Choosing the right type of cloud deployment is vital and an integral part of every industry. Knowing the difference between private, public, and community cloud ensures that an educated decision is being made.
The community cloud is a new concept that is somewhere between Public and Private Cloud.
What is a Community Cloud?
Essentially, it is a hybrid form of a private cloud and has the same ability to use set levels of security and privacy. It’s a platform that lets other organizations work on a shared platform. The goal is to let multiple customers work on joint projects and applications that belong to the community. Governments, healthcare companies, or even large manufacturing companies would all be an ideal industry to utilize a community cloud environment.
Here are a few examples of the advantages and disadvantages of a Community Cloud deployment model.
Benefits of Community Cloud
Flexible and Scalable
With this type of deployment, compatibility among users is guaranteed and properties can be modified on an individual use case. This also lets companies better interact with remote employees.
As this cloud is a community of users, it is scalable with services, hardware resources, and manpower. This type of cloud looks at the account demand growth and pivots according to the users needs.
Secure
Community deployments operate in a similar way to their private counterparts. Users are able to configure security levels for their own data. Compromising data hurts all of the tenants in the cloud.
Convenience and Control
Resources, infrastructure, cloud resources, and more are all shared among the organizations. All of the tenants share and own the community cloud infrastructure, so decisions are made collaboratively. Data is kept closer to them but has less complexity than a Private cloud.
Challenges
Data Is Accessible Between Organizations
Because data is housed in the same location, any data stored there might be accessible by others. This can lead to overall security concerns about the rules and regulations to compliance within a community cloud. For example, the systems of one group may have to adhere to the regulations of all the other organizations as well.
Not a “One-Size-Fits-All”
As a relatively new and unique cloud deployment, community clouds are not a great fit for many organizations and should be looked at on a case-by-case basis. It’s unnecessary for small business, medium businesses, and most large businesses.
Shared Storage and Bandwidth
Finite data storage and bandwidth is being shared among community members. It can be challenging to prioritize.
This recent cloud computing model is a great option for businesses seeking cost-effective cloud services to collaborate on joint projects. This cloud deployment is unique in that it caters to the specific needs of a group of users. Cloud computing continues to expand as technology evolves, and there will soon be even more deployment options available to businesses and consumers.