Cloud Computing has revolutionized technology and business, enabling companies to attain better scalability. Besides, it helps companies to maintain their data without worrying about hardware or software issues. Cloud computing utilizes modern technology for easier accessibility and data sharing across different devices.
It provides shared resources, software, and information over a network using remote servers or access points. It allows users to use services on-demand hosted on remote computers rather than installing software locally. Cloud computing allows users to share resources like storage space and processing power with others or organizations over the internet.
What is cloud migration?
Cloud Migration involves moving services from on-premise to a public cloud service provider’s infrastructure and migrating the workloads to the new environment. Cloud migration has many benefits, such as lower costs, faster deployment time, higher performance, better security and scalability, and more control over data privacy. It facilitates moving an application or data from a local server to a cloud-based one.
How to prepare the organization for could migration?
Cloud migration can be complex, especially involving many different systems and departments. Still, there are ways to make sure that everything goes smoothly. Nowadays, it has become hassle-free for organizations to prepare for cloud migration by understanding the importance of digital transformation, adopting and leveraging new technologies, and changing their IT strategy. This article will discuss what it takes to prepare your organization for moving to the Cloud.
The cloud migration strategy includes the following:
- Initiate the migration-architect part
- Select the cloud integration level
- Deciding between single or multi-cloud
- Setting up Cloud KPIs (Key Performance Indicators)
- Determining the performance baselines
- Lining up migration component
- Performing the refactoring
- Implementing data-migration plan
1. Initiate the migration-architect part:
The migration architect is a system architect role where an individual is accountable for planning and accomplishing all the migration aspects. They define the refactoring needed for a successful migration, curate strategies for migrating data, and determine the requirements of cloud solutions. It also fixes the priorities of migration alongside production switchover technicalities. When handling large migration projects, it is crucial to have a designated architect who can handle all aspects of migration and contribute to the project’s success without glitches.
2. Select the cloud integration level:
It is crucial to choose between shallow or deep integration. In the case of shallow cloud integration, the on-premises applications are moved to the Cloud. It is also known as lift and shift, as there are no restricted changes to the cloud servers for running the application. During deep cloud integration, the applications are modified for utilizing the critical cloud capabilities, thus enabling the usage of serverless computing capabilities such as AWS Lambda, or it might also involve using cloud-specific data stores such as DynamoDB and Amazon S3.
3. Deciding between single or multi-cloud
The best way to determine which Cloud to use is what your company needs and wants from its technology. For example, if your company needs high availability and scalability, you should consider using Amazon Web Services (AWS). If your company needs low-cost services that are easy to scale up, consider using Google Cloud Platform (GCP). However, deciding between single or multi-cloud is not as simple as we have mentioned and may need an expert cloud service provider. A cloud service provider can assess the cloud computing needs of the organization and suggest the right way for your organization.
4. Setting up Cloud KPIs (Key Performance Indicators)
It is vital to establish the right KPIs to measure the success of the migration. The main KPIs include users’ satisfaction and cost savings, performance, security, and reliability of the Cloud. The objective of KPIs is to evaluate certain aspects of cloud migration, such as revenue generation, cost per conversion, uptime improvement, and detection of technical threats/vulnerabilities. Apart from these, a whole other set of cloud migration KPIs, like Page load time, Lag, response time, session duration, error rates, Apdex, throughput, application performance, component performance, and most importantly, user experience.
Some organizations even track business engagement, disk performance, network throughput, CPU usage %, cart adds, conversion percentage and engagement rates. Once the KPIs are set for each category, metrics can help determine which is most important for your organization.
5. Determining the performance baselines
Establishing performance baselines is an indispensable step in migrating to the Cloud. It will help business owners and IT professionals understand what they should expect from the new systems and what needs to be done for them to be up and running as soon as possible. It defines the computing power, storage space, network bandwidth, etc. Baselines also help organizations determine the migration status and check how the migration is performing. Setting a baseline metric for each KPI helps determine how long the organization must collect data to check the performance. Choosing a more extended period may be time-consuming. However, it provides the exact representative data required.
6. Lining up migration components
Understanding what elements should be prioritized when migrating to the Cloud is essential. Identify business priorities and how you will use the Cloud. Also, consider your company \’s goals for moving to the Cloud. It will help determine which components you need to prioritize. A cloud service provider may help you by mapping out a plan to migrate to Cloud based on small, medium, and immense complexities.
7. Performing the refactoring
Cloud migration is a process that should be done with caution. It can be difficult to migrate your codebase to the Cloud, especially if you have a lot of legacy code. Refactoring is changing a software system’s internal structure or organization to improve its design or make it easier to maintain and extend. But refactoring is essential to make your organization become Cloud ready and handle all migration successfully.
8. Implementing data-migration plan
Create a data-migration plan and ensure that all the information is backed up. Define and assess how your company can benefit from the move to the Cloud, what data you need, how you will store it, and what security measures you need. The best way is to use a cloud-migration service provider who can be involved in data migration planning to execution.
Conclusion
The cloud system increases speed and flexibility, lowers costs, and reduces risk. Data centres are becoming obsolete with cloud migration; companies can now access their data from any device. It helps to switch over production from the old data centres to new ones. Cloud migration provides the company with a more flexible and cost-effective way to manage its production with resource optimization.
Rapyder is one of the leading AWS Cloud Service Providers known to help thousands of organizations move to the Cloud seamlessly across the Cloud. Get in touch with our Cloud experts today and migrate to faster ways of managing the business through the Cloud.
