Automated analysis of cloud offerings for optimal service provisioning

Abstract

Cloud computing paradigm has brought an overwhelming variety of cloud services from different providers, each one offering a plethora of configuration and purchasing options for them. Users may have certain requirements and preferences not only concerning service configuration, but also with respect to their usage schedule. In this situation, an appropriate provisioning plan considering all restrictions would help users to achieve their goals while taking into account the different available providers, their pricing and even the usage discounts they provide. In this work, we describe an automated solution that analyzes user needs that include scheduling restrictions to obtain optimized provisioning plans for different cloud providers, which allow users to compare several offerings that possibly consider volume or usage discounts. We validate this solution against a realistic use case, while also providing a prototype implementation in the form of publicly available microservices.