Define Cloud Computing

Cloud computing is the delivery of computing services—including servers, storage, databases, networking, software, analytics, and intelligence—over the Internet ("the cloud") to offer faster innovation, flexible resources, and economies of scale.

Key Characteristics

Cloud computing has several essential characteristics:

• On-demand self-service: Users can provision computing capabilities automatically without human interaction.
• Broad network access: Services are available over the network and accessed through standard mechanisms.
• Resource pooling: Provider's computing resources are pooled to serve multiple consumers.
• Rapid elasticity: Capabilities can be elastically provisioned and released to scale with demand.
• Measured service: Cloud systems automatically control and optimize resource use through metering capabilities.

Service Models

Cloud computing typically falls into three main service models:

1. Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS): Provides virtualized computing resources over the internet.
2. Platform as a Service (PaaS): Provides a platform allowing customers to develop, run, and manage applications.
3. Software as a Service (SaaS): Delivers software applications over the internet, on a subscription basis.

Benefits

The main benefits of cloud computing include:

• Cost savings: Reduce capital expenditure on hardware and software.
• Scalability: Easily scale resources up or down based on demand.
• Flexibility: Access your data and applications from anywhere.
• Disaster recovery: Cloud providers offer robust backup and recovery solutions.

Understanding these fundamentals is crucial for anyone working with cloud technologies, especially when preparing for cloud certification exams.