Lecture 15:

Cloud Computing

Modified from Mark Baker

 What is Cloud Computing?
• Cloud Computing is a general term used to describe a new class
of network based computing that takes place over the Internet,
– basically a step on from Utility Computing
– a collection/group of integrated and networked hardware,
software and Internet infrastructure (called a platform).
– Using the Internet for communication and transport provides
hardware, software and networking services to clients
• These platforms hide the complexity and details of the
underlying infrastructure from users and applications by
providing very simple graphical interface or API (Applications
Programming Interface).

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 What is Cloud Computing?
• In addition, the platform provides on demand
services, that are always on, anywhere,
anytime and any place.
• Pay for use and as needed, elastic
– scale up and down in capacity and functionalities
• The hardware and software services are
available to
– general public, enterprises, corporations and
businesses markets

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 Cloud Summary
• Cloud computing is an umbrella term used to refer to
Internet based development and services

• A number of characteristics define cloud data,

applications services and infrastructure:
– Remotely hosted: Services or data are hosted on remote
infrastructure.
– Ubiquitous: Services or data are available from anywhere.
– Commodified: The result is a utility computing model
similar to traditional that of traditional utilities, like gas
and electricity - you pay for what you would want!
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Cloud Architecture

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 What is Cloud Computing

• Shared pool of configurable computing resources

• On-demand network access
• Provisioned by the Service Provider
Adopted from: Effectively and Securely Using the Cloud Computing Paradigm by peter Mell, Tim 6
Grance
 Cloud Computing Characteristics
Common Characteristics:
Massive Scale Resilient Computing

Homogeneity Geographic Distribution

Virtualization Service Orientation

Low Cost Software Advanced Security

Essential Characteristics:

On Demand Self-Service
Broad Network Access Rapid Elasticity
Resource Pooling Measured Service

Adopted from: Effectively and Securely Using the Cloud Computing Paradigm by peter Mell, Tim 7
Grance
 Cloud Service Models
Software as a Platform as a Infrastructure as a
Service (SaaS) Service (PaaS) Service (IaaS)

SalesForce
CRM
LotusLive

Google
App
Engine

Adopted from: Effectively and Securely Using the Cloud Computing Paradigm by peter Mell, Tim 8
Grance
 SaaS Maturity Model

Level 1: Ad-Hoc/Custom –
One Instance per customer

Level 2: Configurable per

customer

Level 3: configurable &

Multi-Tenant-Efficient

Level 4: Scalable, Configurable

& Multi-Tenant-Efficient

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Source: Frederick Chong and Gianpaolo Carraro, “Architectures Strategies for Catching the Long Tail”
 Different Cloud Computing Layers
MS Live/ExchangeLabs, IBM,
Application Service Google Apps; Salesforce.com
(SaaS) Quicken Online, Zoho, Cisco

Google App Engine, Mosso,

Application Platform Force.com, Engine Yard,
Facebook, Heroku, AWS

Server Platform 3Tera, EC2, SliceHost,

GoGrid, RightScale, Linode

Storage Platform Amazon S3, Dell, Apple, ...

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 Cloud Computing Service Layers
Services Description
Services – Complete business services such
Services as PayPal, OpenID, OAuth, Google Maps,
Alexa

Application – Cloud based software that

Applicati
Application eliminates the need for local installation
on such as Google Apps, Microsoft Online

Focused Development – Software development

Development platforms used to build custom cloud based
applications (PAAS & SAAS) such as
SalesForce
Platform – Cloud based platforms, typically
Platform provided using virtualization, such as
Amazon ECC, Sun Grid

Storage – Data storage or cloud based NAS

Infrastructur Storage such as CTERA, iDisk, CloudNAS

e
Hosting – Physical data centers such as those
Focused
Hosting run by IBM, HP, NaviSite, etc.

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 Basic Cloud Characteristics
• The “no-need-to-know” in terms of the underlying
details of infrastructure, applications interface with
the infrastructure via the APIs.
• The “flexibility and elasticity” allows these systems
to scale up and down at will
– utilising the resources of all kinds
• CPU, storage, server capacity, load balancing, and databases
• The “pay as much as used and needed” type of
utility computing and the “always on!, anywhere
and any place” type of network-based computing.

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 Basic Cloud Characteristics
• Cloud are transparent to users and
applications, they can be built in multiple ways
– branded products, proprietary open source,
hardware or software, or just off-the-shelf PCs.
• In general, they are built on clusters of PC
servers and off-the-shelf components plus
Open Source software combined with in-
house applications and/or system software.

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 Software as a Service (SaaS)
• SaaS is a model of software deployment where an
application is hosted as a service provided to
customers across the Internet.
• Saas alleviates the burden of software
maintenance/support
– but users relinquish control over software versions and
requirements.
• Terms that are used in this sphere include
– Platform as a Service (PaaS) and
– Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)

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 Virtualization
• Virtual workspaces:
– An abstraction of an execution environment that can be made
dynamically available to authorized clients by using well-defined
protocols,
– Resource quota (e.g. CPU, memory share),
– Software configuration (e.g. O/S, provided services).
• Implement on Virtual Machines (VMs):
– Abstraction of a physical host machine,
– Hypervisor intercepts and emulates instructions from VMs, and allows
management of VMs, App App App
– VMWare, Xen, etc. OS OS OS
• Provide infrastructure API: Hypervisor

– Plug-ins to hardware/support structures Hardware

Virtualized Stack
 Virtual Machines
• VM technology allows multiple virtual
machines to run on a single physical machine.
App App App App App
Xen
Guest OS Guest OS Guest OS
(Linux) (NetBSD) (Windows)
VMWare
VM VM VM

Virtual Machine Monitor (VMM) / Hypervisor

UML

Hardware
Denali
etc.
Performance: Para-virtualization (e.g. Xen) is very close to raw physical
performance!
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 What is the purpose and benefits?
• Cloud computing enables companies and applications,
which are system infrastructure dependent, to be
infrastructure-less.
• By using the Cloud infrastructure on “pay as used and on
demand”, all of us can save in capital and operational
investment!
• Clients can:
– Put their data on the platform instead of on their own desktop
PCs and/or on their own servers.
– They can put their applications on the cloud and use the
servers within the cloud to do processing and data
manipulations etc.
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 Cloud-Sourcing
• Why is it becoming a Big Deal:
– Using high-scale/low-cost providers,
– Any time/place access via web browser,
– Rapid scalability; incremental cost and load sharing,
– Can forget need to focus on local IT.
• Concerns:
– Performance, reliability, and SLAs,
– Control of data, and service parameters,
– Application features and choices,
– Interaction between Cloud providers,
– No standard API – mix of SOAP and REST!
– Privacy, security, compliance, trust…
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Some Commercial Cloud Offerings

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Cloud Taxonomy

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 Cloud Storage
• Several large Web companies are now exploiting the
fact that they have data storage capacity that can be
hired out to others.
– allows data stored remotely to be temporarily cached on
desktop computers, mobile phones or other Internet-
linked devices.

• Amazon’s Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) and Simple

Storage Solution (S3) are well known examples
– Mechanical Turk

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 Amazon Simple Storage Service (S3)
• Unlimited Storage.
• Pay for what you use:
– $0.20 per GByte of data transferred,
– $0.15 per GByte-Month for storage used,
– Second Life Update:
• 1TBytes, 40,000 downloads in 24 hours - $200,

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 Utility Computing – EC2
• Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2):
– Elastic, marshal 1 to 100+ PCs via WS,
– Machine Specs…,
– Fairly cheap!
• Powered by Xen – a Virtual Machine:
– Different from Vmware and VPC as uses “para-virtualization” where
the guest OS is modified to use special hyper-calls:
– Hardware contributions by Intel (VT-x/Vanderpool) and AMD (AMD-V).
– Supports “Live Migration” of a virtual machine between hosts.
• Linux, Windows, OpenSolaris
• Management Console/AP

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 EC2 – The Basics
• Load your image onto S3 and register it.
• Boot your image from the Web Service.
• Open up required ports for your image.
• Connect to your image through SSH.
• Execute you application…

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 Opportunities and Challenges
• The use of the cloud provides a number of
opportunities:
– It enables services to be used without any understanding
of their infrastructure.
– Cloud computing works using economies of scale:
• It potentially lowers the outlay expense for start up companies, as
they would no longer need to buy their own software or servers.
• Cost would be by on-demand pricing.
• Vendors and Service providers claim costs by establishing an
ongoing revenue stream.
– Data and services are stored remotely but accessible from
“anywhere”.

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 Opportunities and Challenges
• In parallel there has been backlash against cloud computing:
– Use of cloud computing means dependence on others and that could
possibly limit flexibility and innovation:
• The others are likely become the bigger Internet companies like Google and
IBM, who may monopolise the market.
• Some argue that this use of supercomputers is a return to the time of
mainframe computing that the PC was a reaction against.
– Security could prove to be a big issue:
• It is still unclear how safe out-sourced data is and when using these services
ownership of data is not always clear.
– There are also issues relating to policy and access:
• If your data is stored abroad whose policy do you adhere to?
• What happens if the remote server goes down?
• How will you then access files?
• There have been cases of users being locked out of accounts and losing access
to data.

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 Advantages of Cloud Computing
• Lower computer costs:
– You do not need a high-powered and high-priced computer
to run cloud computing's web-based applications.
– Since applications run in the cloud, not on the desktop PC,
your desktop PC does not need the processing power or hard
disk space demanded by traditional desktop software.
– When you are using web-based applications, your PC can be
less expensive, with a smaller hard disk, less memory, more
efficient processor...
– In fact, your PC in this scenario does not even need a CD or
DVD drive, as no software programs have to be loaded and
no document files need to be saved.
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 Advantages of Cloud Computing
• Improved performance:
– With few large programs hogging your computer's
memory, you will see better performance from your PC.
– Computers in a cloud computing system boot and run
faster because they have fewer programs and processes
loaded into memory…
• Reduced software costs:
– Instead of purchasing expensive software applications, you
can get most of what you need for free-ish!
• most cloud computing applications today, such as the Google Docs suite.
– better than paying for similar commercial software
• which alone may be justification for switching to cloud applications.

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 Advantages of Cloud Computing
• Instant software updates:
– Another advantage to cloud computing is that you are no longer faced
with choosing between obsolete software and high upgrade costs.
– When the application is web-based, updates happen automatically
• available the next time you log into the cloud.
– When you access a web-based application, you get the latest version
• without needing to pay for or download an upgrade.

• Improved document format compatibility.

– You do not have to worry about the documents you create on your
machine being compatible with other users' applications or OSes
– There are potentially no format incompatibilities when everyone is
sharing documents and applications in the cloud.

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 Advantages of Cloud Computing
• Unlimited storage capacity:
– Cloud computing offers virtually limitless storage.
– Your computer's current 1 Tbyte hard drive is small compared
to the hundreds of Pbytes available in the cloud.
• Increased data reliability:
– Unlike desktop computing, in which if a hard disk crashes and
destroy all your valuable data, a computer crashing in the cloud
should not affect the storage of your data.
• if your personal computer crashes, all your data is still out there in the
cloud, still accessible
– In a world where few individual desktop PC users back up their
data on a regular basis, cloud computing is a data-safe
computing platform!
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 Advantages of Cloud Computing
• Universal document access:
– That is not a problem with cloud computing, because you
do not take your documents with you.
– Instead, they stay in the cloud, and you can access them
whenever you have a computer and an Internet connection
– Documents are instantly available from wherever you are
• Latest version availability:
– When you edit a document at home, that edited version is
what you see when you access the document at work.
– The cloud always hosts the latest version of your documents
• as long as you are connected, you are not in danger of having an outdated
version
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 Advantages of Cloud Computing
• Easier group collaboration:
– Sharing documents leads directly to better collaboration.
– Many users do this as it is an important advantages of cloud
computing
• multiple users can collaborate easily on documents and projects
• Device independence.
– You are no longer tethered to a single computer or network.
– Changes to computers, applications and documents follow
you through the cloud.
– Move to a portable device, and your applications and
documents are still available.

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 Disadvantages of Cloud Computing
• Requires a constant Internet connection:
– Cloud computing is impossible if you cannot connect to the
Internet.
– Since you use the Internet to connect to both your
applications and documents, if you do not have an Internet
connection you cannot access anything, even your own
documents.
– A dead Internet connection means no work and in areas
where Internet connections are few or inherently
unreliable, this could be a deal-breaker.

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 Disadvantages of Cloud Computing
• Does not work well with low-speed connections:
– Similarly, a low-speed Internet connection, such as that
found with dial-up services, makes cloud computing
painful at best and often impossible.
– Web-based applications require a lot of bandwidth to
download, as do large documents.
• Features might be limited:
– This situation is bound to change, but today many web-
based applications simply are not as full-featured as their
desktop-based applications.
• For example, you can do a lot more with Microsoft PowerPoint
than with Google Presentation's web-based offering

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 Disadvantages of Cloud Computing
• Can be slow:
– Even with a fast connection, web-based applications can
sometimes be slower than accessing a similar software
program on your desktop PC.
– Everything about the program, from the interface to the
current document, has to be sent back and forth from your
computer to the computers in the cloud.
– If the cloud servers happen to be backed up at that
moment, or if the Internet is having a slow day, you would
not get the instantaneous access you might expect from
desktop applications.

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 Disadvantages of Cloud Computing
• Stored data might not be secure:
– With cloud computing, all your data is stored on the cloud.
• The questions is How secure is the cloud?
– Can unauthorised users gain access to your confidential data?
• Stored data can be lost:
– Theoretically, data stored in the cloud is safe, replicated
across multiple machines.
– But on the off chance that your data goes missing, you have
no physical or local backup.
• Put simply, relying on the cloud puts you at risk if the cloud lets you
down.

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 Disadvantages of Cloud Computing
• HPC Systems:
– Not clear that you can run compute-intensive HPC applications
that use MPI/OpenMP!
– Scheduling is important with this type of application
• as you want all the VM to be co-located to minimize communication
latency!
• General Concerns:
– Each cloud systems uses different protocols and different APIs
• may not be possible to run applications between cloud based systems
– Amazon has created its own DB system (not SQL 92), and
workflow system (many popular workflow systems out there)
• so your normal applications will have to be adapted to execute on these
platforms.
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 The Future
• Many of the activities loosely grouped together under cloud
computing have already been happening and centralised
computing activity is not a new phenomena
• Grid Computing was the last research-led centralised
approach
• However there are concerns that the mainstream adoption of
cloud computing could cause many problems for users
• Many new open source systems appearing that you can install
and run on your local cluster
– should be able to run a variety of applications on these systems

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