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An Overview of Multi-cloud Computing

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DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-15035-8_103

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An Overview of Multi-Cloud Computing

Jiangshui Hong, Thomas Dreibholz, Joseph Adam Schenkel, and Jiaxi Alessia Hu

Abstract The purpose of this paper is to provide a brief overview of cloud comput-
ing technologies, particularly with respect to multi-cloud networks. First, the basics
of cloud computing concepts are discussed. Next we outline some challenges fac-
ing cloud computing, and discuss how multi-cloud systems including multi-clouds,
hybrid clouds, federated clouds, and cross-clouds may be used to deal with some of
these issues. Finally, multi-cloud systems may also be used in conjunction with new
developing technologies such as Big Data and Machine Learning, leading to excit-
ing innovations. These are reviewed in brief. Our goal is to provide a modern look
at the state of the art in multi-cloud computing and review open issues in the field.
The goal is that this paper will help the reader to understand challenges facing cloud
computing, how multi-cloud computing addresses some of these issues, and inspire
community excitement at the future integration of multi-cloud platforms with other
novel technologies.

1 Cloud Computing Basics

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) defines cloud compu-
tation as a “model for granting users access to a shared pool of configurable com-
putational resources including networks, servers, storage, applications, and services
that can be rapidly provisioned (adapted for new services) with little management
or service provider interaction” [25]. Cloud computing is not a new technology in
itself, per se, but rather a new way to incorporate existing technologies [26]. In other
words, cloud computing is simply a way to remotely access and manage computing
resources [34]. This technology has now been integrated into many businesses, as
third-party cloud networks allow firms to focus on core business elements without

Jiangshui Hong, Thomas Dreibholz

SimulaMet, Pilestredet 52, 0167 Oslo, Norway, e-mail: [email protected],[email protected]
Joseph Adam Schenkel, Jiaxi Alessia Hu
Durham University, Stockton Road, Durham, DH1 3LE, United Kingdom,
e-mail: [email protected],[email protected]

1
2 Hong, Dreibholz, Schenkel, Hu

the need to worry about maintenance or the computer infrastructure, essentially turn-
ing computation into the “fifth utility” after water, electricity, gas, and telephony [6].
A major advantage of this technology is that computational resources can be used
far more efficiently, resulting in quicker results due to economies of scale. [6] il-
lustrates this point by comparing the costs of operating one server for 1000 hours
versus 1000 servers for one hour. Though the monetary costs may be the same, the
speed of 1000 servers operating in unison to solve a problem greatly reduces the
time needed for the task.
Clouds have five essential qualities that make them useful to consumers [25].
First of all, they can be remotely accessed at any point by a single individual
without requiring any additional human interaction (on-demand self-service). Ad-
ditionally, these networks can be used through various interfaces, including mo-
bile phones, laptops, and desktop computers (broad network access). Cloud Ser-
vice Providers (CSP) also usually rely on multi-tenant models, where resources are
pooled to serve multiple customers (resource pooling). Another feature of cloud
computing is that these networks can be provisioned easily and released to suit con-
sumer needs (rapid elasticity). Finally, cloud systems feature metering capabilities
for their services that can be used for transparent feedback for both provider and
user (measured service). These characteristics make cloud computing attractive for
small businesses as no upfront investment is needed. Additionally, they also reduce
operation costs, are easily accessible and decrease the pressure of having to main-
tain company networks by outsourcing the infrastructure to providers, allowing a
company to focus on core business elements [26].
Currently there are three cloud computing service models that dominate the in-
dustry: Software as a Service (SaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS), and Infras-
tructure as a Service (IaaS). In SaaS, the consumer can operate a software on the
provider’s cloud system, typically over the Internet [25, 26]. In PaaS, the provider
allows the consumer to use the cloud network as a platform for their own developed
or acquired programs. Finally, in IaaS, the consumer is provided with virtual storage
and machines.

End Users Resources Managed at Each Layer

Examples:

Business Applications, Web Services, Multimedia

Google apps,
Facebook, YouTube,
Software as a Saleforce.com
Service (SaaS) Application

Software framework (Java/ Python/ .Net) Microsoft Azure,

Storage (DB/ File)
Platform as a Google AppEngine,
Service (PaaS) Amazon Simple DB/S3
Platforms

Computation (VM) Storage (block) Amazon EC2,

GoGrid,
Flexiscale
Infrastructure
Infrastructure
as a Service (IaaS)
CPU, Memory, Disk, Bandwidth
Data Centres
Hardware

Fig. 1 Cloud Computing Architecture, based on [26]

An Overview of Multi-Cloud Computing 3

The Cloud computing architecture, as shown in Figure 1, consists of four layers,

beginning with the Hardware Layer. The Hardware Layer, as the name suggests,
contains the physical hardware including servers, switches, power, cooling systems,
etc.. Usually, the Hardware Layer takes the form of data centers harbouring thou-
sands of servers. The next level up is the Infrastructure Layer, which operates by
using virtualisation technologies to partition compute and storage resources. The
Platforms Layer is made up of operating systems and application frameworks, and
is mostly used to decrease the strain of deploying applications directly into virtual
machine containers. Finally, the Application Layer consists of the cloud computing
applications, which refers to the applications (SaaS) that are built on the lower levels
(IaaS and PaaS) of the cloud network. For example, the applications that are avail-
able on Google Play or other app stores deliver applications that run some of their
features in clouds, allowing both ease of access and lowering the computational cost
of the app on the device, as operations can be performed in the cloud.
It is important to discuss deployment models, and overall there are four ways
in which cloud computing can be deployed. In the private model, the cloud is pro-
visioned for use by a single organisation with multiple users (e.g. business con-
sumers). The organisation may own and oversee the system, rely on a third party for
service or some combination of the two. In the community cloud model, multiple
organisations may be responsible for cloud provisioning. As with private cloud com-
puting, one or more of the organisations using the community cloud may own and
operate it, rely on third parties, or again, some combination of them. A public cloud
is one that is accessible by the general public and, unlike the previous two types of
cloud computing, they are only available on the premises of the cloud provider (e.g.
university campus), while the others may be accessible off premises. Finally, hybrid
cloud systems incorporate two or more of the above deployment models which re-
main separate entities. However, they are unified by an underlying technology that
allows for data application portability between the units [25].

2 Issues with Cloud Computing

Now that the basics of cloud computing have been reviewed, it is possible to dis-
cuss some of the issues facing this technology. Though cloud computing is useful
to businesses as it removes the need for planned provisioning and grants small busi-
nesses the ability to scale their computing needs growing in line with their business
requirements, there are some issues and challenges facing cloud systems that could
be the subject of future research [26]. Though still in its infancy, the widespread use
of cloud computing has allowed many researchers and businesses to begin to weigh
in on potential issues facing the technology.
Security: One subject of concern cited by many authors is that of data security
and privacy [6,15,26,27]. In a study by [15], security concerns were flagged as a key
issue in 66 research papers reviewed, with the next highest issue being infrastructure
at 46, followed by data management at 15. In this study, practitioners were also
interviewed, expressing additional concerns, however still indicated that security
was a practical issue, highlighting that this is a pressing matter for many researchers
and businesses.
4 Hong, Dreibholz, Schenkel, Hu

Security issues can be subdivided into several subcategories, including: safety

mechanisms, cloud server monitoring, data confidentiality, and avoiding malicious
operations [27]. The authors describe problems pertaining to data storage in cloud
computing networks, separating it into the components of data integrity, data con-
fidentiality, data availability, and data privacy. Maintaining data integrity involves
ensuring that data present within a system cannot be deleted, modified, or fabricated
without authorisation. Data confidentiality is another issue as currently it can be dif-
ficult to protect against both insider threats and external breaches limiting the utility
of cloud networks for sensitive data storage, such as medical records or government
files [33]. Another dimension of security is data availability, or the degree to which
data can be recovered. Finally, data privacy refers to the ability of an individual or
group to privately and selectively share information only amongst themselves.
Despite these concerns, [6] argues that – given the proper preparation – cloud
computing may actually become more secure than other methods. The authors ex-
plain that any obstacles facing cloud computing are also present in traditional sys-
tems and can be solved using technologies that are already used, such as data en-
cryption, virtual local area networking, firewalls, and more.
Legal Concerns: Legal issues, while related to security issues, are another dis-
tinct concern [15, 27]. Data storage rules and laws vary depending on the loca-
tion [6]. Although service level agreements between providers and consumers have
been established, there are currently no standards in place. Adopting cloud comput-
ing storage rules to fit local law may be a challenge in the future, and will require
careful planning and coordination when designing these systems.
Data Management: Perhaps an obvious concern to many is what happens to
the data on cloud computing systems in the event of a catastrophic loss of data. If,
for example, a cloud provider company were to go bankrupt, the data may become
irretrievable. This would present a huge problem for large organisations that are
dependent on data storage [15, 33].
Interoperability: [23] considers interoperability, or the “ability of diverse sys-
tems and organisations to work together (inter-operate)” to be the second-greatest
challenge to cloud computing systems after data security and trust issues. This is
crucial, because it would allow users to avoid vendor lock-in, whereby the user be-
comes dependent on the CSP because they cannot extract their services to other
platforms or clouds. The lack of standardisation means that it can be difficult to
transfer data between cloud systems.
High Latency: Another issue facing cloud computing is the problem of high la-
tency, or a lag from when the transfer of data begins following an instruction for
its transfer. In the context of cloud computing, this is caused by the necessity of
the various nodes in the cloud to communicate with each other. Two solutions have
emerged as potential solutions to this problem: fog computing and edge computing.
Fog computing may be defined as “a scenario where a huge number of heteroge-
neous (wireless and sometimes autonomous) ubiquitous and decentralised devices
communicate and potentially cooperate among them and with the network to per-
form storage and processing tasks without the intervention of third parties.” [31].
Another suggested fog definition is that proposed by [35]. These authors state that
fog computing is “a geographically distributed computing architecture with a re-
source pool that consists of one or more ubiquitously connected heterogeneous de-
vices at the edge of network and not exclusively seamlessly backed by cloud ser-
vices. This network collaboratively provides elastic computation, storage and com-
munication in isolated environments to many clients within proximity”. To combat
An Overview of Multi-Cloud Computing 5

latency [17] suggested a fog-based opportunistic spatio-temporal event processing

system which predicts future query region for moving consumers. It is also impor-
tant to note that there are several types of fog networks. Edge computing is some-
what similar and refers to distributed computing paradigms where computation is
largely performed on edge devices (such as smartphones, and laptops) as opposed
to on the central cloud network itself. Computations are shifted to the periphery of
the system.
Vendor Lock-in: Numerous authors have also discussed the problem of vendor
lock-in, the situation where the client becomes dependent on the provider, making
shifting provider costs expensive, as it is complicated by legal issues, or the tech-
nical incapability of transfer due to incompatibility issues. This issue is related to
the interoperability problem, due to the presence of several cloud systems, many of
which are incompatible with one another. [21] explains that a large part of this issue
stems from the lack of standardisation with reference to operating platforms, Appli-
cation Programming Interfaces (API), Service Level Agreements (SLA) and cloud
semantics causing interoperability (see above) issues. This makes it difficult for a
company to shift its resources from one cloud to another, causing a situation where
a company may become dependent on a single provider. Although some businesses
have already shifted towards cloud technology, the vendor problem poses a consid-
erable barrier to others due to a lack of trust in a single CSP [20]. For instance,
if a business were to hire a CSP, and that provider were to go bankrupt, then the
business could potentially lose all the data on that cloud, making it a considerable
risk. Solutions to this problems are varied, but one example from recent literature
is the standardisation of edge computing [28]. In 2017, the EdgeX Foundry project
was launched with the intent of developing a vendor-neutral framework for Inter-
net of Things (IoT) computing. Meanwhile the Open-Fog consortium has also been
launched as a collaboration between Princeton University and several notable tech
companies including Dell and Microsoft in an attempt to standardise fog computing.
Goal of MELODIC (Multi-cloud Execution-ware for Large-scale Optimised Data-
Intensive Computing) [11, 12] is to provide a vendor-independent middleware to
base cloud applications on.

3 Multi-Cloud Solutions

To help deal with some of the issues mentioned above, the next logical progres-
sion in cloud computing is in multi-cloud computing, or cloud systems that utilise
numerous cloud networks and services simultaneously [13]. In short, multi-cloud
systems simply use more than one CSP, though they come in many subcategories
that will be described below. This is similar to the definition of cross-cloud archi-
tectures, defined as systems that span across multiple provisioning boundaries [14].
Though the exact distinction between multi-clouds and cross-clouds is lacking (as
described in further detail below), it can be understood that in multi-clouds, the user
or business in question utilizes different cloud services for different applications in
their business. For example, they may store data on a private cloud, share documents
on the Google Cloud platform, and perform data analysis on yet another cloud. On
the other hand, cross-cloud architectures are designed to make the transfer of data
and utilisation of apps across the clouds more streamlined and cohesive [14].
 6 Hong, Dreibholz, Schenkel, Hu

There are various rationales for using multi-clouds or cross-clouds, many of

which address some of the issues mentioned in the previous section. According
to [24], multi-cloud computing directly addresses 10 key issues, some of which
have been mentioned above. Furthermore, it is important to realise that these issues
are both shared and specific to the parties involved, including individual customers,
company level customers, and the CSPs. The 10 key issues addressed by multi-cloud
computing are:
1. Dealing with peaks in service/resource requests using external ones on demand;
2. Optimising costs or improving quality of services;
3. Reacting to changes of the offers by the providers;
4. Following constraints such as new locations or laws;
5. Ensuring the high availability of resources and services;
6. Avoiding the dependence on only one external provider;
7. Ensuring backups to deal with disasters or scheduled inactivity;
8. Acting as intermediary;
9. Enhance own Cloud service/resources offers, based on agreements with others;
10. Consuming different services for their particularities not provided elsewhere.
For example, if a company were to provide an online service, and overestimated
how much time the users are spending on their site or application, it may be bene-
ficial to scale down by shifting the infrastructure from lifelong virtual machines to
ephemeral virtual machines, which charge by the minute instead of by the hour, and
therefore reducing costs. In another case, a company manager may find that differ-
ent branches or teams within the company rely on different private or public cloud
infrastructures. So, consolidating the teams would require substantial overhauls to
the underlying logic. In short, changes to the predetermined plan pertaining to ser-
vice provisioning, use, or management are expected challenges to businesses as they
grow, and cross-cloud computing is necessary to deal with the alterations [13, 24].
Another advantage of cross-cloud computing is the avoidance of long-term com-
mitment to a single CSP, tackling issues of interoperability and vendor lock-in. Be-
cause cross-cloud platforms often rely on communicating between their different
cloud components, they may generate new methods of operability, either through
increased standardisation of systems used, or by devising new ways for clouds to
share data with one another on a more universal level. Developing technologies that
would allow the transfer of services to other CSPs would help with this problem and
allow for greater flexibility within the business [13].
Before proceeding, it should be noted that a significant problem in the field of
cloud computing models is a degree of ambiguity present in the literature. As men-
tioned above, standardisation is an issue. However, it also pertains to the definitions
surrounding multi-cloud computing. Some authors, such as [13] categorise multi-
clouds, hybrid clouds, and federation clouds all under cross-cloud computing. On
the other hand, [24] places all of the previous models under “multiple cloud” com-
putation, differentiating between multi-clouds and federation cloud frameworks.
Most recently, [32] classified hybrid and federation infrastructures under multi-
cloud computing, in line with the classification by [24]. For the purposes of this
document, hybrid clouds, multi-clouds, and federation clouds will be treated as dis-
tinct methods to avoid confusion. Future work may benefit from more concrete def-
initions such as those provided by the NIST for cloud computing as a whole [25].
Multi-Cloud: Multi-cloud can be defined as cloud systems in which applica-
tions are hosted as chunks among a heterogeneous network of different cloud. How-
An Overview of Multi-Cloud Computing 7

ever, with multi-cloud the components are all unique cloud systems, not deployment
methods, as is the case with hybrid clouds (see below). As discussed above, some
have used “multi-cloud” as an umbrella term to describe some of the other multi-
cloud systems described below, leading to some ambiguity. So, for the definition
presented here, multi-clouds will specifically refer to a cloud system where multiple
different cloud networks are combined for different roles, with the aim of reducing
the necessary trust requirements among the CSPs [24, 30]. In other words, in multi-
cloud networks, unique CSPs are used for a single business or organisation needs,
and they may all have differing levels of application as well as differing SLAs.
Again, an example of this may be a company that uses a small amount of one cloud
to store or send documents, another private cloud for sensitive company data, and
yet another for data analysis. All the clouds in this case may have different SLAs,
different costs, and different degrees of utilisation by the company.
The reasons for using the multi-cloud approach are varied. For example a busi-
ness may seek to use a multi-cloud approach for legal considerations, where the
business may operate on one cloud, but requires a different cloud to legally store
data. An- other reason is to avoid using a single CSP and [9] proposes an archi-
tectural framework and principles for Programmable Network Clouds hosting Soft-
ware Defined Networking (SDN) and Network Function Virtualisation (NFV) for
geographically distributed multi-cloud computing environments. Costs and SLA-
aware resource provisioning and scheduling that minimised the operating cost with-
out violating the negotiated SLAs were investigated with respect to techniques for
autonomic and timely NFV composition, deployment and management across mul-
tiple Clouds. The authors strongly suggested for future works to investigate opti-
misation techniques that simultaneously optimise the VM/container placement and
traffic consolidation, maximising both SLA satisfaction and reducing costs [9].
Arguably the most useful and well-researched application of multi-cloud archi-
tecture offer enhanced security. [5, 7, 18, 30] describe several multi-cloud architec-
tures with a primary focus on security, specifically with medical records. In this
paper, the authors discuss four mechanisms for enhanced security. The first is appli-
cation imitation, where the clouds within the multi-cloud essentially “double-check”
each other, as results from one cloud can be compared with those in a different cloud,
ensuring data integrity. Layer-wise application partition allows for a separation be-
tween logic and data, protecting against flaws in logic. The application provider
cannot recreate logic entirely from user data unless it is entirely executed on the
cloud users system. Partitioning into segments refers to splitting the application into
smaller segments, which are then run on different clouds, and this process involves
two phases: in the first phase, trusted private clouds receive small computational
parts, while untrusted public clouds handle higher loads. In the second phase, the
computation is shared amongst the untrusted clouds. The final mechanism for in-
creasing security is the distribution of chunks, or simply that data is split amongst
the different clouds within the multi-cloud. In this case, different methods for cryp-
tographic data segmentation have been trialed for the storage and retrieval of data.
Several models have been suggested for these mechanisms. For example, a coop-
erative provable data possession (CPDP) scheme was tested by [36]. However, it had
a problem in that the security parameter π 0 is independent of other parameters, al-
lowing authentication bypass via forgery of π 0 in the response sequence [18]. More
recently, [18] have expanded on integrity checking methods using the Co-Check
scheme, which is based on Boneh-Lynn-Shacham (BLS) signature and homomor-
phic tags [18]. As defined by [8], homomorphism is a property by which a problem
8 Hong, Dreibholz, Schenkel, Hu

in one algebraic system can be converted to a problem in another algebraic system.

The problem can then be solved and converted back, allowing a third party to view
the encrypted information and use it, if it said party had the right tools. Homomor-
phic encryption in other words, is the ability to perform operations or calculations
on encrypted data without the need to decrypt it first. In the Co-Check framework,
users do not have to retrieve the entire data file during the challenge-response and
integrity checking stages of the model (stages II and III). Instead the users generate
the challenges for audition by using parts of the metadata restored at the client side
to prompt the audition efficiency and ensure that malicious CSPs cannot bypass the
check [18]. Other authors have also used homomorphic encryption tools for multi-
cloud security. One of the future research directions for multi-cloud models will
be to experiment with security, as homomorphic encryption is still in infancy with
cloud computing application.
Hybrid Cloud: Hybrid clouds are probably the most common type of multi-
cloud framework, and are defined as a subset of multi-cloud networks in which
private cloud deployment methods are combined with one or more public ones. Un-
like a multi-cloud, the deployment methods are not entirely unique clouds. Hybrid
clouds are useful to businesses aiming to share some of their data across various user
types, yet still desire to keep certain elements confidential [3]. For example, one area
where hybrid clouds are currently being explored is in the field of medicine, where
big data is becoming increasingly available. Recently, [19] explored security so-
lutions for healthcare data using linear network coding and re-encryption based on
ElGamal cryptography in the form of hybrid approach. To provide security and fault
tolerance for cloud storage, the authors considered a linear network coding mecha-
nism and used the ElGamal re-encryption scheme to encode the key matrix securely.
One of the key distinctions between hybrid clouds and multi-clouds is the nature of
the work performed on the systems. Because multi-clouds use distinct clouds, they
can often be used to handle a variety of tasks and services for a company. On the
other hand, hybrid clouds are more unified in their framework and usually used to
handle one task, such storing and distributing medical records, in a secure fashion.
Federated Cloud Computing: The key distinction for federated cloud comput-
ing is that the CSPs agree to share resources. In this system, CSPs share the client
load under a single umbrella federation. This grants the client access to a poten-
tial catalogue of services and resources available and increases the interoperability
as well as the portability of applications. [32] gives the example of the EU-based
EGI Federated Cloud, which unites more than 20 cloud providers and 300 data cen-
ters. Federated clouds can address the vendor lock-in problem in that applications.
Furthermore, data can be migrated from one cloud to another more easily than in a
pure multi-cloud system, due to the underpinning SLAs. Federated cloud computing
likely benefits smaller providers, as they allow to cover each other’s weaknesses.
Cross-Cloud Computing: According to [14], a cross-cloud application is one
that utilizes more than one cloud API under a single version of the application.
Cross-cloud architecture may use either dynamically interchangeable APIs or non-
dynamically interchangeable APIs, so long as the APIs in question are divergent.
The literature referring to cross-cloud systems is sparse when compared to the
frameworks mentioned above, and this may be due to the lack of specificity of def-
inition. Even in the [14] paper referenced above, the author defined hybrid-clouds,
multi-clouds, and federated clouds as subclassifications of cross-cloud computing,
not multi-cloud computing, raising questions as to what the actual distinction be-
tween the two is, and what constitutes a “cross-cloud”.
An Overview of Multi-Cloud Computing 9

Regardless of this ambiguity, recent work proposes different cross-cloud archi-

tectures for different ends, and in some cases merges the idea of cross-cloud systems
with some of the other multi-cloud models described above. One idea that appears
to pervade cross-cloud is the notion of the “cloud broker” – an entity that manages
the use, performance, and delivery of cloud services, and negotiates relationships
between CSPs and consumers [25]. [2] suggested a broker-based cross-cloud fed-
eration manager as a business model for federated cloud networks. More recently,
cross-cloud computing has been highlighted as a potential solution for the problem
of Big Data management in the IoT [29].

4 Research Directions and Considerations for the Future

In the sections above, we have outlined how multi-cloud computing frameworks

can address some of the issues facing cloud computing as a whole, such as data
security and vendor lock-in avoidance. That being said, there are several other ap-
plications for multi-cloud computing networks. Two of the major themes currently
being explored in the literature are cloud computing and Big Data as well as Ma-
chine Learning. The following, we will describe some of the challenges and current
projects in these fields.
Big Data: Though data management has always been an issue with cloud com-
puting, the looming goal of processing vast quantities of data is one of the major
topics facing current research. The most obvious application of big data is again,
medical, where vast quantities of patient information will need to be stored and pro-
cessed over large cloud computing networks. This problem is compounded when
medical wearables are introduced, gathering and sending even more information
into the relevant cloud networks, and decentralising data sources. This new in-
terconnectivity between household electronics, smart devices, computers, vehicle
monitoring equipment and any other devices that allow for the collection and ex-
change of data is referred to as the IoT, and presents a large hurdle for data analysis,
as the data will likely come from a multitude of sources. Due to the sheer volume of
data that either currently exists or is being generated, traditional analytic methods
cannot keep up [29]. This data must be processed efficiently, analysed (horizontally
and vertically), and transferable between different cloud systems. For example, in
the case of medical records, a centralised system may work well within a nation-
alised healthcare system. However, they must also be able to account for peripheral
services, such as private practices, which may use alternative cloud systems. It is
important that these private firms possess the ability to feed medical information
into the larger, more mainstream sources.
One solution to the problem of big data storage proposed in 2012 is the idea of
the “rain cloud”, a multi-cloud model where each member cloud completes an SLA
with other member clouds that allow them to work together when data gets too large
for any single cloud to handle [9]. Hybrid clouds are also thought to be useful for
big data management, as the combination between private and public deployment
allows for confidentiality when different parties require differing (unequal) levels
of access to the available data. In many cases businesses may require portions of
their data and infrastructure to remain behind the corporate firewall due to industry
standards, legal regulations, or their own desire for privacy [22]. Other approaches
10 Hong, Dreibholz, Schenkel, Hu

involve divvying up data amongst clouds for rapid data storage. In Hadoop, an open
source implementation of Google’s method for data storage, large volumes of data
are cut into more manageable chunks across thousands of computers. A parallelised
programming API is then used to distribute the computations to where the data is
located and to aggregate the results. This method has tremendous application for
bioinformatics and genomics. However, the technical savvy and lack of bioinfor-
matics tools that run in parallel has proven to be a barrier up until very recently [4].
They reviewed various big data cloud computing frameworks including Hadoop,
Spark and Flink. It will be interesting to see what further improvements will be
made and how multi-cloud computing architectures will integrate these approaches.
Finally [29] also mentions the use of Amazon Elastic Map Reduce, IBM BigIn-
sights, and Microsoft Azure HDInsight as methods for allowing accessible large-
scale data processing frameworks, namely Apache Hadoop, and Apache Spark.
Machine Learning: Although related to big data, machine learning presents its
own sets of challenges and applications for use with cloud computing technologies.
Given the availability of data stored in clouds (e.g. photographs and videos), there
is a wealth of information that can be processed by machine learning algorithms.
Techniques such as virtual machine optimisation for healthcare services are being
trialed and studied, and show promise, but must be trialed with other diseases to
demonstrate consistency [1]. [16] has explored the use of hybrid cloud storage and
machine learning for use in the oil and gas industry, where technical documents
contain valuable information from disciplines like geoscience and engineering and
are in general stored in a unstructured format. To improve data extraction and util-
isation, the authors propose a machine-learning-enabled platform, consisting of a
carefully selected sequence of algorithms, developed as a hybrid cloud container
that automatically reads and understands the technical documents with little human
supervision. The user can upload raw data to the platform, which is stored on a pri-
vate local server. Structured data is generated as output, which is pushed through to
a search engine that is accessible to the user via the cloud. This allows for a user to
quickly identify the most important parts of technical documents, automate the ex-
traction or relevant data from the documents, present the data in a meaningful way
for further analysis, and finally, allows the user to share it easily and port it to other
platforms.
Future directions for machine learning and multi-cloud computing research in-
clude a shift towards the wide-scale adoption of auto-tuners, especially for the SaaS
layer of the Cloud. [10] also anticipate the advent of new automated tools for cloud
users to benefit from the experience of other users through partially automated ap-
plication builders, automated database sharers, query optimisers, or smart load bal-
ancers and service replicators. In other words, the interface between cloud, applica-
tion, and user, is expected to become more streamlined and intuitive based on what
is learned from the user experience. As security has always been a key concern for
cloud networks of any kind, novel machine learning methods may be used for in-
creased security measures. However, the authors did not specify what these may
look like or on what they would be based, representing a future area of research
application.
An Overview of Multi-Cloud Computing 11

5 Conclusion

Cloud computing is a blossoming technology with numerous applications in many

industries, including remote computing and storage. Though vendor lock-in and cy-
ber security are major concerns hybrid clouds, multi-clouds, and federation clouds
may address some of these problems by providing users with alternatives in the case
of scheduled maintenance, breaches, or shut-downs, though each has their own ben-
efits and disadvantages. Hybrid systems are easily customised to a given application,
however less transferable, and often used for only one task whereas multi-clouds and
federated clouds are suited for businesses that require multiple tasks or services. Fu-
ture work should incorporate multi-cloud paradigms and combine them with other
technologies such as machine learning and big data, as these technologies can either
be used to solve some of the current issues with cloud computing, such as increasing
security, or can be used for entirely new methods of analysis.

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