One of the recent trends in cloud computing is the tendency for enterprises to use multiple clouds, either to take advantage of unique offerings per cloud vendor or to hedge their bets. Creating a data tier that spans multiple clouds is a key consideration in these architectures. Apache Cassandra is an ideal technology for the multi-cloud data tier due to its flexibility and resilience. In this talk we’ll discuss the challenges you’ll face in developing the data tier of multi-cloud applications, provide recommendations on how to address these challenges with Cassandra, and show how we created a sample application to demonstrate these recommendations in practice.

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Deploying Cassandra in
Multi-Cloud
Jeff Carpenter

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3. @jscarp
Got Consoles?
© DataStax, All Rights Reserved.3

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Why multi-cloud?
• Data center locality
• Provider-specific services
• Cloud provider competition
• Cost
Key question: Unique workloads, or same workload?
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Challenges
• General: complexity, terminology
naming, observability
• Networking: routing, load balancing,
reliability, latency
• Application / Service Tier: scaling,
managing state, caching
• Database Tier: legal / policy
compliance,
• Security: identity management,
boundary protection, encryption,
auditing
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KillrVideo – a video sharing application
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https://github.com/KillrVideo
https://killrvideo.github.io
http://killrvideo.com

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KillrVideo Architecture
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KillrVideo
Services
Your
Browser
Web
Application
Technology Choices
• Node.js
• Falcor
• Java / C# / Node.js
• GRPC
• Etcd
• DataStax Drivers
• DataStax Enterprise
including Apache
Cassandra & Spark,
Graph
Deployment
• Download and run locally
via Docker
• Deployed in AWS using
DataStax Managed
Cloud:
http://killrvideo.com/

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WEB
WEB Client
static RenderUI States Requests
bootstrap React Redux Falcor
WEB Server
Incoming
requests
Falcor Router
HTTP
request
Service
requests
Service
Registry
Service TIER (x3)
CASSANDRA
Microservices
(Service
requests)
9091
generator
SEARCH
GRAPH
ANALYTICS
DRIVERS
9042
2379
registrator
Express grpc
3000
8899

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OREGON (US-WEST-2)
www.killrvideo.com
Killrvideo-gilardi-default
Killrvideo-dev application
(vpc-7ddc1e18)
Killrvideo-prod
application
us-west-2a us-west-2b us-west-2c
KillrVideo on Amazon overview
Killrvideo-web-2Killrvideo-web-1
KillrVideo-web studio KillrVideo-web studio
killrvideo-devkillrvideo-prod
Dse_cassansdra
Killrvideo-server-A
Killrvideo-server-A Killrvideo-server-A
KillrVideo-server studio KillrVideo-server studio KillrVideo-server studio
ELB
Killrvideo-dev
ELB
Killrvideo-prod
Ops
Center
Ops
Center
Ops
Center
Ops
Center DSE DSE. DSE DSE DSE DSE

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DataStax Managed Cloud
• DSE on public cloud (AWS, Azure) for
production workloads
• 24x7x365 coverage, lights-out
management
• System configuration and tuning to meet
your-specific requirements
• Architecture advisory services,
guidance, and best practices
• Focus on business innovation and
accelerate time-to-market
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DataStax Management and Hosting Options
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OpsCenter DataStax Cloud
Self-Managed
And Hosted
DataStax Managed
And Hosted

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AWS Azure GCP
Desired End State
• Three clouds: AWS, Azure, GCP
• One DC per cloud
• Full stack available in each DC
• Same data in each DC
• Secure network between DCs
• Independent web / application tiers
per DC
• Interactions only at the database
tier
© DataStax, All Rights Reserved.15
Services
Client
Web

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Application Tier Considerations
• Things to consider
– Deployment
– Orchestration
– Scheduling
– Service discovery and routing
– Distributed tracing
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• KillrVideo Multi-Cloud Prototype
– Manual creation of compute
– Manual provisioning
– Etcd for service discovery
• Desired end state
– Service mesh (Istio, Envoy)
– Terraform
– Kubernetes
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Database Tier Considerations
• Things to consider
– Snitch, topology, seed nodes
– Keyspace replication strategies
– Security best practices
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• KillrVideo Multi-Cloud Prototype
– GossipingPropertyFileSnitch
– NetworkTopologyStrategy (RF=3 per DC)
– Automated creation of new admin/user
accounts
– Node-to-node encryption
• Things we may still explore
– Kubernetes operator for C* / DSE
– Managing data locality
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Security and Network Considerations
• Things to consider
– Networking across data centers
• Latency
• Access control
• Encryption
• Which tiers?
– Privacy and data locality compliance
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• KillrVideo Multi-Cloud Prototype
– Public IPs for prototype
• Not for production
• Desired End State
– Private networks between clouds
– 3rd party load balancer
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KillrVideo Roadmap
• (loosely) Multi-cloud related
– Service packaging (separate
processes)
– Service discovery /
communications (Envoy, Istio)
– Kubernetes (of course)
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• Other Stuff
– Customer 360 extension
– Streaming (Kafka)
– CI/CD Automation
– Distributed Tracing
– Improved Metrics
– Analytics (virtual DC)
– Python service implementations
– GraphQL API / client
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22. @jscarp
Recommendations and Best Practices
• Orchestration / Scheduling ➡️ Kubernetes for application tier, maybe
for data tier
• Application / service tier ➡️ Push state to the data tier
• Data tier ➡️ Apache Cassandra / DataStax Enterprise for cross-cloud
replication and scaling
• Automate deployment ➡️ Terraform, etc.
© DataStax, All Rights Reserved.22

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Talking Multi-Cloud on the Distributed Data Show
• Episode 56: Multi-Cloud: The What
& Why
• Episode 57: Multi-Cloud Challenges
• Episode 58: Multi-Cloud Networking
© DataStax, All Rights Reserved.
• Episode 59: Multi-Cloud State
Management
• Episode 60 / 61: Multi-Cloud
Security and Compliance
23
https://www.youtube.com/datastaxacademy

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Credits and Advertisements
• Thanks for help from
– Adron Hall @Adron
– David Gilardi @SonicDMG
– Justin Breese @justinbreese
– Cedrick Lunven @clunven
– Patrick McFadin @PatrickMcFadin
– Amanda Moran @AmandaDataStax
– Hannah Aubry @DataStaxAcademy
© DataStax, All Rights Reserved.24