2012 International Conference on Computing, Electronics and Electrical Technologies [ICCEET]

Cloud Computing - Concepts, Architecture and

Challenges

Yashpalsinh Jadeja Kirit Modi

Dept. of Computer Engineering & IT Dept. of Computer Engineering & IT
U. V. Patel College of Engineering, Ganpat University U. V. Patel College of Engineering, Ganpat University
Kherva (Mahesana), Gujarat, India Kherva (Mahesana), Gujarat, India
yashpaljadeja@gmail.com kirit.modi@ganpatuniversity.ac.in

Abstract- With the advent internet in the 1990s to the problems. Cloud computing deals with virtualization,
present day facilities of ubiquitous computing, the internet has scalability, interoperability, quality of service and the delivery
changed the computing world in a drastic way. It has traveled
models of the cloud, namely private, public and hybrid.
from the concept of parallel computing to distributed computing
to grid computing and recently to cloud computing. Although the
idea of cloud computing has been around for quite some time, it II. HISTORY
is an emerging field of computer science. Cloud computing can be The underlying concept of cloud computing was introduced
defined as a computing environment where computing needs by way back in 1960s by John McCarthy. His opinion was that
one party can be outsourced to another party and when need be "computation may someday be organized as a public utility.
arise to use the computing power or resources like database or
[4]" Also the characteristics of cloud computing were explored
emails, they can access them via internet. Cloud computing is a
for the first time in 1966 by Douglas Parkhill in his book,
The
recent trend in IT that moves computing and data away from
Challenge of the Computer Utility[4]. The history of the term
desktop and portable PCs into large data centers. The main
cloud is from the telecommunications world, where telecom
advantage of cloud computing is that customers do not have to
companies started offering Virtual Private Network (VPN)
pay for infrastructure, its installation, required man power to
services with comparable quality of service at a much lower
handle such infrastructure and maintenance. In this paper we
will discuss what makes all this possible, what is the architectural
cost. Initially before VPN, they provided dedicated point-to­
design of cloud computing and its applications. point data circuits which was a wastage of bandwidth. But by
using VPN services, they can switch traffic to balance
Keywords-applications, architecture, business component of utilization of the overall network. Cloud computing now
cloud computing, cloud computing, issues extends this to cover servers and network infrastructure.

Many players in the industry have jumped into cloud

I. INTRODUCTION computing and implemented it. Amazon has played a key role

The term "cloud" ongmates from the world of and launched the Amazon Web Service (A W S) in 2006. Also

telecommunications when providers began using virtual private Google and IBM have started research projects in cloud
network (VPN) services for data communications [1]. Cloud computing. Eucalyptus became the fust open source platform
computing deals with computation, software, data access and for deploying private clouds.
storage services that may not require end-user knowledge of
the physical location and the configuration of the system that is
delivering the services. Cloud computing is a recent trend in IT
III. CHARACTERISTICS OF CLOUD COMPUTING
that moves computing and data away from desktop and
portable PCs into large data centers [2]. The defmition of cloud
• In cloud computing, users access the data, applications
computing provided by National Institute of Standards and or any other services with the help of a browser
Technology (NIST) says that: "Cloud computing is a model for regardless of the device used and the user's location.
enabling convenient, on-demand network access to a shared The infrastructure which is generally provided by a
pool of configurable computing resources (e.g., networks, third-party is accessed with the help of internet. Cost is
servers, storage applications and services) that can be rapidly reduced to a significant level as the infrastructure is
provisioned and released with minimal management effort or provided by a third-party and need not be acquired for
service provider interaction. [3]" With the large scale occasional intensive computing tasks.
proliferation of the internet around the world, applications can • Less IT skills are required for implementation.
now be delivered as services over the internet. As a result this • Reliable service can be obtained by the use of multiple
reduces the overall cost. sites which is suitable for business continuity [4] and
disaster recovery [4]. However, sometimes many cloud
The main goal of cloud computing is to make a better use computing services have suffered outages and in such
of distributed resources, combine them to achieve higher times its users can hardly do anything [5].
throughput and be able to solve large scale computation

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 2012 International Conference on Computing, Electronics and Electrical Technologies [ICCEET]

• Sharing of resources and costs amongst a large NetSuite, Oracle, IBM and Microsoft [10]. Google Apps is the
collection of users allows efficient utilization of the most widely used SaaS.
infrastructure.
Platform services "Platform as a Service (PaaS)" provide a
• Maintenance is easier in case of cloud computing
computing platform using the cloud infrastructure. It has all the
applications as they need not be installed on each user's
application typically required by the client deployed on it. Thus
computer.
the client need not go through the hassles of buying and
• Pay per use facility allows measuring the usage of
installing the software and hardware required for it. Through
application per client on regular bases.
this service developers can get a hold of all the systems and
• Performance can be monitored and thus it is scalable. environments required for the life cycle of software, be it
• Security can be as good as or better than traditional developing, testing, deploying and hosting of web applications.
systems because providers are able to devote resources Key examples are GAE, Microsoft's Azure [10].
to solving security issues that many customers cannot
afford. However, security still remains an important Infrastructure services "Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)"
concern when the data is quite confidential. This delays provides the required infrastructure as a service. The client
adoption of cloud computing to some extent [6, 7]. need not purchase the required servers, data center or the
network resources. Also the key advantage here is that
customers need to pay only for the time duration they use the
IV. CLOUD COMPUTING ARCHITECTURE
service. As a result customers can achieve a much faster
Cloud computing system can be divided into two sections: service delivery with less cost. Examples are GoGrid,
the front end and the back end [8]. They both are connected Flexiscale, Layered Technologies, Joyent and
with each other through a network, usually the internet. Front Mosso/Rackspace [10].
end is what the client (user) sees whereas the back end is the
cloud of the system. Front end has the client's computer and Figure shows the conceptual diagram of Cloud Computing
the application required to access the cloud and the back has [4]:
the cloud computing services like various computers, servers
and data storage.

Monitoring of traffic, administering the system and client

demands are administered by a central server. It follows certain
rules i.e., protocols and uses a special software called the
middleware [8]. Middleware allows networked computers to
communicate with each other.

A. Layers and Services of Cloud Computing

Architecture
The below diagram shows the different layers of cloud
computing architecture [4].

Client

Appli cati on

Platform

Infrastructure
Server

A cloud client consists of computer hardware and/or

Server consists of the characteristic computer hardware
computer software which relies on cloud computing for
and/or software required for the delivery of the above
application delivery, or that is specifically designed for
mentioned services.
delivery of cloud services [9].
Figure shows the various cloud computing services with
Acloud application delivers "Software as a Service
their examples:
(SaaS)" over the internet, thus eliminating the need to install
and run the application on the users system [9]. Important
characteristics of this are: [9] Network-based access and
management of commercially available software that are
managed from centralized locations and enabling customers to
access these applications remotely through the internet.
Examples of the key providers are SalesForce.com (SFDC),

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 2012 International Conference on Computing, Electronics and Electrical Technologies [ICCEET]

validation on both sides, by the cloud vendor as well as the

I saaS II PaaS II l aaS .I client. Also both the parties need to identify their
Software as a Service
,I Platform as a Service l..I lnfrastructure as a Service .l responsibilities within their boundaries of operation.

• G ov A pps
-
• Appli Gi tion DlII e bpment • Servers b. Private Cloud
• ComlTlJnication(email) • SeclJity Services • N etv.l:lrk A private clouds operation is within an organization's
• Coll aboration • Datab ase ManagEme nt • Stolilge internal enterprise data center. The main advantage here is
• Producti vity tools (office) • Management that it is easier to manage security, maintenance and
• ERP • Reporting upgrades and also provides more control over the
deployment and use. Private cloud can be compared to
EXAMPlfS: EXAMPlfs: EXAMPlfs:
intranet. Compared to public cloud where all the resources
SalesForte.com GAE GoGrid
NelSuitl! Microsoft's Azure Fleciscale
and applications were managed by the service provider, in
Oracle Amazon EC2 Joy ent private cloud these services are pooled together and made
IBM available for the users at the organizational level. The
Goq:leApps resources and applications are managed by the
organization itself. Security is enhanced here as only the
organizations' users' have access to the private cloud.

c. Hybrid Cloud
All the above mentioned services are pay per use, which
It is a combination of public cloud and private cloud.
makes cloud computing an attractive option for those
In this model a private cloud is linked to one or more
organizations which cannot afford buying, installing and
external cloud services. It is more secure way to control
maintaining the required services.
data and applications and allows the party to access
B. Deployment a/Cloud Computing Service information over the internet. It enables the organization to
serve its needs in the private cloud and if some occasional
For deploying a cloud computing solution, the major task is
need occurs it asks the public cloud for intensive
to decide on the type of cloud to be implemented. Presently
computing resources.
three types of cloud deployment takes place - public cloud,
private cloud and hybrid cloud Figure below shows the d. Community Cloud
overview of the deployment of these three clouds [11] : When many organization jointly construct and share a
cloud infrastructure, their requirements and policies then
such a cloud model is called as a community cloud. The
cloud infrastructure could be hosted by a third-party
provider or within one of the organizations in the
community.

V. ADV ANTAGES OF CLOUD COMPUTING

a. Easy Management
The maintenance of the infrastructure, be it hardware
or software is simplified, thus, less headaches for the IT
team. Also applications that are quite storage extensive are
more easier to use in the cloud environment compared to
the same when used by the organization by its own. Also
C Mlnt·Hot�
at the user level, what you mostly need is a simple web
I browser with internet connectivity.
Data ProtectIon
F1J:ure I; Cloud ComputlDI: Map I
b. Cost Reduction
The main advantage for SMEs lies here. Cloud
computing drastically reduces the IT spending for SMEs.
a. Public Cloud
Costly systems need not be required for occasional use of
Public cloud allows users' access to the cloud via
intensive computing resources. Also the man power
interfaces using web browsers. Users need to pay only for
required for such systems is not required. Even simple
the time duration they use the service, i.e., pay-per-use.
applications like email can be set up and mostly free
This can be compared to the electricity system which we
through applications like Google Apps. Also as most of the
receive at our homes. We pay only for the amount of that
time such providers are quite reliable in terms of
we use. The same concept applies here. This helps in
availability, it is clear winner.
reducing the operation costs on IT expenditure. However
public clouds are less secure compared to other cloud c. Uninterrupted Services
models as all the applications and data on the public cloud Lower outages are provided by cloud computing
are more prone to malicious attacks. The solution to this services, thus providing uninterrupted services to the user.
can be that security checks be implemented through However, some occurrences of outages have occurred in

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 2012 International Conference on Computing, Electronics and Electrical Technologies [ICCEET]

the past, like the Gmail outage in 2009. Also other cloud future. We can have approximately infinite computing
vendors like EC2 have failed at some point of time, but capabilities, scalability, pay-per-use scheme and so on.
however, they are much more dependable compared to the However this wave still needs to resolve some of its existing
infrastructure installed on the organization. issues with urgency.

d. Disaster Management
In case of disasters, an offsite backup is always REFERENCES
helpful. Keeping crucial data backed up using cloud
storage services is the need of the hour for most of the
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lock and key.

However companies offering cloud computing services

counter argue to this say that they live and die by their
reputations. Customers pay these companies as they are reliable
in security measures. Otherwise, they would lose their clients.
It's their concentration to provide best services to their clients.

Privacy is another factor. As these data are accessed from

any location, it's possible the client's privacy could be
compromised. One way to solve this issue is the use of proper
authentication techniques. Another solution is to provide with
an authorization - so that each user can access only the data
and applications relevant to his or her job.

Replication time and costs also play an important role. How

fast can the data be replicated is important for data resiliency.

Reliability is an issue. Servers in the cloud can have the

same problems as the organization's resident servers.
Downtimes can occur with cloud servers too.

VII. CONCLUSION

In this paper we have discussed a new wave in the field of

information technology: cloud computing. We have also
described its architecture, advantages and some issues. There is
no doubt that cloud computing is the development trend for the

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