IAAS in Cloud Computing

The internet is an ever-growing space that introduces new opportunities every day. One such opportunity is cloud computing, which has been growing in popularity year in and year out. It is a market that is estimated to be worth $800 billion by 2025. Another one is IaaS, which basically goes along with cloud computing. The IaaS market is expected to double in growth and have a value of $121 billion in 2022. So, let's explore what these popular tools offer and what they can do.

IaaS or infrastructure as a service that provides you with access to cloud-hosted physical and virtual servers, storage, and networking resources on demand. It is based on a pay-as-you-go basis, and it is one of the four types of cloud computing services. It is a significant and profitable market, with approximately 90% of all IaaS providers experiencing growth in 2020.

The "as a service" part of IaaS relates to the way that IT resources are used and encompasses the core difference between cloud computing in general and traditional IT. So, in traditional IT, companies have to buy IT resources like hardware, software, tools, applications, etc. These resources have to be installed, managed, and maintained in their own on-site data center.

With cloud computing, on the other hand, the cloud service provider is the one that owns, manages, and maintains the resources. You, as a customer, get these resources and use them via an internet connection, and you pay for them on a pay-as-you-go basis.

With IaaS, you can choose between using two options:

• Virtual Machines or VMs – the VMs are hosted on shared physical hardware, and the cloud service provider is the one who manages the virtualization

• Bare metal servers – which are hosted on dedicated (private) physical hardware

Thus, the main benefit of the "as a service" aspect of IaaS is that you can access all the IT resources you need without having to buy them yourself and manage them in their own data center. Instead, you pay for as much of a resource as you need, and the computing service provider does the managing and maintaining.

Cloud computing is an umbrella term that encompasses everything related to delivering hosting services on demand via an internet connection. Instead of having an on-site data center or another storage device, cloud computing allows you to save files on a remote database in the cloud or a virtual space.

Cloud computing delivers different resources to customers, including:

• Data Storage

• Servers

• Databases

• Networking

• Software

There are two types of cloud computing:

• Private cloud – everyone has access to this cloud, and it sells services to any user

• Public cloud – this refers to a data center that provides hosting services only to a limited amount of users who have access to it

Migration

IaaS is the cheapest and quickest solution for migrating apps and workloads to the cloud. This is because, with IaaS, you do not refactor your underlying architecture, which in turn can increase performance, enhance security, and decrease the costs of running an app or workload.

Development

IaaS makes setting up and dismantling test and development environments fast and easy. This, in turn, makes the introduction of new applications to the market much faster. Also, the scaling of test and development environments is cheap and straightforward.

Data storage, backups, and recovery

IaaS simplifies the storage, backup, and recovery process and management. Businesses using IaaS can save a great deal of money because they will not incur any costs related to storage management, as the cloud computing service provider deals with this process. Also, storage management usually requires experienced staff who know how to manage data and keep up with all the legal and compliance requirements. IaaS is also helpful in managing unprecedented demand, steadily growing storage needs, and planning and managing backup and recovery systems.

Supporting web apps

With IaaS, you get all the infrastructure you need to support different web apps, like storage, web and application servers, and networking resources. When demand for the apps is unpredictable, your business may swiftly build web apps on IaaS and quickly scale infrastructure up and down.

High-performance computing

IaaS supports high-performance computing, which refers to computing on supercomputers, computer grids, or computer clusters. High-performance computing helps in solving complex issues that contain numerous variables and calculations, such as earthquake simulations, weather predictions, financial modeling, product design evaluations, etc.

Cost reduction

IaaS allows companies to completely avoid expenses related to configuring and managing a physical data center, making it the choice that has better value-for-money compared to traditional IT. Also, the pay-as-you-go method that IaaS providers use reduces the hardware costs because the price of the resource depends on how much you use it. The reduced maintenance associated with IaaS is also beneficial. It allows you and your team to focus more on the actual business, leaving the technical side of it to the IaaS provider.

Enhanced stability and reliability

You will not have to maintain and upgrade software and hardware with IaaS nor troubleshoot equipment issues. This is all handled by the IaaS provider, who also makes sure that your infrastructure is reliable and compliant with service-level agreements or SLAs.

Keeps your business running

IaaS makes sure that the infrastructure of your business is not affected by external issues, such as failure of some hardware component, loss of internet connection, data going offline, etc. IaaS keeps your infrastructure safe and intact.

Security

Businesses do not have any say over cloud security with IaaS. They need to do their own research into the cloud computing service provider's SLA or service-level agreement to know what the provider offers in terms of security. Also, if you are worried about any gaps or loopholes that the provider could have security-wise, you will need to scour the SLA to know if they exist and what you need to protect your business from.

Technical issues

Not all, but some businesses experience downtime with IaaS, which limits their access to applications, data, workloads, etc.

Depending on the provider

If you use IaaS and give it complete control over your infrastructure, it makes you entirely dependent on the IaaS provider or other third parties. This could potentially cause problems because if something goes wrong with the provider or it has some issues, it could affect your business and its data and workload.

Possible process changes

IaaS could require some businesses to make changes to their processes and workloads.

Difficult to integrate

IaaS can pose a problem to some businesses, as it can be challenging to integrate it with existing systems.

Selecting a provider

You may have a difficult time choosing an IaaS provider because it can be complicated to vet and approve some of them.

Most popular IaaS providers:

• Digital Ocean
• IBM Cloud
• Amazon AWS
• Microsoft Azure
• OpenStack
• Rackspace
• VMware
• Red Hat
• Togglebox
• Green Cloud Technologies
• Google Compute Engine
• Linode
• Cisco Metapod
• CenturyLink Cloud
• INAP
• Linode
• Virtual Machine Manager
• Alibaba Elastic Compute Service

• IaaS is highly suitable for start-ups, small companies, and generally for non-professionals. IaaS enables companies to avoid doing and managing many of the technical aspects that come with having a website, as it takes care of the hardware and software components. You will not have to purchase them yourself, which grants you more time to focus on growing your business and looking for new opportunities and customers.

• Large enterprises also like using IaaS because it allows them to pay only for resources that they need to use. Of course, some companies like to have complete control over the applications and infrastructure they have, but saving time and money with the services of IaaS overrides the need for control in the majority of cases.

• If your company is experiencing rapid, unprecedented growth, then IaaS can be an excellent solution for you. IaaS attracts rapid-growth companies because of the scalability options it offers, which enable companies to modify the hardware and software components whenever they need to.

• IaaS is an excellent web hosting solution for more complex websites and projects. Additionally, many websites with highly versatile traffic choose IaaS for web hosting. The main reason why companies choose cloud hosting over traditional web hosting is because it provides on-demand access to large amounts of computing power. Also, this hosting is very flexible, as companies can use as much or as little of a service as they need.

• IaaS is a fantastic solution for companies that need high computing performance. IaaS supports tasks that require the use of supercomputers or clusters and that involve several million variables and calculations to be done.

• Companies that deal with extensive data analysis choose IaaS because it can manage, store, and analyze massive workloads and can integrate with business intelligence tools. This improves the process of acquiring business information, which users may use to create relationships with their clients and forecast current trends.

• PaaS - Cloud providers host development tools on their infrastructures in the PaaS model. Clients use APIs, web portals, and gateway software to access these services over the internet. PaaS is a platform for developing generic software, and many PaaS providers host the software once it's finished. Some PaaS providers include Google App Engine, Microsoft Azure, and Heroku.

• SaaS - This is a distribution model for software applications, a.k.a web services, that are delivered over the internet. Users can access SaaS applications and services from any location using a PC or mobile device with internet access. The SaaS model provides users with access to application software and databases. Some examples of SaaS providers are Shopify, IBM Cloud, and Oracle Cloud.

Cloud computing is growing in popularity year in and year out, and for a good reason. It is an excellent solution for businesses of almost all sizes, and it is a cheap way to obtain all the IT resources a business could need.

IaaS is one of the four types of cloud services available today, and it is rapidly growing and attracting all kinds of users. It is perfect for small, large, and start-up companies that need IT resources but don't want to manage and maintain them by themselves. Also, it's an excellent solution for users who want to buy a specific amount of hardware and software that will satisfy their needs, with the possibility to increase or decrease that amount whenever they need to.