The promise of cloud computing is to reduce the cost and make the system scalable, robust and decreasing operational expenses by allowing organizations to buy only those resources that are necessary and when they are needed.
It is very important to remember that you must be very clear with your cloud migration strategy and compelling business reasons to move to the cloud otherwise, the cost of migration and efforts of your team will be completely wasted and no desired results will be achieved.
Cloud Computing Migration Framework
Moving applications and data is a multi-step process and is not much different from traditional cross-platform application migration. Cloud migration framework can be explained in five steps:
- Analysis
- Planning
- Implementing Cloud Migration
- Optimizing the Target Environment
- Final Testing of all resources
Analysis
In this stage, various methods like a manual and automated collection of data tools help in conducting requirement workshops with stakeholders to get proper data for analysis. There can be a complete analysis of system and workloads. For example, will the workload run in the targeted cloud environment? There can be issues related to infrastructure, middleware and choosing correct operating system.
Will target cloud environment is capable enough to comply with application security, regulatory requirements, and privacy?
The analysis phase takes time and the outcome of this phase is generally identification of workloads like web serving, web applications, data warehouse, ERP, SCM, and analytics.
Your system must be scalable and robust with a proper security of data stored in the cloud.
Planning
In this step, there is detailed designing and planning of the target environment which includes disk storage, processor, and memory. The planning phase of cloud migration framework includes taking key decisions on architectural and hardware sizing after studying patterns of utilization.
Implementation
In the implementation phase, there are three scenarios depending upon the workload considered and type of target cloud environment chosen (Public Cloud, Private Cloud, Hybrid Cloud).
- Like for Like Migration
- Cross-Platform Migration
- Application Only Migration
Tuning the Target Migration
After the customer’s existing instances are successfully migrated to the cloud environment successfully, these instances have to go through adjustment stage of configuration.
Some of these include applying operating system level security patches, security policy, and regular requirements, IP address changes.
Testing and Implementation
After above four steps are completed, it’s time for the final phase i.e testing. In this stage, it is confirmed that the migrated workload is performing as expected. After a predefined period of monitoring, the system is activated and used for working.
This model of cloud migration framework works for all types of businesses whether it is small or big. You can also read the process of migration by following this seven-step model of cloud migration. In this model, you will get detailed information about each step of migration.