The complete guide to provisioning and managing cloud-based Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) data center solutions Cloud computing will revolutionize the way IT resources are deployed, configured, and managed for years to come. Service providers and customers each stand to realize tremendous value from this paradigm shift--if they can take advantage of it. Cloud Computing brings together the realistic, start-to-finish guidance they need to plan, implement, and manage cloud solution architectures for tomorrow's virtualized data centers. It introduces cloud "newcomers" to essential concepts, and offers experienced operations professionals detailed guidance on delivering Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS), and Software as a Service (SaaS). This book's replicable solutions and fully-tested best practices will help enterprises, service providers, consultants, and Cisco partners meet the challenge of provisioning end-to-end cloud infrastructures. Drawing on extensive experience working with leading cloud vendors and integrators, the authors present detailed operations workflow examples, proven techniques for operating cloud-based network, compute, and storage infrastructure; a comprehensive management reference architecture; and a complete case study demonstrating rapid, lower-cost solutions design. Cloud Computing will be an indispensable resource for all network/IT professionals and managers involved with planning, implementing, or managing the next generation of cloud computing services. Venkata (Josh) Josyula, Ph.D., CCIE(R) No. 13518 is a Distinguished Services Engineer in Cisco Services Technology Group (CSTG) and advises Cisco customers on OSS/BSS architecture and solutions. Malcolm Orr, Solutions Architect for Cisco's Services Technology Solutions, advises telecoms and enterprise clients on architecting, building, and operating OSS/BSS and cloud management stacks. He is Cisco's lead architect for several Tier 1 public cloud projects. Greg Page has spent the last eleven years with Cisco in technical consulting roles relating to data center architecture/technology and service provider security. He is now exclusively focused on developing cloud/IaaS solutions with service providers and systems integrator partners. - Review the key concepts needed to successfully deploy clouds and cloud-based services - Transition common enterprise design patterns and use cases to the cloud - Master architectural principles and infrastructure designs for "real-time" managed IT services - Understand the Cisco approach to cloud-related technologies, systems, and services - Develop a cloud management architecture using ITIL, TMF, and ITU-TMN standards - Implement best practices for cloud service provisioning, activation, and management - Automate cloud infrastructure to simplify service delivery, monitoring, and assurance - Choose and implement the right billing/chargeback approaches for your business - Design and build IaaS services, from start to finish - Manage the unique capacity challenges associated with sporadic, real-time demand - Provide a consistent and optimal cloud user experience This book is part of the Networking Technology Series from Cisco Press(R), which offers networking professionals valuable information for constructing efficient networks, understanding new technologies, and building successful careers. Category: Cloud Computing Covers: Virtualized Data Centers

Manage, operate, and integrate existing infrastructure in hybrid and multicloud environments Hybrid cloud adoption is accelerating, as companies discover that hybrid cloud architectures can reduce hosting costs, improve agility, promote scalability, accelerate deployment, and enhance security. Cisco Cloud Infrastructure is the definitive reference for every IT professional, IT manager, and CIO who needs to understand, implement, or manage Cisco hybrid cloud solutions for networking, compute, storage, applications, or security. Bringing together crucial information, a team of leading Cisco architects present end-to-end insights for seamlessly integrating management and operation of public cloud resources and on-premises deployments. The authors describe each Cisco solution and offering in detail, from both technical and business viewpoints. They review each leading deployment option, reviewing key concepts, best practices, guidelines, tradeoffs, design do's and don'ts, case studies, and more. Cisco Cloud Infrastructure contains many configuration examples--including topologies, configuration, and verification--each based on actual Cisco Cloud deployments, and specifically designed to help you drive value faster. Use Cisco data center orchestration software to automate tasks and operations, and enable an agile DevOps approach to continual improvement Gain big-picture insights and actionable drill-down data from the Cisco API-driven monitoring and assurance solutions Optimize workloads across clouds, on-premises data centers, labs, and co-location facilities for scale, performance, agility, and value Use AppDynamics enterprise-grade performance cloud monitoring and analytics tools to identify issues and overcome growth challenges Efficiently manage modern workloads with Intersight Workload Optimization Manager, Cisco Container Platform, and Intersight Kubernetes Service (IKS) Manage interdependencies between networks, compute, storage, application, and security in hybrid cloud environments Take advantage of Cisco Cloud Webex to improve collaboration in hybrid/multicloud environments Integrate operational hardware with the Internet of Things (IoT) to gain deeper insight for greater efficiency Protect users, data, and applications everywhere with Cloudlock, Umbrella, Cloud Analytics, Duo, and API-based integrations

Designing Networks and Services for the Cloud Delivering business-grade cloud applications and services A rapid, easy-to-understand approach to delivering a secure, resilient, easy-to-manage, SLA-driven cloud experience Designing Networks and Services for the Cloud helps you understand the design and architecture of networks and network services that enable the delivery of business-grade cloud services. Drawing on more than 40 years of experience in network and cloud design, validation, and deployment, the authors demonstrate how networks spanning from the Enterprise branch/HQ and the service provider Next-Generation Networks (NGN) to the data center fabric play a key role in addressing the primary inhibitors to cloud adoption–security, performance, and management complexity. The authors first review how virtualized infrastructure lays the foundation for the delivery of cloud services before delving into a primer on clouds, including the management of cloud services. Next, they explore key factors that inhibit enterprises from moving their core workloads to the cloud, and how advanced networks and network services can help businesses migrate to the cloud with confidence. You’ll find an in-depth look at data center networks, including virtualization-aware networks, virtual network services, and service overlays. The elements of security in this virtual, fluid environment are discussed, along with techniques for optimizing and accelerating the service delivery. The book dives deeply into cloud-aware service provider NGNs and their role in flexibly connecting distributed cloud resources, ensuring the security of provider and tenant resources, and enabling the optimal placement of cloud services. The role of Enterprise networks as a critical control point for securely and cost-effectively connecting to high-performance cloud services is explored in detail before various parts of the network finally come together in the definition and delivery of end-to-end cloud SLAs. At the end of the journey, you preview the exciting future of clouds and network services, along with the major upcoming trends. If you are a technical professional or manager who must design, implement, or operate cloud or NGN solutions in enterprise or service-provider environments, this guide will be an indispensable resource. * Understand how virtualized data-center infrastructure lays the groundwork for cloud-based services * Move from distributed virtualization to “IT-as-a-service” via automated self-service portals * Classify cloud services and deployment models, and understand the actors in the cloud ecosystem * Review the elements, requirements, challenges, and opportunities associated with network services in the cloud * Optimize data centers via network segmentation, virtualization-aware networks, virtual network services, and service overlays * Systematically secure cloud services * Optimize service and application performance * Plan and implement NGN infrastructure to support and accelerate cloud services * Successfully connect enterprises to the cloud * Define and deliver on end-to-end cloud SLAs * Preview the future of cloud and network services

The definitive guide to UCS and the Cisco® Data Center Server: planning, architecture, components, deployment, and benefits With its new Unified Computing System (UCS) family of products, Cisco has introduced a fundamentally new vision for data center computing: one that reduces ownership cost, improves agility, and radically simplifies management. In this book, three Cisco insiders thoroughly explain UCS, and offer practical insights for IT professionals and decision-makers who are evaluating or implementing it. The authors establish the context for UCS by discussing the implications of virtualization, unified I/O, large memories and other key technologies, and showing how trends like cloud computing and green IT will drive the next-generation data center. Next, they take a closer look at the evolution of server CPU, memory, and I/O subsystems, covering advances such as the Intel® XEON® 5500, 5600, 7500, DDR3 memory, and unified I/O over 10 Gbps Ethernet. Building on these fundamentals, the authors then discuss UCS in detail, showing how it systematically overcomes key limitations of current data center environments. They review UCS features, components, and architecture, and demonstrate how it can improve data center performance, reliability, simplicity, flexibility, and energy efficiency. Along the way, they offer realistic planning, installation, and migration guidance: everything decision-makers and technical implementers need to gain maximum value from UCS–now, and for years to come. Silvano Gai has spent 11 years as Cisco Fellow, architecting Catalyst®, MDS, and Nexus switches. He has written several books on networking, written multiple Internet Drafts and RFCs, and is responsible for 80 patents and applications. He teaches a course on this book’s topics at Stanford University. Tommi Salli, Cisco Technical Marketing Engineer, has nearly 20 years of experience with servers and applications at Cisco, Sun, VERITAS, and Nuova Systems. Roger Andersson, Cisco Manager, Technical Marketing, spent more than 12 years in the CLARiiON® Engineering Division at EMC, and 5 years as Technical Product Manager at VERITAS/Symantec. He is now focused on Cisco UCS system management. Streamline data centers with UCS to systematically reduce cost of ownership Eliminate unnecessary server components–and their setup, management, power, cooling, and cabling Use UCS to scale service delivery, simplify service movement, and improve agility Review the latest advances in processor, memory, I/O, and virtualization architectures for data center servers Understand the specific technical advantages of UCS Integrate UCS 6100 Fabric Interconnect, Cisco UCS 2100 Series Fabric Extenders, UCS 5100 Series Blade Server Enclosures, UCS B-Series Blade Servers, UCS C-Series Rack Servers, and UCS Adapters Use Cisco UCS Manager to manage all Cisco UCS components as a single, seamless entity Integrate third-party management tools from companies like BMC ®, CA ®, EMC ®, IBM ®, Microsoft ®, and VMware ® Practice all this with a copy of Cisco Unified Computing SystemTM Platform Emulator Lite (UCSPE Lite) on the DVD in the back of the book This book is part of the Networking Technology Series from Cisco Press®, which offers networking professionals valuable information for constructing efficient networks, understanding new technologies, and building successful careers.

Use policies and Cisco® ACI to make data centers more flexible and configurable--and deliver far more business value Using the policy driven data center approach, networking professionals can accelerate and simplify changes to the data center, construction of cloud infrastructure, and delivery of new applications. As you improve data center flexibility, agility, and portability, you can deliver far more business value, far more rapidly. In this guide, Cisco data center experts Lucien Avramov and Maurizio Portolani show how to achieve all these benefits with Cisco Application Centric Infrastructure (ACI) and technologies such as python, REST, and OpenStack. The authors explain the advantages, architecture, theory, concepts, and methodology of the policy driven data center. Next, they demonstrate the use of python scripts and REST to automate network management and simplify customization in ACI environments. Drawing on experience deploying ACI in enterprise data centers, the authors review design considerations and implementation methodologies. You will find design considerations for virtualized datacenters, high performance computing, ultra-low latency environments, and large-scale data centers. The authors walk through building multi-hypervisor and bare-metal infrastructures, demonstrate service integration, and introduce advanced telemetry capabilities for troubleshooting. Leverage the architectural and management innovations built into Cisco® Application Centric Infrastructure (ACI) Understand the policy driven data center model Use policies to meet the network performance and design requirements of modern data center and cloud environments Quickly map hardware and software capabilities to application deployments using graphical tools--or programmatically, via the Cisco APIC API Increase application velocity: reduce the time needed to move applications into production Define workload connectivity instead of (or along with) subnets, VLAN stitching, and ACLs Use Python scripts and REST to automate policy changes, parsing, customization, and self-service Design policy-driven data centers that support hypervisors Integrate OpenStack via the Cisco ACI APIC OpenStack driver architecture Master all facets of building and operating multipurpose cloud architectures with ACI Configure ACI fabric topology as an infrastructure or tenant administrator Insert Layer 4-Layer 7 functions using service graphs Leverage centralized telemetry to optimize performance; find and resolve problems Understand and familiarize yourself with the paradigms of programmable policy driven networks

This book describes cloud computing as a service that is "highly scalable" and operates in "a resilient environment". The authors emphasize architectural layers and models - but also business and security factors.