Cloud Database Management

Business Optima defines the cloud database management system (DBMS) market as being that for products from vendors that supply fully provider-managed public or private cloud software systems that manage data in cloud storage. Data is stored in a cloud storage tier (such as a cloud object store, a distributed data store or other proprietary cloud storage infrastructure), and may use multiple data models — relational, non-relational (document, key-value, wide-column, graph), geospatial, time series and others.

Considerations for cloud databases

• Control options: Users can opt for a virtual machine image managed like a traditional database or a provider’s database as a service (DBaaS).
• Database technology: SQL databases are difficult to scale but very common. NoSQL databases scale more easily but do not work with some vvvvvvapplications.
• Security: Most cloud database providers encrypt data and provide other security measures; organizations should research their options.
• Maintenance: When using a virtual machine image, one should ensure that IT staffers can maintain the underlying infrastructure.