Many small businesses are realizing that cloud computing isn’t just for large corporations. Many providers offer services that are targeted at the small business owner. Cloud computing presents unique opportunities for small businesses, giving them access to infrastructure that had traditionally only been available to much larger organizations. There are several options perfectly suited to small businesses.
Small businesses with larger than average hosting needs tend to require some sort of dedicated server hosting system. Basically you rent a private server virtualization from a provider so you can customize the server software at the operating system level. The problem with this setup was the waste of resources when the hardware was running at anything but maximum load.
A Virtual Dedicated Server is a cloud-based service that mimics the customization of a dedicated machine, but with the easy scalability and redundancy of cloud computing. It provides business owners with the ability to modify and control all aspects of their hosting service.
It’s beneficial for the service provider because there are no wasted resources. Any processing power not being used during a period of low activity for one user can be immediately tasked to another virtual server on the same machine. This allows providers to offer VPS at a cost that is lower than traditional dedicated servers.
There is one major difference between a cloud-based VPS and true Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS). While both provide flexible and scalable hosting services, a VPS still must operate within the confines of a single machine. IaaS is a broader system that has the resources available that far exceed any single machine. A VPS running as IaaS has none of the confining issues of a single machine server. The scalability and processing power available is only limited by the size of the provider’s network and the budget of the client.
Most small scale businesses won’t have a need for a system as robust as Platform as a Service (PaaS). PaaS is intended for those companies that need to deploy a full customized software application, but lack the hardware resources and storage space to make it happen. The client will handle the creation and deployment of the app. The service provider supplies access to a network, server, storage and programming libraries.
Application PaaS is an extension of PaaS whereby the client builds the customized applications within the PaaS service itself. It further reduces the amount of resources a business must have to develop a custom application. Most of what is needed is provided within the aPaaS framework.