How Does Google Cloud Storage Work?

There are multiple prospects already at play depicting the future of the cloud, the internet and technology itself. It can get a little complicated to determine the absolute point of where we are headed. Cloud computing has provided us with many benefits, the markets have flourished, jobs have been created and the users are being served the right way. This is the new digital age where software and hardware co-exist in a remote fashion, with the ability to scale up or down depending on a business’ goals.

Scalability is not a problem anymore. We have immersive storage and system deployment, such as updates, security patches and various other items that can be deployed to the customers in real-time. Various companies are going head-to-head in the battle for taking a front seat to transferring all of their assets and operations to the cloud.

It is a great overall initiative where you get to enjoy unlimited speeds, customization to cover your needs and great architecture that won't slow down.

This has given way to various companies that have started their journey as cloud computing companies, such as AWS by Amazon, Azure by Microsoft and GCP by Google.

This article will specifically be directed to the Google Cloud Platform, explaining what it is, why you should use it, the storage-based options available and how they work. The other cloud computing platforms have their own ups and downs, and the Google Cloud Platform is no different in that regard. Let’s see why GCP is rising in popularity:

GCP: Google Cloud Platform

Google has recently launched their cloud computing service which consists of many elements that businesses might be interested in. The service that Google offers is a little different and dynamic. It is based on a separate and completely different architecture than other cloud vendors called Google Cloud Platform. With outsourcing your production and operations while increasing the workflow at consistent cloud computing speeds, the idea of using GCP emerges among various professional entities.

You can deploy servers as many as you want, and increase/decrease the storage, computing and speed at which the work is done or data gets processed. The technology which Google implements is nothing like the rest of the cloud vendors.

You might have grasped a sense of understanding and introduction for the Google Cloud Platform, such as what it is, who owns it and other basic ideas. The next thing you need to know is the benefits that it provides clients and enterprises and how they can leverage intensive resources to get their work done by Google Cloud. The basic interface of the GCP in the cloud is simple, intuitive and well put together so that anyone who doesn't have a background in cloud computing could be able to easily use it and get their work done.

When you get to the web-based GCP console, you will get to work with a variety of different resources offered by Google. You can run a simulation similar to what you do and what your end-goals are to create a sense of a package, such as what the most common resources from the Google Cloud Platform that you will use and how you can best utilize them.

This will allow you to carefully pick whatever resources you will be in constant need of and develop a price model around it. You don’t have to worry about anything, as you will only be charged for the resources used. You can also leverage any volume of the said resource as long as it gets your work done.

Available Tools?

There are a lot of tools on the Google Cloud Platform, and some of them might be of some use to you while others not so much. That is why it is easier to break all aspects of the platform into your primary computing needs and how these will get served:

IaaS

Infrastructure as a service (IaaS) is a model in which the enterprises don’t have to spend anything on developing their own infrastructure, as everything will be provided by the cloud platform. When your workload is changing all the time and requires sudden optimization, then you should be considering this option. You can get your hands on as much computing power as required by your project or company, and you can definitely scale up and down at any given point.

PaaS

Platform as a service (PaaS) is a model in which the operating system along with the hardware that happens with the IaaS is provided to the professionals. All the software-based, middleware and operating system-based requirements of the users can also be fulfilled here. The vendors will host and manage all of these elements.

SaaS

Software as a service (SaaS) is a model that finds its application almost everywhere. There are tools and software systems that are available on the subscription-based model and users can use them all they want for a fixed monthly or yearly fee. These kinds of systems are only available on the web, which means that the host will be responsible for managing, hosting, implementing and deploying the services to the end clients. You pay for the service, use it and the cycle repeats itself. You don’t have to download the program onto your machine or anything like that. You will only have to interact with the web-based integration and use the service—nothing else.

Google App Engine

It is a platform as a service (PaaS) engine and can be used for hosting the web applications directly, which means a variety of mobile and web-based applications can be developed and deployed using this engine.

Google Container Engine

It allows users to develop Docker-based containers using the prime architecture of the Google Cloud engine and work with hybrid networking.

The core set of services that are provided by the Google Cloud Platform includes:

• Compute
• Networking
• Storage and databases
• AI and ML
• Big data
• Identity and security
• Management tools

What is Cloud Storage?

Cloud storage is a service that helps you store your objects within the Google Cloud. The object can be referred to as a piece of data or information that can reside in any possible format within the containers that are called buckets. All buckets, and there can be many of them depending on the categories that you have made for your data, are associated with a dedicated project, and every project can be listed under the organization. In general, this is the basic working of Google Cloud storage.

All you have to do is start with a single organization and list a single project, and under that specific project you can continue developing buckets and as many of them as you like. Then you will be able to upload objects or data into the bucket and download data or objects from the bucket. There are various other integrated tools that can make your work easier, such as being able to grant permissions to make your data accessible to other third-party members of another enterprise or specific employees from your organization that you specify will be able to interact or access your objects.

Basic tools for cloud storage

Cloud storage can't be run alone and requires an intricate harmony between various tools that are going to be used for making the best out of them. Here is a list of possible cloud storage tools:

Console: To manage your data in a browser, the Google Cloud Platform provides you with a visual interface that is known as the console.

gsutil: gsutil can be taken as a command line terminal that can be used to interact with your cloud’s storage. If you are using other services, then you can download the cloud SDK that will allow you to have both gsutil and G Cloud tool to be used for other various services.

Client Libraries: You can manage all of your important data along with other various elements of the cloud storage in your preferred language including C++, C#, Java, Python or Ruby.

Rest APIs: Manage all of your data using the JSON or XML application programming interface

Securing Your Data on the Google Cloud Storage

When you have started to upload all of your objects into the GCP cloud storage, you get to decide to use a variety of different options on how to better secure and share your data. The following are some of the ways that will allow you to secure all of your precious data into the cloud storage:

Identity and Access Management: You must be using identity and access management to allow who gets to access all your objects and who doesn’t. This way you will be able to allow access to whomever that you want to and restrict anyone that you don’t want anything to do with your current cloud storage. It is as easy as it gets. You can provide all types of access to the members, such as for updating, creating or deleting any entry that they want to or as per the permission allotted to them.

Data Encryption: Encryption is always of the essence when it comes to securing your precious data and stopping it from coming into the hands of cybercriminals and hackers. You can implement various different data encryption systems, such as having your own customer-managed encryption keys or customer applied encryption keys. Talking about the default encryption, you get to have server-side encryption, which is more than enough for guarding your data within the cloud channels.

Authentication: Make sure that anyone you have provided access to has or is using proper credentials to gain access to cloud storage. You can implement the use of dual-factor authentication, which enables to user to authenticate themselves twice before they can have any access to what lies in your buckets.   

Bucket Lock: Interesting enough, like the folder lock or drive lock that you will be able to practice with in Windows, the Google cloud stage provides you with the bucket lock system, which helps you lock your objects within the bucket and can only have be accessed through a code. But make sure that the lock uses a retention policy.

Object Versioning: If you have enabled the object versioning feature, then any dedicated object that you have deleted or replaced can be restrained as a noncurrent version. This can be made available to you on request and can help in the restoration of the object or said pieces of data, if enabled.                   

If you want to develop a career around Google Cloud, then it is important that you complete a particular Google Cloud certification and engage in cloud training to help you become an expert in using the cloud.