Cloud data warehouses – services that provide the ability to store their files on remote servers, as well as to access them from anywhere in the world where there is access to the Internet. In the conditions of rapidly growing volumes of stored and transmitted information, these services have become popular and in demand by users.
Sharing a photo with a friend, accessing a book on several devices at the same time, backing up important information in case of loss or failure of a flash drive or hard drive, as well as performing any other actions with information and data thanks to cloud technologies has become more convenient.
Cloud data warehousing has also found application in various companies. Today, because of rapidly evolving technologies, information is the main tool for companies to compete for its place. It is impossible to make any adequate, timely, and successful management decisions without knowing the issue at hand.
Every day, a large amount of information appears in the company, which is necessary for decision-making. It accumulates in various sources and storages, turning into the experience of the enterprise. Every year this information becomes more and more and, accordingly, the need for computing power for storing and processing of such amount of data increases, which leads to large expenditures of time, money, human and other resources.
Therefore, cloud technologies are increasingly used in many sectors of the economy, and even in such an insufficiently automated area of the economy of the Russian Federation as housing and communal services.
Cloud computing is a new approach that allows to reduce the complexity of IT-systems due to the use of a wide range of effective technologies. Moving to the “clouds”, enterprises can get a lot of advantages, including reduction of IT costs, improvement of the quality of service provision and business agility.
“Cloud” helps employees to focus on the company’s strategic projects rather than on routine tasks, such as managing their own data centers.
Types of “clouds”
There are 3 deployment models – private, public and hybrid clouds. Below is a brief description and main characteristics of these types.
Private clouds are designed to be used within a company. It can be owned by the organization itself or hosted by the provider. This deployment model provides more control and a higher level of security by keeping infrastructure components and customers within the same organization.
Everything is optimally tailored to the needs of the company. However, this approach to IT infrastructure involves significant material, financial and human resource costs. Deploying it on its own territory, the company will significantly spend on the purchase of hardware and software, to pay for the appropriate IT staff and administration.
The public “cloud” is provided by the provider of these services and can, unlike the private one, be freely used by the general public (e.g., Google Disk, Cloud Mail.ru). When such an IT infrastructure is located on a supplier’s premises, it saves on hardware and software costs, as in the case of a private cloud, and their maintenance.
Only the Internet is needed to access services. Companies also benefit from this deployment model because the downtime risks associated with server failures disappear. Powerful and qualitative equipment of the provider is always under the control of the qualified personnel. The disadvantage of the public “cloud” in the first place is the lack of control on the part of the customer services.
Low performance, data transfer rate and weak data security will also not attract a serious company to sign a contract with the provider of such services. Mainly, these “clouds” are designed for private use – file exchange, sending messages.
Hybrid clouds combine the infrastructures of the above models. Providers provide part of the service as a private cloud and part as a public cloud. This combination allows you to save on the organization of your own infrastructure, but at the same time get control and a high level of security.
At the moment there are a lot of cloud data warehouses [8], each of which offers a certain set of functions and, of course, has its own advantages and disadvantages.
Of course, the main advantage and distinctive feature of cloud data warehouses, any model of deployment, is the ability to access data from any device that has access to the Internet.
Users have the ability to publish their files, share them, edit them, browse the browser. Cloud service also stores the history of file changes. They also have the ability to synchronize folders between devices – personal computer, smartphone, tablet, etc.
Cloud storages allow you to share a file for viewing or editing by assigning a certain number of persons to it. Data security is guaranteed by the cloud provider’s use of backup disks with file copies.
Encryption of user data is used to protect user data from being viewed by third parties. Depending on the service, the key can be stored on the server side or on the user side. In the first case, the system ensures the confidentiality of the key and data, decrypting them for the user.
In the second case the protected data can be decrypted only by the user or by the one to whom the user personally will transfer the key. However at loss of this key the user will appear without possibility of their decoding.
Also cloud storage services can give means for developers and interfaces of applied programming (API). Such tools are used in the development of third-party services and corporate applications that use the space and functions of the existing cloud data warehouse.
