Cloud Fundamentals

Cloud computing has transformed how organizations build and operate infrastructure. Understanding cloud concepts is essential for modern DevOps.

Cloud Service Models

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│                        SaaS                                     │
│        Software as a Service                                    │
│        ┌─────────┐ ┌─────────┐ ┌─────────┐                     │
│        │Gmail    │ │Salesforce│ │Dropbox  │                     │
│        │Office365│ │Slack    │ │Zoom     │                     │
│        └─────────┘ └─────────┘ └─────────┘                     │
│        You manage: NOTHING                                      │
│        Provider manages: Everything                             │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│                        PaaS                                     │
│        Platform as a Service                                    │
│        ┌─────────┐ ┌─────────┐ ┌─────────┐                     │
│        │Heroku   │ │AWS       │ │Google App│                     │
│        │Elastic  │ │Beanstalk│ │Engine   │                     │
│        │Beanstalk│ │Azure App │ │Cloud Run │                     │
│        └─────────┘ └─────────┘ └─────────┘                     │
│        You manage: Application and Data                         │
│        Provider manages: Runtime, Middleware, OS, Virtualization│
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│                        IaaS                                     │
│        Infrastructure as a Service                                │
│        ┌─────────┐ ┌─────────┐ ┌─────────┐                     │
│        │AWS EC2  │ │Azure VM │ │Google   │                     │
│        │AWS S3   │ │Azure    │ │Compute  │                     │
│        │AWS VPC  │ │Storage  │ │Engine   │                     │
│        └─────────┘ └─────────┘ └─────────┘                     │
│        You manage: Applications, Data, Runtime, Middleware, OS│
│        Provider manages: Virtualization, Servers, Storage, Net  │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│                    On-Premises                                  │
│        You manage: EVERYTHING                                   │
│        Hardware, Data Centers, Networking, Security            │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Cloud Deployment Models

Public Cloud

• Resources owned by cloud provider
• Shared infrastructure
• Pay-as-you-go pricing
• Examples: AWS, Azure, GCP

Private Cloud

• Dedicated infrastructure
• Single organization use
• On-premises or hosted
• Examples: OpenStack, VMware Cloud

Hybrid Cloud

• Combination of public and private
• Workload portability
• Data sovereignty compliance
• Examples: AWS Outposts, Azure Stack

Multi-Cloud

• Using multiple cloud providers
• Avoid vendor lock-in
• Best-of-breed services
• Requires orchestration tools

AWS Global Infrastructure

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│                    AWS Global Infrastructure                    │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│                                                                  │
│   Region (us-east-1)                                             │
│   ┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐  │
│   │  Availability Zone A    │  AZ B    │  AZ C              │  │
│   │  ┌─────────────────┐    ┌─────────┐ ┌─────────┐          │  │
│   │  │ Data Center 1   │    │  DC 2   │ │  DC 3   │          │  │
│   │  │ Data Center 2   │    │  DC 4   │ │  DC 5   │          │  │
│   │  └─────────────────┘    └─────────┘ └─────────┘          │  │
│   │  Separate facilities with independent power, cooling,    │  │
│   │  and networking - designed for high availability        │  │
│   └─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘  │
│                                                                  │
│   Edge Locations (CloudFront CDN)                               │
│   • 400+ locations worldwide                                    │
│   • Content caching and delivery                                │
│                                                                  │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Key Concepts

AWS Account Fundamentals

Account Structure

Organization
├── Management Account
├── Production Account
├── Staging Account
├── Development Account
├── Sandbox Account (per team)
└── Security Account (logs, audit)

AWS Free Tier

• Always Free: 1M Lambda requests, 25GB DynamoDB storage
• 12 Months: 750 hours EC2 t2.micro, 5GB S3 standard
• Trials: Various service-specific trials

Cost Management

# AWS CLI cost explorer
aws ce get-cost-and-usage \
  --time-period Start=2024-01-01,End=2024-01-31 \
  --granularity MONTHLY \
  --metrics BlendedCost

# Budget alerts
aws budgets create-budget --budget file://budget.json

AWS CLI and SDK

Installation and Configuration

# Install AWS CLI
curl "https://awscli.amazonaws.com/awscli-exe-linux-x86_64.zip" -o "awscliv2.zip"
unzip awscliv2.zip
sudo ./aws/install

# Configure
aws configure
# AWS Access Key ID: AKIA...
# AWS Secret Access Key: ...
# Default region: us-east-1
# Default output: json

# Configure profiles
aws configure --profile production
aws configure --profile development

# Use profile
aws s3 ls --profile production

Common CLI Commands

# EC2
aws ec2 describe-instances
aws ec2 run-instances --image-id ami-123 --instance-type t3.micro
aws ec2 start-instances --instance-ids i-123456
aws ec2 stop-instances --instance-ids i-123456

# S3
aws s3 ls
aws s3 mb s3://my-bucket-name
aws s3 cp file.txt s3://my-bucket/
aws s3 sync ./local s3://my-bucket/remote
aws s3 rm s3://my-bucket/file.txt

# IAM
aws iam list-users
aws iam create-user --user-name newuser
aws iam attach-user-policy --user-name newuser --policy-arn arn:aws:iam::aws:policy/ReadOnlyAccess

# CloudWatch
aws cloudwatch list-metrics
aws cloudwatch get-metric-data --metric-data-queries file://query.json

# EKS
aws eks update-kubeconfig --region us-east-1 --name my-cluster

AWS Well-Architected Framework

Six Pillars

1. Operational Excellence

   • Perform operations as code
   • Make frequent, small, reversible changes
   • Refine operations procedures frequently
   • Anticipate failure

2. Security

   • Implement strong identity foundation
   • Enable traceability
   • Apply security at all layers
   • Automate security best practices
   • Protect data in transit and at rest

3. Reliability

   • Automatically recover from failure
   • Test recovery procedures
   • Scale horizontally for resilience
   • Stop guessing capacity

4. Performance Efficiency

   • Democratize advanced technologies
   • Go global in minutes
   • Use serverless architectures
   • Experiment more often

5. Cost Optimization

   • Adopt a consumption model
   • Measure overall efficiency
   • Stop spending on undifferentiated heavy lifting
   • Analyze and attribute expenditure

6. Sustainability

   • Understand your impact
   • Establish sustainability goals
   • Maximize utilization
   • Use efficient hardware and software

Shared Responsibility Model

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│                    CUSTOMER                                     │
│   ┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐  │
│   │ • Data                                                    │  │
│   │ • Platform, Applications, Identity & Access Management   │  │
│   │ • Operating System, Network & Firewall Configuration      │  │
│   │ • Client-side Data Encryption & Data Integrity           │  │
│   │ • Server-side Encryption                                 │  │
│   │ • Networking Traffic Protection                          │  │
│   └─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘  │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│                    AWS                                          │
│   ┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐  │
│   │ • Software: Compute, Storage, Database, Networking       │  │
│   │ • Hardware: AWS Global Infrastructure                    │  │
│   │ • Regions, Availability Zones, Edge Locations          │  │
│   └─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘  │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Quiz

Next Steps

Now let's explore AWS core services: EC2, S3, IAM, and VPC.