cloud services can vary considerably and so it is hard to define what constitutes a private cloud from a technical aspect. Instead such services are usually categorised by the features that they offer to their client. Traits that characterise private clouds include the ring fencing of a cloud for the sole use of one organisation and higher levels of network security. They can be defined in contrast to a public cloud which has multiple clients accessing virtualised services which all draw their resource from the same pool of servers across public networks. Private cloud services draw their resource from a dsitinct pool of physical computers but these may be hosted internally or externally and may be accessed across private leased lines or secure encrypted connections via public networks.
The additional security offered by the ring fenced cloud model is ideal for any organisation, including enterprise, that needs to store and process private data or carry out sensitive tasks. For example, a private cloud service could be utilised by a financial company that is required by regulation to store sensitive data internally and who will still want to benefit from some of the advantages of cloud computing within their business infrastructure, such as on demand resource allocation.
The private cloud model is closer to the more traditional model of individual local access networks (LANs) used in the past by enterprise but with the added advantages of virtualisation. The features and benefits of private clouds therefore are:
Higher security and privacy; public clouds services can implement a certain level of security but private clouds - using techniques such as distinct pools of resources with access restricted to connections made from behind one organisation’s firewall, dedicated leased lines and/or on-site internal hosting - can ensure that operations are kept out of the reach of prying eyes
More control; as a private cloud is only accessible by a single organisation, that organisation will have the ability to configure and manage it inline with their needs to achieve a tailored network solution. However, this level of control removes somes the economies of scale generated in public clouds by having centralised management of the hardware
Cost and energy efficiency; implementing a private cloud model can improve the allocation of resources within an organisation by ensuring that the availability of resources to individual departments/business functions can directly and flexibly respond to their demand. Therefore, although they are not as cost effective as a public cloud services due to smaller economies of scale and increased management costs, they do make more efficient use of the computing resource than traditional LANs as they minimise the investment into unused capacity. Not only does this provide a cost saving but it can reduce an organisation’s carbon footprint too
Improved reliability; even where resources (servers, networks etc.) are hosted internally, the creation of virtualised operating environments means that the network is more resilient to individual failures across the physical infrastructure. Virtual partitions can, for example, pull their resource from the remaining unaffected servers. In addition, where the cloud is hosted with a third party, the organisation can still benefit from the physical security afforded to infrastructure hosted within data centres
Cloud bursting; some providers may offer the opportunity to employ cloud bursting, within a private cloud offering, in the event of spikes in demand. This service allows the provider to switch certain non-sensitive functions to a public cloud to free up more space in the private cloud for the sensitive functions that require it. Private clouds can even be integrated with public cloud services to form hybrid clouds where non-sensitive functions are always allocated to the public cloud to maximise the efficiencies on offer.
Cloud hosting is relatively new in web hosting services. It is a hosting arrangement put in place to facilitate the efficiency of the website. It aims at making the website meet with huge traffics. It is a common feature these days to see websites breakdown at the peak periods of its activities as a result of inability of the server to sustain work pressure. Such a problem can easily be tackled through cloud hosting. Cloud hosting makes it possible for different servers to be located at different places. The importance of this arrangement is that it eliminates the problem associated with centralizing the hosting in one single computing system.
This arrangement may seem cumbersome to an ordinary observer, but the reality is that it is one of the most effective ways of ensuring that the website is fit and running twenty four hours of the day. How it works is that many different servers are teamed together to create a cloud. The benefit of this arrangement to the efficiency of the website is easily understood, it eliminates the problem of over reliance on a particular server by balancing the load which server carries. It may appear more expensive to the casual observer but that is far from the reality.
How it works is that different machines are set into the cloud arrangement and it is done in such a way that each of the machines has different resources or responsibility it is associated with such as the required disk storage, memory, processor and others. The required software necessary for the operation of the cloud are installed in the hypervisor. This is a technical word that represents the code which actually controls the machines that runs in the software. The hypervisor is itself a server. The commonly used hypervisors include Xen, VMware and Hyper-v among others.
Cloud hosting is a very good web hosting arrangement; it is relatively new not many web hosting companies have paid the required attention and only few of those who do approach it with the right resources. The providers who are known to offer efficient services approach it with the required materials. For the cloud hosting to work perfectly the right quality servers have to be deployed. To achieve the gain and make the best use of the cloud hosting high class hardware that make use of VMware resources are the best material. Many poor providers could find it difficult to provide the requisite hardware that will ensure successful operations.
When compared to the normal dedicated servers it is observed that the efficiency and the performance of the cloud hosting are more reliable. The distribution of the servers allows the users of the cloud hosting powered website to enjoy more stable services than they would have been obtained with the use of dedicated servers. It will be difficult for the dedicated servers to compete with cloud hosting because they do not have the kind of hardware balancing which the cloud servers enjoy and without the hardware load balancing efficiency and performance of the dedicated servers cannot be as strong as that of the cloud hosting.
There is future for cloud hosting because many web designers and even web hosting companies are beginning to see the advantages it has over the dedicated web hosting plans. With time the cloud hosting arrangement will emerge to dominate the way web hosting is done.