DCN November 2016 | Page 44

final thought

WE HAVE LIFT-OFF !

Michael Hack of Ipswitch explains how IT can make hybrid cloud work .

Hybrid cloud is fast approaching lift-off speed . And it ’ s easy to see why . The attraction of the hybrid cloud model is that it allows organisations to maintain the same level of control they ’ ve always exercised over key elements of their infrastructure while adding the flexibility to introduce new business models and revenue streams quickly and at minimal cost .

Hybrid cloud ’ s automation , orchestration and self-service capabilities make it possible to create new services based on a variety of infrastructure and application elements . In addition , those services can be scaled up quickly to meet demand peaks and scaled back just as rapidly to control operational costs .
UK organisations are starting to take note with 80 per cent adopting at least one cloud service , according to the Cloud Industry Forum ’ s 2016 UK Cloud Adoption and Trends survey . Further , nearly half of private sector ( 48 per cent ) and more than a third of public sector organisations ( 36 per cent ) revealed they were using hybrid infrastructures .
Causes for concern But while it ’ s clear large enterprises are starting to use hybrid cloud , they are also concerned that it could have a cost in terms of performance and heightened data vulnerability .
While hybrid cloud brings new security risks that need to be addressed , another cause for trepidation is the potential reduction in responsiveness of data and applications and the associated hit to user productivity . Delivering optimal performance from hybrid cloud environments is a challenge for IT teams , but they can take advantage of a number of best practices to manage and maintain high performance .
There are at least four areas where IT teams can take action to ensure they are getting the best performance from their hybrid cloud environments : infrastructure monitoring , automated log collection , flow record analysis and networking testing .
How to make hybrid cloud better Automatic infrastructure monitoring solutions can deliver end-to-end visibility into the cloud security infrastructure and enable analysis of network traffic patterns . Continuous monitoring of the entire environment – including network devices , physical and virtual servers – should be complemented with alert and notification policies that standardise escalation procedures . Bandwidth usage policies based on incoming network traffic should also be put in place .
IT teams should monitor a number of areas to ensure availability of critical infrastructures while maximising performance for users . These include : Internet connectivity , VPN sessions , network traffic and flow records , servers , remote desktops , virtual machines and applications , routers , switches , firewalls , load balancers and intrusion prevention systems .
Log collection and analysis From a security perspective , detecting unauthorised activity or security threats can be significantly enhanced by effective network analysis . IT teams can be much more proactive in terms of homing in on irregular activity if the collection , storage and back up of logs from firewalls , security and load balancers ( and the creation of alerts ) is automated . This can also provide them with evidence for audit and compliance activities .
Automated log collection should include access and permission changes to files , folders and objects , along with the most common log types such as Syslog , Microsoft event and W3C / IIS . As well as network analysis , IT teams should use network flow records to identify the applications that consume the most expensive ISP bandwidth . Flow records can also help them to spot users of non-business applications . Using information on NetFlow , sFlow , J-Flow and IPFIX can also deliver 360 ° visibility into overall network performance .
44