By utilizing multi-cloud systems, organizations are able to run their systems and store data across various cloud providers. According to the IBM Institute for Business Value, 85% of companies are currently using a multi-cloud system to manage their information. While the multi-cloud has its advantages, it also creates specific challenges that organizations need to take into consideration. Learn what you can do to work around the three most common challenges.
Network
Moving data around in the same cloud infrastructure is faster than having that information go across the internet. This means that network bandwidth and latency rates need to be taken into consideration when working with multi-cloud architectures.
If you are using a multi-cloud approach, this bottleneck is unavoidable. Network connectivity is the only way for the various clouds to communicate with one another. Fortunately, your IT team can use the approaches below to keep connectivity issues to a minimum.
- Avoid having large amounts of data stored in one cloud and processed in another. While one cloud storage service might cost less, it is not worth the potential performance issues.
- Compress data before sending it to another cloud.
- If you have workloads that are mirrored across two or more clouds to improve reliability, make sure that each cloud’s instance of the workload can operate independently when not synced. This minimizes data transfer delays that can affect performance.
Monitoring
Recognizing performance and availability problems is difficult when monitoring multiple clouds. Finding a reliable cloud monitoring tool can help you avoid this issue. Most APM solutions are able to support the majority of clouds. This gives organizations multiple options for finding the right monitoring tool.
Nevertheless, efficient performance monitoring for multi-clouds includes ensuring that the tool understands how the cloud’s workload functions. In order to alert you of incoming problems, the monitoring tool needs to recognize that the two workloads are running in different clouds although they are connected and dependent upon each other.
Scaling
One advantage of cloud computing is the ability to scale resources for workloads quickly depending on demand. However, when it is done across multiple clouds, this can be difficult.
While you cannot use Azure’s auto-scaling to scale up AWS components, you can configure autoscaling for each individual cloud. This approach should not require too much effort from your IT team. However, should this approach not work, teams can rely on a universal control plane to manage their multi-clouds. A universal control plane automates the scaling and load-balancing across multiple clouds, eliminating the need to configure each cloud.
Finding the Best Cloud Solution
Learn more about the benefits and challenges of cloud computing and how it pertains to your organization. Check out the Cloud Computing Course Program, which offers 37 self-paced courses focused on various aspects of cloud computing technologies.
Contact an IEEE Content Specialist for more details about getting access to this program for your organization.
Interested in getting the program for yourself? Visit the IEEE Learning Network today.
Resources
Tozzi, Christopher. (25 November 2019). Multicloud Architecture: 3 Common Performance Challenges and Solutions. ITPro Today.
Jen, Miller. (8 November 2019). Multicloud vs. hybrid cloud: What it all means. CIO Dive.
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