Cloud Computing Concepts

Utility Computing

• The primary focus is on providing a business model for computing services.

Characteristics of Cloud Computing

• Fixed computing capacity is NOT a characteristic of cloud computing.
• Cloud computing does include:
  • Elasticity
  • Resource sharing
  • Pay-per-use model

Grid Computing (Early 1990s)

• Scientific computing was the primary target.

Cloud Infrastructure Types

• Community clouds are shared by several organizations with shared concerns.

Resource Sharing in Cloud Computing

• The main advantage is higher resource utilization.

Cloud Delivery Models

• PaaS (Platform as a Service) allows users to deploy consumer-created applications using provider-supported tools.

Challenges for Cloud Computing

• Data transfer bottleneck is a major challenge.

Benefits of Cloud Computing

• Higher maintenance costs for users is NOT a benefit of cloud computing.
• Cloud computing provides:
  • Elimination of initial infrastructure investment
  • Cost reduction through resource concentration
  • User convenience through virtualization

Elastic Computing

• It refers to dynamically acquiring computing resources.

Cloud Computing Standardization

• NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology) is involved in standardization efforts.

Data Security in Cloud Computing

• A main concern is data confidentiality.

Cloud Delivery Models

• SaaS (Software as a Service) provides applications supplied by the service provider.

Cloud Computing Success Factors

• A key factor is a homogeneous set of resources.

Cloud Types

• Distributed cloud is NOT a type of cloud.
• Cloud types include:
  • Public
  • Private
  • Hybrid

"Future Internet"

• It is expected to be content-centric.

Ethical Issues in Cloud Computing

• One ethical issue is relinquishing control to third parties.

De-perimeterisation

• It refers to systems spanning multiple organizations' boundaries.

Privacy Concerns in Cloud Computing

• Cultural differences in privacy attitudes are a privacy concern.

Security Attacks

• A denial-of-service attack affected Google News and Gmail in 2009.

NIST Cloud Reference Model

• The physical resource layer is at the bottom.

Data Storage Advantages

• Data being stored closer to where it is used primarily reduces communication costs.

Cloud Activities

• Fixed resource allocation is NOT considered a cloud activity.
• A cloud activity is:
  • Virtualization
  • Service provisioning
  • Billing and accounting

Network-Centric Computing

• Access via thin clients is a primary characteristic.

Cloud Computing Adoption

• Apple is NOT mentioned as embracing cloud computing for utility computing.

Data-Intensive Application Requirements

• Resource aggregation is a key requirement.

Cloud Security Management

• Intrusion detection is a security management activity.

Semantic Web Focus

• The main focus is including semantic content in web pages.

Customer Service Activity

• Business intelligence is considered a customer service activity.

Amazon Downtime

• Lightning caused prolonged downtime in 2012.

Cloud Computing Attributes

• A fixed pricing model is NOT a defining attribute.
• Defining attributes:
  • Massive infrastructure
  • Utility computing
  • Elasticity

IaaS Pioneer

• Amazon pioneered Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS).

AWS Availability Zone

• It is a data center with many servers.

AWS Storage Service

• EBS (Elastic Block Storage) provides persistent block-level storage volumes.

Amazon S3 Object Size

• The maximum size of an object is 5 TB.

EC2 Counterpart

• Eucalyptus is described as an EC2 counterpart.

AWS Elastic IP Address

• It provides a static public IP.

Google PaaS Offering

• Google AppEngine is a Platform-as-a-Service.

Microsoft Azure

• Compute, storage, and the fabric controller are the main components.

US Electricity Consumption by Data Centers (2006)

• Data centers consumed 1.5% of U.S. electricity

AWS Request Distribution

• Elastic Load Balancer automatically distributes incoming requests.

EC2 Virtual Machine Import

• VM Import allows importing VM images from a user environment.

AWS Region Costs

• The US West (Oregon) region typically has the lowest cost.

CloudWatch

• The main purpose is performance monitoring.

AWS NoSQL Database

• DynamoDB is a fully managed NoSQL database.

Vendor Lock-In Risk

• The main risk is service unavailability.

Eucalyptus and EBS

• The Storage Controller in Eucalyptus corresponds to Amazon's EBS.

Intercloud Implementation Barrier

• The main barrier is a lack of standards.

Energy-Proportional Systems

• They scale power with load.

Microsoft Cloud-Based SQL Server

• SQL Azure is the cloud-based SQL Server.

Service Level Agreement (SLA) Purpose

• The main purpose is to define customer needs.

Economic Benefits of Cloud Computing

• Pay-per-use billing is a key economic benefit.

Application Suitability for Cloud Computing

• Applications with intensive inter-instance communication are LEAST suitable.

Challenges for Cloud Application Development

• Performance unpredictability is a major challenge.

Architectural Style for Cloud Applications

• Client-server architecture is commonly used.

REST Definition

• REST stands for Representational State Transfer.

Workflow Patterns

• The AND split workflow pattern activates multiple tasks simultaneously after a preceding task.

ZooKeeper

• ZooKeeper is primarily used for distributed coordination.

ZooKeeper Guarantees

• Sequential consistency ensures updates are applied in order.

MapReduce Model

• The first phase is Map.

Scientific Applications of Cloud Computing

• High-frequency trading is not typically a scientific application
• Scientific applications include:
  • Genomic data analysis
  • Climate modeling
  • Astrophysics simulations

Limitations of HPC Applications

• Network latency is a primary limitation of running HPC applications on clouds.

Cloud Platforms for Legacy Applications

• Cirrus assists in migrating legacy Windows applications to the cloud.

BOINC

• BOINC is middleware for distributed computing in volunteer computing.

Workflow Properties

• Liveness ensures "something good will eventually happen."

Arbitrarily Divisible Workloads

• The main advantage is dynamic scaling.

Economic Benefits of Cloud Computing for Business

• Pay-as-you-go pricing is the primary economic benefit.

Applications that Benefit Most from Cloud Elasticity

• Transaction-based web services benefit most.

Cloud-Unfriendly Applications

• Applications with intensive inter-instance communication are cloud-unfriendly.

"Just-in-Time Infrastructure"

• This refers to on-demand resource provisioning.

Parallelization in Cloud Computing

• It can reduce execution time by dividing workload across instances.

RESTful APIs

• They are characterized by platform independence.

Protocols in Cloud Application Communication

• FTP is NOT typically used in cloud application communication.

Workflow Task Dependencies

• Barrier synchronization is used for workflows that require tasks B AND C to complete before D can start.

Liveness Property

• Ensures progress is eventually made.

ZooKeeper Atomic Broadcast

• Guarantees causal message ordering.

ZooKeeper Znode

• Analogous to a file system inode.

Storage of Map Phase Outputs

• Stored on workers' local disks.

GrepTheWeb

• Analogous to Unix grep command.

AzureBLAST

• Used for DNA sequence analysis.

SETI@home

• They use donated consumer devices for volunteer computing.

Cirrus

• Aids in migrating Legacy Windows apps to cloud.

BOINC Specialization

• BOINC is NOT specialized for financial applications.

Cloud Computing and Initial Investment

• Cloud computing eliminates the need for any initial investment in computing infrastructure

Grid Computing Target

• Primarily targeted at enterprise computing, is FALSE.

Elastic Computing Definition

• Refers to the ability to handle variable workloads.

Public Cloud Operation

• Public clouds are operated solely for a single organization, is FALSE.

Multiplexing Impact in Cloud Computing

• Multiplexing in cloud computing leads to lower resource utilization, is FALSE.

SaaS User Control

• SaaS allows users to manage the underlying cloud infrastructure, is FALSE.

Data Transfer Bottleneck

• Data transfer bottleneck is not a challenge for cloud computing, is FALSE.

Cloud Computing Resource Billing

• Cloud computing resources can be metered and users charged only for what they use.

Hybrid Cloud Deployment

• Hybrid clouds combine two or more types of cloud deployments.

"Future Internet" Expectation

• The "Future Internet" is expected to be device-centric, is FALSE.

Utility Computing

• Utility computing often requires a cloud-like infrastructure

Cloud Service Provider Hardware

• All cloud service providers use heterogeneous hardware and software resources, is FALSE.

Performance Unpredictability

• Performance unpredictability is a consequence of resource sharing in clouds

PaaS Usefulness

• PaaS is particularly useful when applications must be portable, is FALSE.

IaaS User Control

• IaaS users have control over the underlying cloud infrastructure, is FALSE.

Cloud Computing Focus

• Cloud computing is focused only on scientific applications, is FALSE.

De-perimeterisation Responsibility

• De-perimeterisation makes it easier to determine responsibility in cloud systems, is FALSE.

Cultural Differences impact Privacy

• Cultural differences can affect attitudes toward privacy in cloud computing

Akamai Attack

• The 2004 attack at Akamai affected Google and Yahoo

NIST Involvement

• NIST is involved in standardization efforts for cloud computing

Cloud Computing Availability

• Cloud computing always guarantees 100% availability of services, is FALSE.

Thin Client Usage

• Thin clients are typically used to access network-centric computing systems.

Data Sharing

• Data sharing in clouds hinders collaborative activities, is FALSE.

Private Cloud Ownership

• Private clouds are owned by organizations selling cloud services to the public, is FALSE.

Cloud Computing Workload Ratio

• Cloud computing can support applications with large peak-to-average workload ratios.

Cloud Vulnerabilities

• All cloud vulnerabilities are caused by malicious attacks, is FALSE.

Semantic Web Advocacy

• The semantic web advocates for more unstructured data, is FALSE.

Community Cloud Support

• Community clouds support groups with shared concerns

Cloud Computing IT Staff

• Cloud computing reduces the need for specialized IT staff in organizations.

Cloud Computing Security

• Physical security is not a concern in cloud computing, is FALSE.

AWS Region Resource Sharing

• AWS regions share resources with each other, is FALSE.

EBS Volume Sharing

• EBS volumes can be shared among multiple EC2 instances, is FALSE.

Google's AppEngine

• Google's AppEngine initially supported only Python

Nimbus Design

• Nimbus is specifically designed for scientific applications,

S3 Operations

• S3 provides copy and move operations for objects,

Elastic Beanstalk

• Elastic Beanstalk handles automatic deployment and scaling

OpenNebula Architecture

• OpenNebula uses a decentralized architecture by default,

Vendor Lock-in Mitigation

• Vendor lock-in can be mitigated by data replication

Data Centers Energy Consumption

• Data centers' energy consumption was expected to decrease after 2006, is FALSE.

IaaS Provider Role

• The provider manages the operating system, is FALSE.

AWS Launch Year

• AWS was launched in 2006

SimpleDB Service Type

• SimpleDB is a relational database service, is FALSE.

CloudFront

• CloudFront is AWS's content delivery network

Windows Azure

• Windows Azure has three main components

Eucalyptus VMM

• Eucalyptus can only use Xen as its VMM, is FALSE.

Fabric Controller

• The Fabric Controller is part of Google's cloud, is FALSE.

SQS Message Locking

• SQS messages remain locked indefinitely during processing, is FALSE.

Energy Efficiency Scaling

• Energy efficiency scales linearly with system utilization, is FALSE.

SLA Service Delivery

• SLAs typically specify how services are delivered, is FALSE.

PaaS User Management

• In PaaS, users manage the hypervisor, is FALSE

Cloud Computing Investment

• Eliminates the need for any upfront infrastructure investment

Complex Workflow Application

• Applications with complex workflows perform well on clouds, is FALSE.

REST Traits

• REST is platform-independent and supports caching

ZooKeeper Algorithm

• ZooKeeper uses the Paxos algorithm for consensus

MapReduce Task Timing

• MapReduce requires all map tasks to finish before reduce tasks begin.

Legacy Application Cloud-Run

• Legacy applications cannot run on cloud platforms, is FALSE.

Volunteer Computing

• Relies on centralized supercomputers, is FALSE.

Cloud Ideal application

• Clouds are ideal for high-frequency trading due to low latency, is FALSE

Workflow Patterns

• Workflow patterns include AND split and XOR merge

BOINC Usage

• BOINC is used in SETI@Home

Cloud Performance Isolation

• Cloud computing eliminates all performance isolation issues, is FALSE.

REST APIs and Firewalls

• REST APIs can work through firewalls

ZooKeeper Requirements

• All servers to be operational, is FALSE.

MapReduce Workers

• Always requires exactly 3 reduce workers, is FALSE.

Scientific Workflows

• Scientific workflows never benefit from clouds, is FALSE.