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What does cloud-agnostic mean and does it matter to your environment? Below are some things to consider when taking the cloud-agnostic approach.

Cloud computing is constantly evolving and because of that, there are inconsistencies and confusion around the industry and best practices.

What Does Cloud Agnostic Mean? (How Does It Differ from Cloud Native?)

Cloud agnostic can be a confusing term because it is also cloud-native. With the vast number of cloud-agnostic and cloud-native applications growing, it’s important to know the differences.

Cloud agnostic refers to the tools, platforms, and/or applications that are compatible with cloud infrastructure environments. Cloud agnostic can be moved to and from different cloud environments without any operational or compatibility issues.

When company IT systems are not locked into a single cloud vendor or rely on one cloud provider’s proprietary services, services can be spread between multiple cloud vendors to preserve uptime of critical applications.

In most demanding organizations, core services that need to be fail-safe should be on a cloud-agnostic platform. They may also have other applications that rely specifically on cloud vendors or on-premise infrastructure systems.

Cloud-Native

Cloud-agnostic usually has a comparison with cloud-native. Cloud-native is an architectural style where applications are typically designed to run on a specific platform or environment.

In many cases, applications can be moved around to different cloud platforms making them also cloud-agnostic. Cloud-native is usually used if the application is designed to run in the cloud from the beginning. Cloud-Native can run on public, private, or hybrid cloud platforms.

Cloud-Agnostic Vs. Cloud-Native Applications

The cloud-agnostic approach has various benefits such as not being locked into a specific vendor. Businesses maintain optimal performance of their applications, regardless of the cloud environment being used.

Since cloud-agnostic offers the option of multiple cloud vendors, built-in redundancies are available to resolve any issues that occur.

Some organizations, however, take a cloud-native approach for applications that are designed to be used on a single cloud platform. This may sometimes be an option to take advantage of a provider’s services and features and usually means that the application can run more efficiently.

Considerations Between Cloud Agnostic and Cloud-Native

Security and Compliance – Since cloud-native applications are built with the cloud provider in mind, the provider’s API may be considered for security and compliance features.

The APIs between a cloud provider can be different, which can make it difficult to have an application work seamlessly on different cloud providers. If unable to utilize the application’s built-in features, you must ensure that security and compliance are in place for the application.

Integration and Portability – Most cloud providers offer similar services, but have features such as HIPAA compliance or government hosting. Cloud agnostic applications can address the requirements of the vendor. Cloud-native helps with integration as long as the cloud-native application is built for the cloud and not a specific cloud provider.

Continuous Monitoring – Monitoring solutions should work across multiple cloud providers, not just one. Cloud-native solutions make it easier for a business to use a cloud vendor’s monitoring solution. Cloud agnostic must not rely on one monitoring solution if utilizing multiple platforms to ensure that it will alert if a platform is having an issue.

Drawbacks of Cloud Agnostic

Be cautious about potential drawbacks. Although organizations can avoid being locked into a single vendor, this can also be a disadvantage for the engineering team.

Cloud agnostic allows organizations tp transfer across multiple cloud providers but means the engineering team is not able to take advantage of proprietary services of cloud providers which can slow down the team.

Another drawback of cloud-agnostic is dealing with data transfer costs.

Often organizations benefit from a hybrid or multi-service approach rather than a cloud-agnostic one. They can lock into one single cloud provider and build their application while taking advantage of best-of-breed services from multiple vendors.

Conclusion

Cloud-agnostic vs. cloud-native isn’t an either-or decision or solution. You don’t have to pick just one.

Align with the plan and requirements of your organization. Cost is often a deciding factor Cloud agnostic solutions are ideal for businesses that want to avoid being locked into a cloud vendor. Understand costs and the value of each business unit regardless of whether you build cloud-agnostic, cloud-native, or both.

Originally posted 2022-03-08 00:03:29. Republished by Blog Post Promoter