Does the Cloud Automatically Make Me DevOps?

This is the third blog in a series in which we take a deeper look into O’Reilly’s DevOps for Media & Entertainment report. One of the competencies for DevOps teams as outlined in the report is the need for dynamic cloud infrastructure. Many business units within media and entertainment and other verticals have embraced the cloud due to the benefits it affords. The cloud provides flexibility and scalability. There’s no need to purchase expensive hardware to deploy new solutions. The cloud can help to eliminate some barriers to entering the market or quickly scaling.

With the cloud, teams can configure the environments they need, when they need them, for as long as they need them. But moving to the cloud isn’t without its challenges; the infrastructure and applications still need to be monitored. Monitoring systems are already standard practice for most organizations, but the existing tools and strategies in place may not be sufficient for the cloud.

Traditional application and infrastructure monitoring tools aren’t much help when it comes to monitoring the cloud. Tools like real user measurement and APM that rely on instrumentation of code or systems aren’t much use for SaaS applications because the source code is controlled by the SaaS provider, not the end user organization. Server and network monitoring tools are great for the organization’s own data center but don’t deliver much visibility of heavily virtualized cloud environments controlled by a third party and scattered all over the world.

The list below covers some items to consider when selecting tools or developing a cloud monitoring strategy:

• Monitor from cloud and non-cloud vantage points. If you’re monitoring from the cloud and the cloud vendor experiences an outage, you have lost visibility into your systems. Vantage points should include either multiple cloud vendors or a mixture of cloud and non-cloud.
• Ensure internal teams have connectivity to the cloud provider by monitoring connections from their vantage point.
• If you are using a cloud provider, chances are you’re using their APIs. These APIs should be monitored to ensure calls between the API and your systems/applications are functioning and performing as expected.
• DNS is often the culprit when performance and availability issues occur. When DNS fails, there are multiple points at which the failure can occur – resolvers, root servers, top-level DNS server, or authoritative servers. Ensure you have the ability to monitor all aspects of the DNS resolution.
• Most cloud providers include service level agreements (SLAs) they protect customers from poor performance and provide object grading criteria. Understand the terms of the SLA and identify ways to monitor and measure the threshold to ensure you are getting the service levels you signed up for.
• Monitor connectivity between the cloud provider and your users.

To learn more about building a cloud performance monitoring strategy download our ebook, Using Digital Experience Monitoring for Cloud Performance Management.