A cloud application, or cloud app, is a software program where cloud-based and local components work together.
Cloud application servers are typically located in a remote data center operated by a third-party cloud services infrastructure provider.
Assuming a reasonably fast internet connection, a well-written cloud application offers all the interactivity of a desktop application, along with the portability of a web application.
Cloud applications can be updated, tested and deployed quickly and on-demand, providing enterprises with fast time to market and agility.
Third-party data sources and data storage services can be accessed with an API. Cloud applications can be kept smaller by using APIs to hand data to applications or API-based back-end services for processing or analytics computations, with the results handed back to the cloud application.
In IaaS cloud computing services, the infrastructure - including physical servers, networks, virtualization and storage - is managed by a provider on behalf of the user via a public cloud or a private cloud.
The term cloud application has gained great cachet, sometimes leading application vendors with any online aspect to brand them as cloud applications.
A web application or web-based application must have a continuous internet connection to function.
Conversely, a cloud application or cloud-based application performs processing tasks on a local computer or workstation.
If the remote server becomes unavailable in a cloud application, the software installed on the local user device can still operate, although it cannot upload and download data until the service at the remote server is restored.
CRM. A CRM application such as Salesforce that is accessed through a browser under a fee-based SaaS arrangement is a web application.
An example of a word-processing cloud application that is installed on a workstation is Microsoft Office 365 Word.
The cloud aspect comes into play when users save work to an Office 365 cloud server.
Zoom, which is a video conferencing and collaboration app, is an example of a cloud application.
Cloud applications such as Dropbox provide cloud storage and synchronization services.
Cloud applications don't face version control issues since users can access and run only the version available on the cloud.
A cloud application must consider internet communications with numerous clouds and the likelihood of accessing data from multiple sources simultaneously.
Using API calls, a cloud application might rely on other cloud services for specialized processing.
Testing should be done to ensure that a cloud application can perform under certain circumstances such as network latency or high user load. This can help identify bottlenecks and optimize the application's performance.
Testing can help identify vulnerabilities in the security of cloud applications as well as protect sensitive data.
This Cyber News was published on www.techtarget.com. Publication date: Mon, 18 Mar 2024 19:43:06 +0000