A big machine, once a month
A small firm makes one big sales report on the last day of each month. The report needs a powerful machine for about 40 hours. For the other weeks, the machine would sit still.
Buying it would waste money. Renting it for 40 hours would not. That idea is called the cloud.
Key words
| Word | What it means |
|---|---|
| Cloud | computing you use over the internet, on computers someone else runs |
| Private cloud | a cloud used by one organisation only |
| Public cloud | a cloud owned by a provider and shared by many customers |
| Provider | the company that owns and runs the cloud |
| Elasticity | growing and shrinking quickly to match demand |
| Portability | being able to move work or data to another place |
| Data centre | a building full of servers |
| Server | a powerful computer that other computers ask for things |
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By the end of this lesson
Note
I can compare a private cloud with a public cloud and give four benefits of cloud.
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Private and public clouds
A private cloud is for one organisation. It may sit in the organisation's own data centre, or be a separate part rented from a provider. Only that organisation uses it.
A public cloud belongs to a provider and many customers share it. Each customer's data is kept apart, but the machines are shared. You pay for what you use.
Private cloud compared with public cloud
| Feature | Private cloud | Public cloud |
|---|---|---|
| Who uses it | One organisation | Many customers |
| Control | High, because you set the rules | Less, because the provider sets many rules |
| Cost | High to start and to run | Low to start, then pay as you use |
| Staff needed | Your own skilled team | Much less |
| Growing quickly | Limited by the machines you bought | Very easy |
| Suits | Very sensitive data and strict rules | Most analysis work and shared reports |
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3 questionsYour answers are marked here and are not kept. A college account keeps every student’s marks.