Cloud Connectivity Options

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Cloud connectivity is the mechanism by which clients connect to whatever infrastructure, platform, or software that the tenant has configured in the cloud.

• multiple connectivity scenarios:
  • Permitting secure access to the cloud for individual hosts or users
  • Connecting on-premises networks with cloud infrastructure
  • Connecting cloud infrastructure established in different geographical regions
  • Creating multicloud infrastructure using different cloud providers

Internet/VPN

A virtual private network (VPN) solution means that the tenant configures a VPN gateway for the VPC.

• can establish a connection to this VPN gateway using either
  • a client-to-site model
  • a site-to-site model
    • used to connect cloud instances to an on-premises network or to another provider’s cloud
    • Within the cloud, a virtual customer gateway is configured to represent the public IP address and security properties of the on-premises site
• advantages
  • cost-effective
  • straightforward to setup
• disadvantages
  • connection running over the Internet can suffer from poor performance
    • latency and bandwidth throttling
    • so not used for mission-critical or high-volume application

Direct Connect/Colocation

• colocation within a datacenter offers a higher bandwidth solution by providing a direct connect or private link
• establishes infrastructure:
  • within a datacenter supported by the cloud provider
  • or provisions a direct connect link from their enterprise network to the datacenter
    • datacenter installs a cross-connect cable or VLAN between the customer and the cloud provider
      • establishing a low-latency, high-bandwidth secure link
    • preferred for organizations which have a more centralized operation
      • connection to the cloud can be from the main HQ
      • company’s own enterprise network is used to allow branch locations access

Transit Gateways

• Connectivity can be configured:
  • between VPCs in the same account or with VPCs belonging to different accounts
  • between VPCs and on-premises networks
• Configuring additional VPCs rather than subnets within a VPC,
  • allows for a greater degree of segmentation between instances
• complex network might split segments between different VPCs across different cloud accounts for performance or compliance reasons
• VPCs can be interconnected using peering relationships and connected with on-premises networks using VPN gateways
  • one-to-one VPC peering relationship
  • can quickly become difficult to manage
    • if each VPC must interconnect in a mesh-like structure
• transit gateway is a simpler means of managing these interconnections
  • is a virtual router that handles routing between the subnets in each attached VPC and any attached VPN gateways