Which of the following is the deployment and management service for Azure?

The advent of cloud computing has completely revolutionised the way in which we store and manage critical business data sets. As more and more cloud managed services are being adopted as the standard technology for accessing IT infrastructure, software and hardware, they can also provide greater assistance to businesses who are looking to improve efficiency with regards to cost, performance and productivity.  

Cloud managed services allow businesses to use customised applications managed by the best cloud managed service providers such as Advantage which can seamlessly store data securely in highly secure servers and networks. 

In this article, we will provide you with the different types of cloud services that are available for your business as well as the different ways of deploying the Cloud within your business. 

Types of Cloud Services: IAAS, PAAS, SAAS 

Most cloud computing services fall into three broad categories: infrastructure as a service (IaaS), platform as a service (PaaS) and software as a service (SaaS). 

Knowing which area in the cloud computing stack works best for your business allows you to meet your objectives more smoothly.  

Infrastructure as a service (IaaS)  

The initial phase in the cloud computing stack is IaaS. With IaaS, you rent IT infrastructure, servers, virtual machines, storage, networks and operating systems from a cloud provider on a pay to use basis.  

Platform as a service (PaaS) 

Platform as a service (PaaS) is cloud computing services that supply an on-demand environment for developing, delivering, testing and managing software applications.  The purpose of PaaS is to make it easier for developers to quickly create web or mobile apps without the worries of setting up or managing the underlying infrastructure of servers, storage, network and the database they need for development.  

Software as a service (SaaS)  

Software as a service (SaaS) is a method of delivering software applications over the Internet on demand and typically on a subscription basis. With SaaS, cloud providers host and manage the software application with underlying infrastructure, handle maintenance which includes upgrades and security patching. Users can connect to the allocation over the internet via web browser, phone, PC or tablet.  

Types of deployment   

Public cloud  

Public clouds are owned and operated by a third-party cloud service provider delivering computing resources such as servers and storage over the Internet. Microsoft Azure is a public cloud, with a public cloud all the software, hardware and infrastructure are owned and managed by the cloud provider. The user accesses these services and manages the account using a web browser.  

Private Cloud  

A private cloud refers to cloud computing resources used exclusively by a single business or organisation. A private cloud can be physically located on the company’s data centre on site however some companies also pay third-party service providers to host their private cloud if this is a more attractive option to them. 

Hybrid Cloud  

Hybrid clouds combine public and private clouds, using technology which allows data and applications to be shared between them. Allowing data and applications to move between private clouds and hybrid clouds gives companies more flexibility with their deployment options and use.  

If you are looking to transform the way you work by moving your business to the Cloud with Azure, are looking for a cloud managed service provider to help you on your journey, require additional IT support or wanting to outsource your IT completely, then please give our team of IT experts a call who will be able to discuss your specific needs in greater detail. 

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IaaS

IaaS is on-demand access to cloud-hosted computing infrastructure - servers, storage capacity and networking resources - that customers can provision, configure and use in much the same way as they use on-premises hardware. The difference is that the cloud service provider hosts, manages and maintains the hardware and computing resources in its own data centers. IaaS customers use the hardware via an internet connection, and pay for that use on a subscription or pay-as-you-go basis.

Typically IaaS customers can choose between virtual machines (VMs) hosted on shared physical hardware (the cloud service provider manages virtualization) or bare metal servers on dedicated (unshared) physical hardware. Customers can provision, configure and operate the servers and infrastructure resources via a graphical dashboard, or programmatically through application programming interfaces (APIs).

IaaS can be thought of as the original 'as a service' offering: Every major cloud service provider - Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud, IBM Cloud, Microsoft Azure - began by offering some form of IaaS.

Benefits of IaaS

Compared to traditional IT, IaaS gives customers more flexibility build out computing resources as needed, and to scale them up or down in response to spikes or slow-downs in traffic. IaaS lets customers avoid the up-front expense and overhead of purchasing and maintaining its own on-premises data center. It also eliminates the constant trade-off between the waste of purchasing excess on-premises capacity to accommodate spikes, versus the poor performance or outages that can result from not having enough capacity for unanticipated traffic bursts or growth.

Other benefits of IaaS include:

• Higher availability: With IaaS a company can create redundant servers easily, and even create them in other geographies to ensure availability during local power outages or physical disasters.
  
  
• Lower latency, improved performance: Because  IaaS providers typically operate data centers in multiple geographies, IaaS customers can locate apps and services closer to users to minimize latency and maximize performance.
  
  
• Improved responsiveness: Customers can provision resources in a matter of minutes, test new ideas quickly and quickly roll out new ideas to more users.
  
  
• Comprehensive security: With a high-level of security on-site, at data centers, and via encryption, organizations can often take advantage of more advanced security and protection they could provide if they hosted the cloud infrastructure in-house.
  
  

• Faster access to best-of-breed technology: Cloud providers compete with each other by providing the latest technologies to their users, IaaS customers can take advantage of these technologies much earlier (and at far less cost) than they can implement them on premises.

IaaS use cases

Common uses of IaaS include: 

• Disaster recovery:  Instead of setting up redundant servers in multiple locations, IaaS can deploy its disaster recovery solution to the cloud provider's existing geographically-dispersed infrastructure.
  
  
• Ecommerce:  IaaS is an excellent option for online retailers that frequently see spikes in traffic. The ability to scale up during periods of high demand and high-quality security are essential in today’s 24-7 retail industry. 
  
  
• Internet of Things (IoT), event processing, artificial intelligence (AI): IaaS makes it easier to set up and scale up data storage and computing resources for these and other applications that work with huge volumes of data.
  
  
• Startups: Startups can't afford to sink capital into on-premises IT infrastructure. IaaS gives them access to enterprise-class data center capabilities without the up-front investment in hardware and management overhead.
  
  
• Software development: With IaaS, the infrastructure for testing and development environments can be set up much more quickly than on-premises. (However, this use case is better suited to PaaS, as you'll read in the next section.)

PaaS

PaaS provides a cloud-based platform for developing, running, managing applications.  The cloud services provider hosts, manages and maintains all the hardware and software included in the platform - servers (for development, testing and deployment), operating system (OS) software, storage, networking, databases, middleware, runtimes, frameworks, development tools - as well as related services for security, operating system and software upgrades, backups and more.

Users access the PaaS through a graphical user interface (GUI), where development or DevOps teams can collaborate on all their work across the entire application lifecycle including coding, integration, testing, delivery, deployment, and feedback. 

Examples of PaaS solutions include  AWS Elastic Beanstalk, Google App Engine, Microsoft Windows Azure, and Red Hat OpenShift on IBM Cloud.

Benefits of PaaS

The primary benefit of PaaS  is that it allows customers to build, test, deploy run, update and scale applications more quickly and cost-effectively than they could if they had to build out and manage their own on-premises platform. Other benefits include:

• Faster time to market: PaaS enables development teams to spin-up development, testing and production environments in minutes, vs. weeks or months.
  
  
• Low- to no-risk testing and adoption of new technologies: PaaS platforms typically include access to a wide range of the latest resources up and down the application stack. This allows companies to test new operating systems, languages, and other tools without having to make substantial investments in them, or in the infrastructure required to run them.
  
  
• Simplified collaboration: As a cloud-based service, PaaS provides a shared software development environment, giving development and operations teams access to all the tools they need, from anywhere with an Internet connection.
  
  
• A more scalable approach: With PaaS, organizations can purchase additional capacity for building, testing, staging and running applications whenever they need it.
  
  
• Less to manage: PaaS  offloads infrastructure management, patches, updates and other administrative tasks to the cloud service provider.

PaaS use cases

PaaS can advance a number of development and IT initiatives including:

• API development and management: With its built-in frameworks, PaaS makes it easier for teams to develop, run, manage and secure APIs for sharing data and functionality between applications.
   

• Internet of Things (IoT):  PaaS supports a range of programming languages (Java, Python, Swift, etc.), tools and application environments used for IoT application development and real-time processing of data from IoT devices.
   

• Agile development and DevOps: PaaS solutions typically cover all the requirements of a DevOps toolchain, and provide built-in automation to support continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD).
   

• Cloud-native development and hybrid cloud strategy: PaaS solutions support cloud-native development technologies - microservices, containers, Kubernetes, serverless computing - that enable developers to build once, then deploy and manage consistently across private cloud, public cloud and on-premises environments.

SaaS

SaaS (sometimes called cloud application services) is cloud-hosted, ready-to-use application software. Users pay a monthly or annual fee to use a complete application from within a web browser, desktop client or mobile app. The application and all of the infrastructure required to deliver it - servers, storage, networking, middleware, application software, data storage - are hosted and managed by the SaaS vendor. 

The vendor manages all upgrades and patches to the software, usually invisibly to customers. Typically, the vendor ensures a level of availability, performance and security as part of a service level agreement (SLA). Customers can add more users and data storage on demand at additional cost.

Today, anyone who uses a or mobile phone almost certainly uses some form of SaaS. Email, social media, and cloud file storage solutions (such as Dropbox or Box) are examples of SaaS applications people use every day in their personal lives. Popular business or enterprise SaaS solutions include Salesforce (customer relationship management software), HubSpot (marketing software), Trello (workflow management), Slack (collaboration and messaging), and Canva (graphics). Many applications designed originally for the desktop (e.g., Adobe Creative Suite) are now available as SaaS (e.g., Adobe Creative Cloud).

Benefits of SaaS

The main benefit of SaaS is that it offloads all infrastructure and application management to the SaaS vendor. All the user has to do is create an account, pay the fee and start using the application. The vendor handles everything else, from maintaining the server hardware and software to managing user access and security, storing and managing data, implementing upgrades and patches and more.

Other benefits of SaaS include:

• Minimal risk: Many SaaS products offer a free trial period, or low monthly fees that let customers try the software to see if it will meet their needs, with little or no financial risk.
  
  
• Anytime/anywhere productivity: Users can work with SaaS apps on any device with a browser and an internet connection. 
  
  
• Easy scalability: Adding users is as simple as registering and paying for new seats; customers can purchase more data storage for a nominal charge.

Some SaaS vendors even enable customization of their product by providing a companion PaaS solution. One well-known example is Heroku, a PaaS solution for Salesforce. 

SaaS use cases

Today, just about any personal or employee productivity application is available as SaaS; specific use cases are too numerous to mention (some are listed above). If an end user or organization can find a SaaS solution with the required functionality, in most cases it will provide a significantly simpler, more scalable and more cost-effective alternative to on-premises software.

SaaS vs. PaaS vs. IaaS: management ease vs. control

SaaS, Paas, IaaS are not mutually exclusive; most organizations use more than one, and many larger organizations today use all three, often in combination with traditional IT.

Obviously, the as-a-service solution a customer chooses depends first on the functionality the customer requires, and the expertise it has on staff. For example, an organization without the in-house IT expertise for configuring and operating remote servers isn't well matched to IaaS; an organization without a development team has no need for PaaS. 

But in some cases, any of the three 'as-a-service' models will offer a viable solution. In these cases, organizations typically compare the alternatives based on the management ease they offer, vs. the control they give up. 

For example, suppose a large organization wants to deliver a customer relationship management (CRM) application to its sales team. It could:

• Choose a SaaS CRM solution, offloading all day-to-day management to the third-party vendor, but also giving up all control over features and functionality, data storage, user access and security.
  
  
• Choose a PaaS solution and build a custom CRM application. In this case, the company would offload management of infrastructure and application development resources to the cloud service provider. The customer would retain complete control over application features, but it would also assume responsibility for managing the application and associated data.
  
  
• Build out backend IT infrastructure on the cloud using IaaS, and use it to build its own development platform and application. The organization's IT team would have complete control over operating systems and server configurations, but also bear the burden of managing and maintaining them, along with the development platform and applications that run on them.

IaaS, SaaS, PaaS  and IBM Cloud

IBM has a broad menu of IaaS, PaaS and SaaS offerings to meet your company’s needs up and down the stack. IBM’s rich and scalable PaaS solutions help organizations develop cloud native applications from scratch, or modernize existing applications to benefit from the flexibility and scalability of the cloud. IBM also offers a full IaaS layer of virtualized compute, network, and storage within our full-stack cloud platform, and more than 150 SaaS business applications to help you innovate. 

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