Cloud Computing For Dummies®

Chapter 14. Setting Some Standards

In This Chapter

• Understanding the importance of standards

• Figuring out why standards are needed in the cloud

• Understanding what standards exist today

Ask knowledgeable companies about their top worries about moving to the cloud. Two major reasons would no doubt be security and vendor lock-in. Read more about security in Chapter 15. This chapter tackles vendor lock-in: being stuck with one cloud provider because of interoperability or portability issues. Standards and best practices address these two concerns.

If standards are the directions, best practices are the blueprint for creating techniques or methods that result in predictable outcomes in the real world. For example, you might have a best practice designed to ensure security in cloud environments.

Understanding Best Practices and Standards

Best practices and standards provide a starting recipe, appropriate tools, required ingredients, and some tips and tricks.

The idea is fewer errors will occur if organizations follow best practices (because the processes, techniques, and methodologies they're using have been repeatedly tested). The same holds true for standards. Standards mean that you don't need to constantly reinvent the same thing. And, best practices and standards for managing critical aspects such as data security and privacy help ensure quality for crucial workloads in the cloud.

Best practicing makes perfect

Best practices are accumulated knowledge that can help individuals and organizations ...