Cloud Monitoring: Why is it important?
With the rise of cloud computing has come the need for cloud monitoring – that is, the continuous monitoring and management of cloud-based IT assets, architecture, and infrastructure to ensure optimal availability and maximum security. There are numerous cloud marketing solutions and services on the market today, as well as a variety of techniques – both manual and automated – to support cloud performance.
What is Cloud Monitoring?
Cloud monitoring assesses the elements of cloud performance for cloud systems and vendor services. Using various metrics and methodologies, organizations performing cloud monitoring try to ensure that systems are providing benchmark levels of access and desired outcomes.
In a world where organizations are increasingly using the cloud, it is extremely crucial. It allows administrators to ensure that the cloud-based system remains highly available by constantly measuring vital metrics.
How does it work?
Ideally, cloud monitoring works in real-time alongside its on-premises and hybrid counterparts. This helps improve visibility across the entire environment, including storage, networks, and apps. Key capabilities include tracking the consumption and traffic of cloud-hosted resources.
Also included, and critical to cloud monitoring is the ability to measure and visualize application and network-layer performance between hybrid, private, and public cloud services. These tools are important for unifying large volumes of data across distributed locations, identifying anomalies and their root causes, and predicting potential risks or production outages.
Some benefits
- They already have infrastructure and configurations in place. Installation is quick and easy.
- Dedicated tools are maintained by the host. That includes hardware.
- These solutions are built for organizations of various sizes. So if cloud activity increases, the right monitoring tool can scale seamlessly.
- Subscription-based solutions can keep costs low. They do not require startup or infrastructure expenditures, and maintenance costs are spread among multiple users.
- Because the resources are not part of the organization’s servers and workstations, they don’t suffer interruptions when local problems disrupt the organization.
- Many tools can be used on multiple types of devices — desktop computers, tablets, and phones. This allows organizations to monitor apps and services from any location with Internet access.
Types of Cloud Monitoring
The cloud has numerous moving components, and for top performance, it’s critical to safeguard that everything comes together seamlessly. This need has led to a variety of monitoring techniques to fit the type of outcome that a user wants. The main types are:
Database monitoring
Because most cloud applications rely on databases, this technique reviews processes, queries, availability, and consumption of cloud database resources. This technique can also track queries and data integrity, monitoring connections to show real-time usage data. For security purposes, access requests can be tracked as well. For example, an uptime detector can alert if there’s database instability and can help improve resolution response time from the precise moment that a database goes down.
Website monitoring
This refers to the process by which technicians monitor traffic, availability, resource utilization, and other key performance metrics across cloud-hosted websites to ensure optimal uptime and functionality.
Virtual machine monitoring
Virtual machine monitoring is most commonly used as part of the IaaS model, often incorporating a virtual server hosting multiple virtual desktops. This form of cloud server monitoring charts traffic and users, along with the infrastructure and status of every associated virtual machine. This type not only offers the benefits of cloud-based monitoring but also fills the role of IT infrastructure monitoring for virtual desktops.
Cloud storage monitoring
Cloud monitoring for cloud storage applications is capable of tracking a range of analytes simultaneously. Often used in hosting Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Software as a Service (SaaS), cloud storage monitoring charts available storage, user actions, processes, and various performance metrics.
Virtual network monitoring
For cloud network monitoring, technicians keep a watchful eye on the connectivity and operational health of the network components to ensure that virtual networks aren’t overwhelmed with traffic and that vital connections don’t go offline. This type of cloud monitoring is often performed by a network operations center.
In public, private, and hybrid clouds
A private cloud gives you extensive control and visibility. Because systems and the software stack are fully accessible, cloud monitoring is relaxed when it’s operated in a private cloud. Monitoring in public or hybrid clouds, however, can be tough. Let’s review the focal points:
- Because the data exists between private and public clouds, a hybrid cloud environment presents curious challenges. Limited security and compliance create problems for data access. Your administrator can solve these issues by deciding which data to store in various clouds and which data to asynchronously update.
- A private cloud gives you more control, but to promote optimal performance, it’s still wise to monitor workloads. Without a clear picture of workload and network performance, it’s nearly impossible to justify configuration or architectural changes or to quantify quality-of-service implementations.
Conclusion
Cloud monitoring refers to the process of controlling and optimizing an organization’s cloud infrastructure. Using various metrics and methodologies, organizations performing cloud monitoring try to ensure that systems are providing benchmark levels of access and desired outcomes. Similar to other systems, the cloud also needs to be monitored to be used effectively and deliver expected results.