Talking about the Urgent Problems to be Solved in the Development of Cloud Computing

Development of cloud computing can not "follow the trend of the wind" "Chaosunfei" - On some problems to be solved in the development of cloud computing

So far, China has set off a boom in cloud computing. From the media's hype, the capital's campaign, to a large number of academic activities co-sponsored business promotion, has been desperate to heat up the concept of cloud computing. Coupled with Google, IBM, Microsoft and other IT giants with unprecedented speed and scale of cloud computing promotion and speculation, it is cloud computing on the peak. Cloud Planning, Cloud Outline, Cloud Project, and Cloud Base seem to have become the most beautiful landscape in the new development plan of all levels of government.

With the ever-increasing enthusiasm of cloud computing around the country, more than one time the government has introduced preferential policies, rapid layout, Happy Valley stalls, the project. All hardware and software vendors also felt that they had encountered the "money-raising opportunity" that they never dreamed of. They all started trials and took the lead in launching cloud products and cloud services. China's earth can be described as unbridled! Hype and noise of the "cloud" continues to heat up, you want to build 10 cloud data center, I want to build a million cloud server cloud computing base; you want to build Asia cloud data center, I want Establish a "World Cloud Data Processing Center." Around the "step-by-step multiplication" enclosure enclosure calls, lively. Follow the trend of the numbers and planning, such as lightning. So that the cloud computing market has grown from 16.7 billion yuan in 2010 to 117.4 billion yuan in 2013. The average annual compound growth rate has reached 91.5%. During the 12th Five-Year Plan period, the scale of the cloud computing industry chain is expected to reach 750 billion to 1 trillion yuan.

We can look at a set of data provided by Li Jie, a senior engineer at the Telecommunications Research Institute of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. At present, there are about 430,000 data centers of various types in our country and about 5 million servers can be accommodated. The operating data center has 921 computer rooms with an area of ​​about 880,000 square meters and a rack of about 177,000 cabinets, accommodating about 2 million servers. Not counting the above-mentioned projects under construction, only the total power consumption of data centers built in China in 2011 reached 70 billion kwh, accounting for 1.5% of the total electricity consumption of the whole society, equivalent to the annual electricity consumption in Tianjin in 2011 .

Vivid figures show that: to avoid duplication of investment, to curb the waste of resources has been imminent, all kinds of "follow the trend of competition" "step by step multiplication" easily tens of thousands of devices engage in cloud data center practices, all kinds of "cloud" "cloud" The upsurge of "Yunshanwuzhao" not only lacks the top-level design but also does not make relevant thinking. It neither develops the stock of resources, nor does it fully consider the market demand. "Cloud cloud" has become an empty talk, a joke. If you allow this "lonely cloud", "floating around", will face a large number of data center "cloud resource pool drought phenomenon." This will not only result in the precipitation and idleness of a large number of high-quality information resources, but will also create new barriers for information sharing and sharing after years of hard work and progress.

These problems in the development of cloud computing, if not timely insight and proper solution, will cause serious troubles. As some scholars have pointed out: When the clouds come together, it will become a cloudy day. In view of this, Miao Wei, minister of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, has clearly warned. Li Deyi, academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and director of the China Electronics Society's cloud computing expert committee, also made a loud cry to change this phenomenon of "chaotic cloud flying" as soon as possible. Unfortunately, these warnings and suggestions did not arouse much response. In view of this, it is necessary to make further elaboration on the five issues that must be solved in the current development of cloud computing.

1 Development of cloud computing should focus on the stock of idle resources for value-added development

Cloud computing will fundamentally change the way of information acquisition and knowledge dissemination, and promote the service transformation of information operations such as infrastructure operation and software. It will also create a new format of new value-added information services that are applied across industries. As a result of cloud computing, a large number of computing resources connected to a network can be uniformly managed and scheduled to form a computing resource pool to provide users with on-demand services. Clusters of distributed resources can be provided to provide the possibility of in-depth development of information resources. Resources come together to provide the possibility of integrating applications. In the information resource pool, the accumulation of a large number of high value-added information resources not only provides the possibility of value-added information and intelligent development of information resources, but also provides the realistic possibility of deep development and value-added development of clustering computing capabilities.

Because of this, Miao Wei, Minister of the Ministry of Industry, recently made it clear that in foreign countries, cloud computing mainly integrates existing server resources and integrates idle resources to establish a virtual data center. However, in many parts of China, millions of new servers are at every turn, and there is a lot of blindness.

This requires us to establish a list of existing inventory resources resources available to provide the number of available physical servers and load stocks, find out the virtual machines or workloads in the entire available server pool intelligent allocation of resources. Integrate idle resources, conduct in-depth development, and develop value-added services of cloud services from stock resources. Another survey shows that after the development of cloud computing, 70% of idle computing power can be used. By putting together these idle computing power and consolidating it, it can be accessed by the user on demand, greatly reducing the waste of computing power.

In the process of developing cloud computing, we need to be careful about the construction of high-performance cloud computing data centers. This is not only due to the high cost of building a high-performance cloud computing data center and high operating costs, but more importantly: Before such a project is launched, it must be fully demonstrated that there is no basic information resource available for high-performance cloud computing data center integration Oriented needs, or long-term application of customer resources. There is no basis for high-performance computing without sufficient underlying information resources, cloud computing-only resource pools, or pools of water, and high operating costs without the need for numerous targeted or long-term application client resources . Taking Shanghai High Performance Computing Center as an example, the peak power consumption of its 200 teralight dawn 5000A reaches 960 kilowatts, and the annual electricity bill to be paid needs to reach tens of millions of yuan. That many current high-performance computer had to close the relevant node, in order to save electricity. It should be noted that: such projects launched a longer period, and the update cycle is fast. This adds even more pressure to investment.

The development of cloud computing resources for value-added development, we must focus on the use of virtualization technology. The beauty of virtualization is that it provides all the available computing and storage resources in a pool of resources to form a single consolidated public platform that provides virtual service capabilities. Its resource pool, like water and electricity in our everyday life, becomes a "utility" and a convenient "access" in enterprise information systems. This is not only conducive to value-added information resources development, but also conducive to idle and sedimentary resources function activation.

2 Development of cloud computing must pay attention to the combination of static cloud and dynamic cloud

The development of cloud computing value-added energy using stock containers and the establishment of a static and dynamic cloud data center is a new feature in the development of cloud computing technology in the world. At present, some trumpeters and hardware traders of cloud capital have masked such an important feature and trend in the development of international cloud computing for their commercial purposes. Drum around desperately expropriating land, buying equipment, Dajian cloud data center.

In fact, after several years of development and practice, the world's cloud computing data center construction ideas and patterns have undergone major strategic changes. The establishment of dynamic and static, modular, floating clouds characterized by "container data center" has become a trendy. This new dynamic data center can be as fast and easy as building blocks. Not only can a data center be "drifted" like a cloud, but when a data center is not enough, it can be added like a building block, does not it solve the problem that the current data center construction must occupy too much land resources Big problem it!

This modular data center, not only occupy less resources, less project investment, construction period is fast, and can be sub-combined, mobile can be static, to meet the demand for combat readiness. It will not be the target of enemy attacks in the war. It is by virtue of these advantages, the world has been quietly popular. IDC researchers at the world's leading market research firm have made it clear that "the massive, monolithic data center is outdated, and the modular data center model is expected to become" almost the default "for building data centers over the next five years. It is also clearer that such containerized data centers are suitable for building disaster recovery centers and that IT facilities can be expanded on an ad hoc or emergency basis and can be put into operation immediately as long as the designated sites provide both power and water supply.The container data center is energy efficient At a very high level of metrics, PUE (Energy Efficiency) can reach 1.2, which is hard to match with traditional data centers. "

This modular data center was first launched in the world since 2007. Including IBM, Hewlett-Packard, Dell, Oracle, SGI, and other manufacturers all set foot in which, Microsoft, Google and more its preference. Using Rackable's containers, Microsoft built a large data center with 150 containers outside Chicago, United States, with 1,000 to 2,000 servers deployed in each data center. Microsoft also used IT preassembly components to build a data center with more than 2,000 servers in Quincy, Washington, USA, and its modular design took the entire build process in just eight months. Google, in turn, patented their modular data center in 2008 to patent innovative technologies in modular data centers.

However, they apparently circumvent this forward-looking innovative thinking in those "solutions" brought to us by the rapid development of cloud computing in China. Is not it worthwhile for us to think seriously and alert at all levels of government officials and related enterprises in Datong Cloud Data Center?

3 Development of cloud computing must seize the "application landing" this focus

It should be said: The rapid development of "cloud computing" has brought new opportunities for development for the in-depth development and application of information technology in our country. Its intelligent management algorithm and integrated development and design provide a new idea and path to solve the resource development and value development of information resources in China's information construction. But also activate the huge demand market, give full play to the investment potential of informatization construction infrastructures for many years, quickly build a state-led "cloud computing" layout system with Chinese characteristics and rapidly form the resource development capability of "cloud computing" in China and Application development advantages.

However, the focus of cloud computing technology development, not how many data centers you have established. But because of your deep application of the value of cloud resources. Only in the depth of application, the value of cloud computing energy and value-added service advantages can be fully developed and revealed. However, many cloud computing development projects and cloud computing development bases in many places do not grasp this key point. They do not pay attention to resource development and value development of cloud computing, do not carry out innovative research on service models of cloud computing, and do not pay attention to the floating "clouds "How to" apply "on the ground, and addicted to the" multi-land "" multi-Gailou "building to attract investment" fishing "have" cloud fly. " As a result, Li Deyi, academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and director of the Cloud Computing Expert Committee of the Chinese Institute of Electronics, has to shout: Many local governments still define the cloud computing as a strategic emerging industry, but still adopt the original land acquisition, building houses and attracting investment Foreign investment, cloud computing into the second real estate. In fact, how many servers is not the key, but to pay attention to the application of the floor.

Academicians here clearly tell us: the development of cloud computing applications must be studied, focusing on applications. Only in the application to demonstrate and develop the value of cloud services energy, in order to find a suitable business model, open up a huge market for cloud services.

4 Development of cloud computing and local energy-saving emission reduction tasks must be considered

It should be noted that computer energy saving is an inevitable requirement of our sustainable development strategy and an essential feature of the development of green economy. Whether it is to "set up a regional cloud computing center" or "to establish a data processing center in Asia and around the world," there is a common lack of commonality: that there is no calculation of the energy consumption of the cloud computing center and the calculation of whether the energy supply can be guaranteed , Or when they are making all kinds of cloud computing development plans, they simply do not understand the need for such correlation thinking. This is a major strategic loss in the development of cloud computing.

In fact, cloud computing center energy consumption is high. Purdue University of the United States to verify the practice of this point. In the past three years, the university has built a high-performance data center for three large server clusters in a 10-story basement to reduce the footprint of space. What they did not realize, however, was that only data center power consumption accounted for 85% of the entire building, so that the power supply to the many offices and research projects on other floors of the building was affected.

Data center power index upgrade imminent, but wait for the approval of layers of government departments, and then to complete the power supply upgrade, takes about two or three years. To this end, they envisioned a number of programs and inspected all the venues on campus, but eventually envisaged the program has been rejected. Nothing to do with the project team, turn their attention to the modular data center. Its modular design not only needs to be submitted to the planning department for approval but also can be rapidly deployed. It can also save a large amount of building construction expenses and power storage capacity costs. It takes only 2-4 months to deploy and can cluster a large server High-performance data center set up. The results show that: The cost of resources and time spent on this program is much lower than any previously considered program.

Since 1999, the U.S. Department of Defense has been seeking computational services that are cheaper, safer, more energy-efficient and more readily accepted by Defense Department engineers and technicians. The problems encountered by the above schools not only make them see the development of cloud computing and launching of new projects, they must think about the correlation between energy consumption and electricity supply, and also set aside value-added cooling energy of 1-2000 computers in summer Consumption It is this experience and vigilance that the U.S. Federal Agency decided to close 137 data centers shortly to save energy and save money. They figured it out: saving 15,000 square feet of space each time they shut down a data center, and saving $ 1.2 million. The U.S. move to shut down 137 high-energy-consumption data centers will surely give us many important insights.

In particular, it needs to be pointed out that during the "12th Five-Year Plan", China is also facing the heavy task of energy conservation and emission reduction. To this end, the State Council issued a "12th Five-Year" comprehensive program of energy-saving emission reduction. " Clearly requires: China should "study and determine the energy-saving advanced level of energy-intensive products and end-use energy products, formulate energy efficiency standards, and clearly define the time limit." Relying on technological advances in enterprises, promote the rapid improvement of energy efficiency. " Therefore, the development of energy-saving cloud computing, low-carbon cloud computing, green cloud computing should be the direction of development of cloud computing in order to ensure energy-saving emission reduction to the downside.

5 The development of cloud computing must focus on ensuring national information security and user information security

We must recognize that the development of cloud computing has brought enormous economic benefits to us and brought about huge security risks.

Therefore, the great challenge of developing cloud computing will be to ensure the information security of cloud computing. There are many operational and usage risks of cloud computing on the Internet, such as risk of isolation failure, compliance risk, risk of damage to the management interface, incomplete data deletion, internal threat risk, but these are just generalities Risk, not the main risk. In fact, the most important and the core risk of cloud computing at present is the risk of national security risks and uncontrolled corporate economic information.

As far as national security risks are concerned, the former president of News Channel of Columbia Television Station has long made it clear: "As the world changes, the future of the United States needs to be reoriented, but cloud computing is the United States that can reaffirm its position as a global economic and technological leader Important area ". It should be said that the proposal and rapid development of "cloud computing" have provided new opportunities for the United States. Once the global flow of information, storage and processing through the US IT giant built on the Internet "cloud" to carry out, then the United States firmly grasp the guidance of global information.

To this end, the Obama administration has long positioned cyberspace security threats as "one of the most serious national economic and national security challenges we face throughout the country," and announced that "from now on, our digital infrastructure will be considered a national strategy assets". To this end, the United States has not only placed itself firmly in the hands of the Internet infrastructure such as the domain name root server to the code resources, but also started earliest the plan to deploy "cloud computing" in the military field. At the same time, their other hand, is to strongly support its commercial companies in the world's largest pool of cloud resources and cloud computing center, to seize the social cloud computing basic strategic resources.

Seriously, on February 6 last year, a U.S. commercial cloud computing service company signed a contract with the U.S. Air Force to build a military base capable of protecting national defense and military information for its nine command centers, 100 military bases and 700,000 dispersed troops around the world "The Cloud Computing Network System," building a "technology that will allow the Air Force to continuously monitor and analyze all network data for any signs of threat or failure," and the U.S. House of Representatives passed without delay the adoption of the plan The "Network Security Research and Development Law."

In the meantime, the U.S. commercial cloud computing service company has aggressively entered the Chinese market. The first was to take Wuxi as an example to open up the path of advancing into China's cloud computing market, using 100 other Chinese cities as potential cloud computing customers and hoping to attract 200,000 independent software companies to use their own data centers. One company that manufactures for the U.S. Air Force a company that "allows the Air Force to continuously monitor and analyze all web data," the other hand wants "100 Chinese cities as potential cloud computing customers" and "the huge railways in China Construction information ". Where is China's national defense information security? What are the high-speed carrying capacity and military logistics safety of China's railways? What is the absolute right of information in our country?

Some member states of the EU are the first to realize the importance of protecting information security. Therefore, they not only put forward the "Digital Agenda Project" that protects the information security of the state and enterprises when entering the cloud, but also stipulated stringent deletion protection measures for the enterprise's economic information entering the cloud resource pool. Provisions: Enterprise data into the cloud, in the retention of 6 to 18 months after the cloud service enterprises must be removed from the resource pool. Germany more stringent provisions of all cloud data into the company must be stored in Germany, are not allowed to cross-border calls. Recently, ENISA released a report on "Cloud Computing: Benefits, Risks and Information Security Recommendations." The report does not recommend putting the most sensitive or core enterprise data in the cloud. These suggestions are not only worth studying and borrowing from China, but also provide important inspiration and warning to the enterprises and businesses in our country.