Cloud microservices make their play

Leading Federal Integrators Address Tactical Cloud Computing

By G C Network | October 7, 2009

Yesterday during the first annual Government IT Conference and Expo, tactical cloud computing was cited as a critical component within this new paradigm. Joining me to address the issue were:…

Carpathia Creates Government Solutions Business Unit

By G C Network | October 6, 2009

In a strong statement of focus, Carpathia Hosting has announced the formation of Carpathia Government Solutions, a unit dedicated to providing solutions specifically for federal civilian and defense agencies. This…

INPUT FedFocus 2010

By G C Network | September 30, 2009

Please join me at the 7th Annual FedFocus Conference, November 5, 2009, at the Ritz Carlton in McLean, VA. This conference has been designed to provide crucial information on upcoming…

Dataline, Lockheed Martin, SAIC, Unisys on Tactical Cloud Computing

By G C Network | September 25, 2009

I’m proud to announce that representatives from Lockheed Martin, SAIC, and Unisys will join me in a Tactical Cloud Computing “Power Panel” at SYS-CON’s 1st Annual Government IT Conference &…

GSA, DoD and NCOIC to Collaborate on Government Cloud Computing

By G C Network | September 22, 2009

Yesterday, during the NCOIC Cloud Computing Workshop, collaboration seemed to be the focus as Katie Lewin, GSA Cloud Computing Initiative Program manager, and Dan Risacher, DoD Cloud Computing Storefront project…

FederalNewsRadio Highlights Government Cloud Computing

By G C Network | September 20, 2009

Last week’s Apps.gov announcement was the latest steps in the government’s “at the quick step” march into cloud computing. FederalNewsRadio, a Washington metro area media fixture, highlighted the event with…

NCOIC Officially Launches Cloud Computing Working Group

By G C Network | September 14, 2009

On Wednesday, 9 September 2009 the Network Centric Operations Industry Consortium (NCOIC) Technical Council formally approved the creation of a Cloud Computing Working Group (CCWG). Organizationally this new working group…

1 Billion Mobile Cloud Computing Subscribers !!

By G C Network | September 10, 2009

Yes. That’s what I said! A recent EDL Consulting article cites the rising popularity of smartphones and other advanced mobile devices as the driving force behind a skyrocketing mobile cloud…

NCOIC Holding Full-Day Cloud Computing Workshop

By G C Network | September 4, 2009

The Network Centric Operations Industry Consortium will be holding an all day Cloud Computing Workshop on September 21, 2009 in Fairfax, VA. Open to the public, this workshop will focus…

Pentagon Reviews Unisys Stealth

By G C Network | August 31, 2009

According to a Newtworkworld.com article, the United States Joint Forces Command (USJFC) is currently evaluating Unisys Stealth technology at the Joint Transformation Command for Intelligence (JTC-I) in Suffolk, Virginia. “Unisys…

 by Kevin L. Jackson

Cloud computing seems destined to be the way enterprises will use information technology. The drastic cost reductions and impressive operational improvements make the transition an unstoppable trend. The “What is cloud computing?” question now, however, seems to be morphing into “Where is cloud computing going?”

While software-as-a-service (SaaS) providers see their market rocketing upward as the easiest and quickest path for cloud adoption, infrastructure-as-a-service providers are suffering as their high-capital-cost commodity business transitions to a profit margin race to the bottom. This unsettling paradox, driven by increased competition between major infrastructure players, portends a near-term shakeout as smaller players either fail, exit or get gobbled up.

Cloud services brokerage, still struggling to be even recognized as a real market, is being seriously threatened by open-source approaches from giants like Booz Allen Hamilton’s Jellyfish and the European Commission-funded CompatibleOne open-source broker. So what about platform-as-a-service? Seen by some as the most profitable segment, this also seems to be where most of the confusion resides. Unfortunately PaaS is still struggling to deliver on the promise of universal software interoperability. So what’s next? With all due deference to Mr. McGuire in “The Graduate,” two words: microservice architecture.

Microservice architecture, or simply microservices, is a new software development method that is, for many developers, rapidly becoming a preferred way of creating enterprise applications. Because of its scalability, this architectural method is considered ideal when there is a need to enable support for a range of platforms and devices — spanning web, mobile, the “Internet-of-Things,” and wearables.

Although no standard, formal definition of microservices exists, it is generally characterized as a method of developing software applications that uses a suite of independently deployable, small, modular services in which each service runs a unique process and communicates through a well-defined, lightweight mechanism. How the services communicate with each other depends on your application’s requirements, but many use HTTP/REST with JSON or Protobuf.
Microservices architecture contrasts with the traditional monolithic development styles in that the latter approach is always built as a single, autonomous unit. In a client-server model, the server-side application is a monolith that handles the HTTP requests, executes logic, and retrieves/updates the data in the underlying database. The challenge with this approach is that all change cycles usually end up being tied to one another. Microservices are also better aligned with more modern agile software development approaches.

Dell, traditionally an infrastructure company, is even noticing the importance of this trend. On this, the observation of James Thomason, CTO of Dell Cloud Marketplace, is of note:

Already, Docker (and others) are working on various new forms of service discovery, in order to solve the infrastructure dependency injection problem, and consequently the “awareness” of dependencies between application components on different servers and infrastructure.

The recent love affair with infrastructure containers like Docker and VMware’s surprising investment in Linux containers through the release of Photon has now opened the door for a rapid adoption of microservices and the isolation of containers to one process or service.

This containerization of single services or processes makes it very simple to manage and update these services. Therefore, it’s not surprising that the emergence of frameworks for managing more complex scenarios will be next. Open-source projects like Kubernetes, Maestro-ng and Mesos are now springing up to answer this need. Stay tuned.

(This post was written as part of the Dell Insight Partners program, which provides news and analysis about the evolving world of tech. For more on these topics, visit Dell’s thought leadership site PowerMore. Dell sponsored this article, but the opinions are my own and don’t necessarily represent Dell’s positions or strategies.)

Cloud Musings

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