Week 12 FINAL Blog Posting

This is my blog retrospective…

My topics were on the basics of Cloud Computing. I started with what is the cloud, to types of clouds, best practices, Cloud Service Providers, and types of jobs. I chose these topics, because I don’t consider myself a great writer, so I find bulleting items with discussion much easier to write about. I used a variety of sources each week. There was just two weeks where I used the same source and that was to finish up the best practices.

I think my type of blog will be helpful for business people that are starting down the road of going to the Cloud. Information security professionals probably need more in-depth information than what I provided. I don’t enjoy writing, but I did find the blog useful. I know more about Cloud Computing than when I started this class 12 weeks ago. There is lots more to learn.

Week 11 - Cloud Computing Jobs

With cloud computing, there are many jobs and career paths for IT professionals. According to Forbes, "$124,300 is the median advertised salary for cloud computing professionals in 2016."

According to ComputerWorld, here are ten different jobs in the Cloud world -both within a Cloud Service Provider and a business that will be using the cloud

• Cloud Architect - Design and implement cloud initiatives within a company
• Cloud Software Engineer - Develop software that integrates with the cloud
• Cloud Sales - including sales executives, sales consultants, sales managers and sales representative - sell outsourced cloud business
• Cloud Engineer - implement and maintain cloud infrastructure
• Cloud Services Developer - develop customer-facing tools so that they can manage their cloud environment
• Cloud Systems Administrator - configure and troubleshoot the cloud infrastructure
• Cloud Consultant - work with businesses to determine their requirements for Cloud technology and make recommendation for implementation
• Cloud Systems Engineer - build cloud servers to support implementation
• Cloud Network Engineer - Install and maintain the network for the cloud infrastructure
• Cloud Product Manager - product manager for cloud-based products

Columbus, Louis. (2016, March 18). Where Cloud Computing Jobs Are In 2016. Retrieved from https://www.forbes.com/sites/louiscolumbus/2016/03/18/where-cloud-computing-jobs-are-in-2016/#558d3b3a1a60
Burns, Christine. (2012, October 16). 10 Cloud Computing Jobs in High Demand. Retrieved from http://www.computerworld.com/article/2473788/cloud-computing/10-cloud-computing-jobs-in-high-demand.html#slide2

Week 10 - Cloud Service Providers

Who are Cloud Service Providers? Cloud Service Providers (CSP) offer some component of cloud computing to other businesses or individuals. There are many Cloud Service Providers out there. There are big one and small ones. You will need to research the CSPs to find the best fit for your company.

Here are some of the major players in the CSP market.

Amazon Web Services - https://aws.amazon.com/
Leader of the market. Complete cloud offerings with IaaS and PaaS. Best for businesses that want high scalability and availability.

Microsoft Azure - https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/
Offers IaaS and PaaS. Also has SaaS offerings. Good for businesses that need robust development and deployment.

Google Cloud Platform - https://cloud.google.com/
Offers IaaS and PaaS. Streamlined system for development and deployment.

IBM Cloud - http://www.ibm.com/cloud-computing/
Offers Bluemix PaaS for enterprise development teams.

Rackspace - https://www.rackspace.com/
Offers cloud hosting in its data centers. Also offers support and services for businesses in other CSPs.

Oracle Cloud - https://www.oracle.com/cloud/index.html
Offers SaaS, IaaS and PaaS.


https://clutch.co/cloud

Week 9 - Best practices, part 2

According to Stephen Orban of Amazon Web Services, these are best practices to follow during and after Cloud migration.

Migration Stage

1. Start simply. Move a small amount of your environment to the Cloud. See how that runs and then proceed to move more. 
2. Automate as many tasks as possible when you move to the cloud.
3. Embrace the technological change and update your internal processes to reflect that.
4. Use your cloud service provider to do the day-to-day maintenance activities. This will free up your employees to focus on more important things.

Post-Migration Stage

1. Have a monitoring strategy for your applications. This will give you insights into how the environment is running.
2. There are cloud-native monitoring tools. You will want to use them. They will let you see how your applications are performing.
3. Hopefully, in your Cloud Service Provider contract, you got enterprise support. If you did, make sure to use those services. The CSP is a valuable source of IT knowledge and how the cloud works. Make sure to escalate any issues to them.

https://medium.com/aws-enterprise-collection/21-best-practices-for-your-cloud-migration-e406546cb66b#.drbhmg427

Week 8 - Best Practices when implementing a Cloud

According to Stephen Orban of Amazon Web Services, these are best practices to follow when planning a cloud migration. Today, we'll discuss about before migration.

1.    IT and business should have a well-defined vision of how they will work together and both will know why moving to the cloud is important.

2.    You will need a Cloud Governance Model. This defines roles and responsibilities of employees. It will also define security procedures.

3.    Have employees trained at the beginning of the process. This way they are knowledgeable about what will happen and how things will work.

4.    You will want to get your processes and procedures with using the cloud throughout your company set up as much ahead of time as possible before you move to the cloud. They will probably need to be tweaked once you have moved, but get a good start on them.
5.  Do a full inventory of all your IT infrastructure. This will allow you to understand what you have moved to the cloud and how much of a savings it will be.
6.  Select the best vendor for your cloud migration. Not all vendors offer the same products and services. Make sure to do your homework and compare 2-3 different Cloud Service Providers.

Next week, we will address the migration and post-migration stages.

https://medium.com/aws-enterprise-collection/21-best-practices-for-your-cloud-migration-e406546cb66b#.drbhmg427

Week 7 - What to look for in a Cloud provider

When looking at a Cloud provider, you will want to consider several things.

• You will want to know your business objectives for moving to the Cloud and communicate it to the vendor. The vendor will need to understand your objectives. They will need to take the time to listen to what you are wanting to accomplish and not just push their agenda.

• You will want to know the location of the Cloud provider’s data centers. This will take into consideration network bandwidth for your users. Also, if you are a global company, there will be regulations on where data can be hosted.

• You will want to know their security policies. The Cloud Security Alliance setup the Security Trust and Assurance Registry certification program. The Cloud providers go through a third-party assessment of the security of their facilities. If they “pass”, they will be listed in the CSA STAR registry. You will want to make sure that the vendor is in there.

• Look for a provider with success in the field. Do they have experience with companies your same size? Have they setup a similar type of cloud for another client? Do they have references that you can talk to?

• Other things to consider: Can you understand their Service Level Agreement? Do they have written processes and procedures? Are they willing to help with a pilot test?

https://cloudsecurityalliance.org/

http://searchcloudcomputing.techtarget.com/feature/Top-considerations-for-choosing-a-cloud-provider

http://searchcloudcomputing.techtarget.com/tip/What-makes-a-good-cloud-provider

Week 6 - Things to consider

So, your ready to implement a cloud? There are things that need to be considered before you start bringing the cloud in to a business.

• Can your application run in the cloud? There can be licensing issues and network bandwidth issues if they are at a cloud provider.
• Do you need to be aware of any compliance regulations? If your company has any compliance regulations (like HIPAA or PCI DSS), you will need to make sure that the data you put there is able to reside there. There are usually specific regulations on how and where personal data can be stored.
• Have you done a business plan? You will want to include a cost analysis. Also, do an assessment of your business needs, your IT organization and your infrastructure. When you understand your current environment, it will make it easier to know what to move to the cloud.
• Have you worked on a migration plan? You will need to plan what applications can be moved, what you plan to move first. Sometimes, moving development and test environments to the cloud first, gives the company a chance to see if they want to continue moving everything to the cloud.

http://meship.com/Blog/2014/11/05/five-steps-implement-cloud-computing/