How do operators use open source software to develop cloud computing
Hong Kong server On February 21, it was reported that cloud computing has lowered the threshold for users and enterprises to use information applications, making IT resources become a social public infrastructure like water and electricity. As a communication infrastructure provider, it is inevitable for operators to upgrade from IDC rental service providers to cloud service providers. At present, the three major domestic operators have entered the cloud computing market through various forms. Most of them adopt the construction mode of providing cloud computing services externally after the integration of commercial software. Compared with the mode of self-developed systems adopted by other cloud computing companies at home and abroad, they face high costs, difficult maintenance and other problems. In the initial stage, when operators do not have core R&D capabilities, how to quickly build self-developed systems becomes an unavoidable problem for operators to develop cloud computing.
The emergence of open source software has given operators the opportunity to stand on the shoulders of giants. It has proved that open source software has the ability to even surpass commercial software in terms of business model, technology development and practical application, and its ecosystem development is more healthy and sustainable. From the perspective of business model, software, like all other types of tools or means of production, has two different economic values: sales value and use value. Generally speaking, sales value refers to the cost paid by users to purchase software, while use value refers to the cost paid or implicit expenditure incurred by users in the later use of software. Under the impact of the Internet business model, the sales value continues to decline, while the use value continues to rise. The emergence of open source software is just in line with this development trend. Users can obtain open source software at a very low cost, but they need high costs (including manpower) to transform, update and maintain open source software. Therefore, we can think that in the mature field in the future, the market share of open source software will continue to rise, and the cloud computing market has entered a stage of steady development. Open source software will become the mainstream of cloud computing software, while commercial software will become a supplement.
From the perspective of technology development, open source software generally operates in a community mode, generally including participants, contributors, co developers, project management committee and other roles. Participants can put forward needs for help, contributors and co developers can solve problems, maintain code, and the project management committee can be responsible for the technical development and major decisions of the entire community. Operators Software providers and individual developers can participate in different roles, forming a closed loop of demand, development and maintenance. At the same time, a well functioning open source software community gathers high-end personnel in this field through the Internet, thus ensuring the technological leadership of the entire open source software. Open source has become the de facto standard in the field of cloud computing, Source code has replaced the traditional natural language standards, and following the mature open source projects has become an important basis for technology selection. In terms of practical applications, Internet companies, traditional IT companies, and communication equipment manufacturers are paying more and more attention to cloud computing open source software. Internet companies such as Tencent, Ali, Ctrip, and JD have all applied open source software in the field of cloud computing and achieved good results. Traditional IT companies such as Citrix VMWare、 Microsoft and others also attach great importance to open source software, acquiring a large number of companies engaged in open source software development, and open source some of their core software. Communication equipment manufacturers such as Huawei also use a large number of open source software in their cloud computing products, and have established an open source software research institute to focus on open source software research and development. In addition to using open source software, these companies have also returned their research and development achievements to the open source community, promoting community development and improving the company image.
Therefore, in the field of cloud computing, the application of open source software is the trend of the times. As a heavyweight player in the cloud computing market, operators must seize this historical opportunity, raise the application of open source software to the level of strategic development, and deepen their work from the aspects of technology development tracking, operation mode transformation, and talent team transformation, so that they can possibly keep up with the tide of cloud computing development.
First of all, in terms of technology development, it is important to follow the latest trend of current cloud computing development, and horizontally expand the cloud deployment scheduling of computing, network, and storage resources on the underlying resources. In terms of computing, KVM new virtualization technology can be used, supplemented by Docker container technology to achieve more precise and rapid scheduling and scaling of resources. Open source projects such as OpenDaylight and ONOS can be tracked in the network technology evaluation, So as to realize flexible scheduling and deployment of data network resources; Software defined storage can actively explore OpenStack Swift Ceph， Realize centralized and flexible scheduling of storage resources; The core network element and application software need to further deepen cloud transformation, adopt NFV technology for the core network element, track the latest development of OPNFV, adopt standardized architecture for application software, and realize cloud deployment of software resources.
Secondly, the operation mode should be changed. It is necessary to establish a procurement, deployment, operation and maintenance system that conforms to the development law of open source software, establish a procurement model of open source software in the procurement link, and take the use of open source software and open source R&D capability as the evaluation criteria for procurement, such as whether to use open source software that has been evaluated to meet the needs, and how many open source community personnel there are, Optimize the original mode of bidding and centralized purchase, reduce the purchase amount of sales value, increase the purchase amount of use value, and encourage the use of self-developed open source software to reduce the construction cost of cloud computing; Standardized processes need to be established in the deployment and operation and maintenance links, and more automatic deployment and operation and maintenance tools are used to improve efficiency, so as to meet the requirements of rapid and flexible expansion in the Internet application mode.
Finally, to transform the talent team, it is necessary to cultivate an open source talent team that meets the needs of enterprises. Open source software reduces the difficulty of initial development, which is an opportunity as well as a challenge for operators. The opportunity means that operators may partially get rid of the equipment manufacturers who use open source software to develop their own software; The challenge is that open source software has high requirements for personnel development ability. The original personnel structure of operators does not have such skills. Creating an open source talent team through recruitment and retraining is a necessary path for operators to embrace open source. Operators need to expand recruitment channels, change recruitment standards, and introduce more genuine open source talent, Through the introduction of open source talents, the existing personnel will be trained and re employed to build an open source development team with R&D strength.
At present, some domestic and foreign operators have promoted software research and development to the core strategic level of their company's development. For example, in June 2015, AT&T put forward the Domain2.0 plan, which mentioned that in 2020, AT&T will become a software company, 75% of the network will be composed of software, and the whole network will be clouded through SDN and NFV; China Mobile has set up R&D centers in Suzhou and Hangzhou to focus on cloud computing, big data and other fields to strengthen its core competitiveness in software research and development. At the same time, active operators can also be seen in many open source communities and organizations. Various international standardization organizations led by operators, such as ITU ETSI, OMA, etc. have also been cooperating with the open source community. Open source software gives operators a hand in developing cloud computing. Operators must seize the opportunity of this era to open up broader business space.
