Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) : Detailed Article

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) is a model of cloud computing where the user maintains the server software,SOA and the supplier maintains cloud environment. Previously we described Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) in brief, in this article, we will elaborately discuss Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS).

Basics on Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) is a model where the vendor company provides the full IT infrastructure including servers, storage, network, virtual machine image library, firewalls, load balancers, IP addresses, virtual local area networks (VLANs). The vendor company gives unrestricted access to the client, as if the material was in their premises. Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) is growing in line with the demand of Platform as a Service (PaaS) and the final layer of cloud – Software as a Service. The practical example of an IaaS client, for example can be AppFog.

The demand of Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) is favored by two major concomitant factors :

• The needed change and adoption of traditional softwares, which can be deployed with more advantage on Cloud as Software as a Service.
• The wish to implement private cloud by the clients. As with Open Source Pay as you Go Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) model, clients has the chance to bypass Platform as a Service.

Impact of Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)

The biggest advantage of Platform as a Service is, the PaaS user, for example who wants to run WordPress, need no technical knowledge. As we have shown before, installation of WordPress is basically of less than so called famous 5 minutes installation.

The application of the model of Infrastructure as a Service requires an organizational approach for administration of services different from traditional models.

The trend towards Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) raises questions related to technical requirements or further development of compatible storage services, virtual machine protection, privacy policy and data retention. The newer challenges are emerging to Infrastructure as a Service, which is related to the operation and supervision of the infrastructure cloud too. The reason is, if there is any change in API by the main vendor, the supplier needs to adapt their softwares, which might not be very easy.