Organizations are increasingly adopting cloud-based services such as SaaS-based apps and using hybrid
and multi-cloud approaches. While the cloud has its advantages, it can create new challenges for IT and
network operations teams.
These teams are still responsible for ensuring that all of the connections
between various components and services are available and performant. And when problems occur,
they need to be identified quickly so that they can be resolved, performance can be optimized, and the
user experience can remain seamless. Yet, many traditional network monitoring tools can’t provide
visibility to and through the cloud. So, as more workloads move to the cloud, the view across the end-to-
end network gets increasingly, well, cloudy.
To further complicate things, there’s a lot more to the end-to-end network path than simply the
enterprise and the cloud. Whether users are located within the walls of an enterprise office or are
remotely connected, to access cloud-based resources, they may need to rely on ISPs, transit provider
networks, or may be using SD-WAN from a service provider. In addition there’s the network routing
inside the actual cloud environment. These “north-south” dependencies are often made up of networks
that an enterprise does not own and for which they lack visibility. As an example, complaints could be
made from users of slow access to business critical apps and this problem may only be happening with
one particular region or ISP.
Having insight into the impact of ISV networks on the complete end-to-end
network path is one example of the visibility that is needed for teams to be successful in safeguarding
the performance of connections to the cloud.
Increasingly, a new challenge is emerging — understanding the network connections between cloud
environments. When data is passed between cloud-based apps or an app is built on a multi-cloud
architecture, it is commonly referred to as “east-west” traffic. Again, an enterprise does not own any of
the infrastructure associated with east-west traffic and lacks visibility.
Some examples of this multi-cloud visibility challenge include connecting to a service on one public cloud provider from another, cross-region performance for a cloud provider, cloud to BPaaS or cloud to SaaS applications.
How can cloud visibility be regained?
To regain the visibility lost in the move to cloud, organizations must adopt a solution which enables
active monitoring for the complete end-to-end paths across cloud services and applications. With active
monitoring, network operations teams get visibility and insight into the entire network path from the
user to the cloud and even between clouds. This is accomplished by sending test packets every minute
(with less than 1% overhead) across the network, whether owned or 3rd party, to see exactly what is
happening to and through any cloud resource.
Active monitoring is enabled by placing Monitoring Points placed on-premises, inside virtual hosts or
containers, on end-user workstations, or next to the app. This provides complete end-to-end visibility
for any network so network operations teams can assure reliable and performant cloud connectivity for
their organizations.
Visibility enables accountability
When active monitoring is applied to the complete network path from the user to cloud resources, it
quickly becomes clear where problems that affect the network experience are coming from. Whether
it’s a cloud provider, ISP or even the end-user’s home Wi-Fi, active monitoring can determine the source
of the problem, reducing Mean Time to Innocence (MTTI) and helping operations teams to avoid the
blame game. Active monitoring can provide the insight needed to make sure the source of the issue is
held accountable.
As phases of cloud transformation are rolled out, active monitoring can provide early indication of
trouble spots, isolating the source and giving IT operations teams the focus needed to address the
problems fast, increasing the rate of transformation as well as allowing teams to prove success of their
initiatives.
Active monitoring that focuses on the network and enables a hop-by-hop understanding of the
complete network delivery to and through any application or cloud is paramount as more and more of
the underlying networks are not owned by an enterprise. With this network-centric understanding of
user and network experience, network operations teams are empowered through new insights that
enable clear visibility in a ‘cloudy’ world.
Learn more about how enhanced network visibility can help you achieve cloud transformation
success.
