Virtualization, moving to the cloud and Cloud Bursting

Virtualization, moving to the cloud and Cloud Bursting

Virtualization is one of those topics that cloud computing aficionados just love to flaunt, and for good reason; it can be used to do pretty much anything in a computer system or network. As far as cloud computing is concerned, virtualization is basically its ancestor. While it's true that not all virtualized systems are clouds, all clouds rely heavily on virtualization. In other words, the door doesn't exactly swing both ways. In fact, many organizations will often utilize virtualized components in their grid-based systems. In their setups, virtualized components might perform specific tasks across their network.

Many of the businesses that might be wary of cloud computing prefer to keep all of their applications (especially those that might be performing more critical tasks) on their own localized hardware stack. For those companies that have already (or perhaps are ready to take the plunge) adopted cloud computing, virtualization is being used in amazing new ways. While most people are familiar with the concept of using virtualization for running copies of operating systems, applications or virtual hardware; they may not be aware that it is now being used to perform storage and desktop simulation duties as well.

The truth is, most organizations (even those with no affiliation with mainstream cloud computing) already have many virtualized components in operation inside their hardware stack. Why is this important you ask? Well for starters, the virtualized components sitting there in your hardware stack could be performing extremely useful and critical tasks; but they could also provide you with a clear cut path toward cloud integration. For example, one of the most logical first steps for most businesses would be to use virtualization as a means for allocating additional resources in the event of drop off.

Let's say that you are anticipating that your computing network (grid-based) will need additional computing power, hardware resources, storage or bandwidth (as is often the case during the busy times of the year). In this scenario, you have two options; buy more hardware / upgrade your service package or use virtualization to handle the overflow. If you configure some virtualized elements on your system to automatically requisition additional cloud-based resources you will have continuous service. Setting things up this way ensures that you will also be able to keep your costs much lower than you would if you had to add hardware (potentially tens of thousands of dollars lower).

Once the crisis period has ended your system would no longer require the use of the requisitioned cloud resources. In other words, you only pay for what you use. Creating a system that requisitions additional cloud resources as they are needed is what is commonly known as 'cloud bursting'.

One potential avenue that many have not previously considered is using virtualization to perform cloud bursting duties. How would that work exactly? Let's pretend for a moment that we have a large grid network set up; for 11 months out of the year, everything is fine, but one month a year there are serious deficiencies. If it is a retail business, it may be due to seasonal customer / product overflow, for example. So maybe we're selling holiday specific products and take in a significantly larger volume of business during a one month period preceding a specific celebration. It would make no sense for us to spend thousands upgrading our entire hardware setup just to cover that one month of accelerated operations, especially if we're operating well within capacity the rest of the year. What's the solution? Use virtualized components within our existing hardware stack to activate / use additional resources automatically in the event of an overdraft. We would simply need to sign up for a service plan from one of the many reputable cloud computing providers out there, configure it with our current system, test it and then sit back and relax.

This is the way that most organizations are introduced to the world of cloud computing, through workflow overdrafts (or cloudbursting, as it is also called). Once most businesses see what cloud computing can actually do, they usually begin the transition. This often occurs as a result of realizing that there is a definitive advantage in terms of cost effectiveness by switching to the cloud. When you combine the aforementioned benefits with the realization that cloud computing is also offering nearly unlimited power / resources and no threat of service blackouts, it's easy to understand why more and more institutions are making the switch.

It is unclear whether or not cloud computing will take hold over the individual users in the same way that it has for businesses. As the current model of cloud computing stands, businesses have a lot more to gain from it than does the average individual user. It could be argued that individual users will always prefer having their own set of contained hardware / software resources on hand; the same cannot be said of businesses however. For organizations, cloud computing is able to reduce their IT related expenditures by such a significant amount that it is highly doubtful that any of them will even look back. For businesses interested in cloud computing, virtualization will provide you with a solid introduction to the field.