Speaker: Vijay Tolani - Cloud Solutions Engineer, RightScale Most enterprises see POC projects as an important step in their path to public, private, or hybrid cloud. RightScale cloud experts will share on-the-ground experience from a range of enterprise cloud POCs, including business and technical best practices. You will learn how to set your POC strategy, choose your POC clouds, navigate technical hurdles, and measure success.

1. april25-26
sanfrancisco
cloud success starts here
Tips for a Successful Cloud
Proof-of-Concept
Vijay Tolani, Cloud Solutions Engineer

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Agenda
• State of the Cloud
• Cloud POCs: Dos and Don’ts
• Choosing the Right Cloud(s)
• Choosing the Right Application
• Navigating the Technical Hurdles
• Measure the Success of Your Cloud POC

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Conventional Vendor Evaluation Techniques
• Steering Committees to Determine Requirements
• Analyst Reports for Vendor Selection
• RFPs to Filter Qualified Vendors
• POCs for Qualified Vendors

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Today’s Challenge: Business Expectations Have
Changed
Instant On
Self Service
Unprecedented
Scale
Public &
Private
Cloud
Business Expectations

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And The Technology Is Evolving Quickly
Open Sourced
Goes OpenStackLaunched
Adds Australia
Grizzly Released
Apr Jun Aug Oct Dec Jan Mar
2012 2013
GALaunched
Cloud Services

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And If You’re Not Careful
• You’ll find yourself applying conventional methodologies to
evaluate revolutionary technology:
• By the time Steering Committees determine requirements, needs have
changed
• Information coming from analysts provide point-in-time snapshots, but may
lack real-time feedback
• RFPs ask questions which are too specific to apply to revolutionary
technology
• POCs test for the worst case, while the technology is being built to start
with the simplest use case

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Cloud POCs: Dos and Don’ts

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Pick the right
approach
A learning experience,
not once and done
Cloud POC Mantra

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Pick the Right Approach
• Keep it lightweight
• Start simple
• Keep it short – 30-60 days
• Accept cloud as it is, don’t try to make it into your data center
• Don’t start with the hardest use case
• Decide if the architecture meets the needs of the application, not if it matches
your data center
• Treat it as a learning experience
• It’s not once and done
• Your cloud deployments will evolve
• Your expertise and knowledge will evolve
• Consider how you will manage the application over time

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Cloud POCs: Dos and Don’ts
Choosing a Cloud

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Choosing a Cloud for POCs
• Public & Private Clouds built on same technologies
• OpenStack
• CloudStack
• Private Clouds are good choices for applications which require:
• High Flexibility & Performance
• Increased Security & Compliance
• CapEx Procurement Model
• Public Clouds offer more advanced automation than Private Clouds

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Public Clouds Enable Additional Agility
• “It’s a marathon, not a sprint”
• Don’t sprint directly to the finish line, without training. You’ll hurt
yourself
• Start with something small and show it works
• Start with the simplest application, then test more complex

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Cloud POCs: Dos and Don’ts
Choosing an Application

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Pick the right
application
Cloud is a fit for everyone,
not for every application
Cloud POC Mantra

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Pick the Right Application
• Keep it real
• Pick a real application for a real project with real expectations
• Don’t start with the most complex use case
• Low to moderate security/compliance profile
• Focus on where cloud adds value
• Speed to deploy, scalable, variable load
• Good options for your first deployment in the cloud
• Web Application
• Mobile/Social/Collaboration Apps
• Big Data
• Batch Processing
• Dev/Test solutions

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Clouds Are Different
• … so don’t treat them like a data center in the sky
• Don’t expect to be able to move a VM image to a cloud and have it
work out of the box
• Successful cloud deployments include HA Application Architectures
designed to run on ephemeral, commodity infrastructure
• NoSQL Databases vs. High Performance Hardware

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Cloud POCs: Dos and Don’ts
Navigating Technical Hurdles

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Next Step: Technical POC
• After proving your application can run on a cloud architecture,
consider testing with a Private Cloud
• Test for Performance
• Ensure Security & Compliance
• Integration with Existing ITSM Processes
• Consider Including More Complex Workloads

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Technical Pitfalls to Watch Out For
• Storage Performance
• Consider Striping, Sharding, & NoSQL Architectures
• Shared Storage
• Consider OpenNFS
• Software Licensing
• Consider Licensing through the MultiCloud Marketplace
• Network Flexibility
• Consider Dynamic DNS
• Security & Compliance
• Design for Public Clouds

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Cloud POCs: Dos and Don’ts
Metrics for Success

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Pick the right
metrics
Begin your cloud journey
with
the end in mind
Cloud POC Mantra

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Cloud POC Success Metric #1
Business Agility
How quickly can
cloud help us
respond to business
needs and
opportunities?
Business
Opportunity
Market Window
Time to Market
$£¥€
✖
Shadow IT

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Evaluation Criteria
• Speed/Ease to:
• Launch new applications or services
• Scale applications or services up or down to meet demand
• Offer services in new geographies
• Self-service IT
• Give control to business users
• Give control to developers
• Automation
• Automate routine work for Operations

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Cloud POC Success Metric #2
Improve Efficiency
Can cloud make us
more efficient with
time and money?

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Evaluation Criteria
• Costs
• Data Center vs Cloud costs
• CapEx vs OpEx
• Opportunity costs?
• Time
• Time to plan/prepare applications or services
• Time to deploy applications or services
• Time to manage applications or services

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Cloud POC Success Metric #3
Better Solutions
Can cloud helps us
deliver better
solutions that meet
customer needs?

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Evaluation Criteria
• Can I support new solutions that were difficult before?
• Web
• Mobile
• Social
• Gaming
• Big Data
• Batch Processing
• Can I support better solutions?
• Geographically Available
• Highly Scalable
• Highly Available

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Summary
• Start with a real application that’s a good fit for cloud
• Treat it as a learning experience
• Use public cloud to evaluate the feasibility of cloud
• Then build a private cloud
• Leverage the strength of cloud – don’t try to recreate your data
center
• Measure success based on broad business goals
• Agility
• Efficiency
• Better solutions

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Thinking about a Cloud POC?
• Ask about a Cloud Strategy Briefing
• Personalized briefing from the cloud experts for your IT executives and managers:
• Real-World Cloud Trends
• Strategic Opportunities in the Cloud
• 5 Technical Considerations for Cloud
• Best Practices for Cloud POCs
Contact RightScale
(866) 720-0208
sales@rightscale.com
www.rightscale.com

30. april25-26
sanfrancisco
cloud success starts here
Questions?