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Cloud Computing best practice: Conduct a Cloud feasibility assessment

guy holding a piece of paper with a cloud and servers on it.

Not all IT activities are right for Cloud computing . What’s more, you may not have the basic elements you need (such as a sufficiently robust network environment) for Cloud computing. And the last thing you need is to learn those uncomfortable truths after you’ve committed to a Cloud project.

This is why conducting a Cloud feasibility assessment is so important. And unless you have Cloud computing expertise on staff, don’t try to do it alone.

Instead, look for a Cloud services provider who will conduct a free Cloud feasibility assessment that does three crucial things:

  1. Helps you identify which IT capabilities you’re thinking of offloading to the Cloud ; the best app candidates are those most frequently requested by users, which also tend to be those that change often. These can include transient apps that are often provisioned, reallocated, cloned, etc. (e.g., a development/test environment), variable-demand apps for which users frequently request application resource adjustments (e.g., seasonal transactions, scientific computation), and ‘long tail’ apps that don’t get prioritized by IT (e.g., resources for an extranet).
  2. Determines what sort of service availability your business requires as well as the security, privacy, and compliance mandates you must meet.
  3. Recommends ways you can achieve a seamless transition to the Cloud.

Remember: It’s certainly possible to shift only particular components to the Cloud (e.g., storage, user interfaces/desktop images) and leave the rest untouched on your premises — but pay attention to colocation of Cloud data for components that are data-process-intensive.

Next time: Doing your Cloud provider due diligence.

Meet the Author
Tim Burke is the President and CEO of Quest. He has been at the helm for over 30 years.
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