THE FUTURE OF SERVERLESS EVERYTHING

The automation of processes, operations, and tasks uses cloud computing to new levels with serverless computing services already available.

Serverless computing is a form of cloud computing and does not mean that stop servers use.

The service provider is the one who manages equipment, Infrastructure, and operating systems. It has a level of automation to provision those computational resources when the customer requires them and to stop providing them when they are no longer used.

What each client company does is develop the applications.

“The client will not have to worry about maintaining, managing, availability, or scalability of their applications,” stressed Tania González, regional and Costa Rican leader of IBM cloud services.

The serverless or serverless architecture is an approach for developers or companies to focus on application code, which would make it easier to reduce time to market, operating costs, and complexity of systems.

The development of cloud technologies or Cloud Computing is increasingly diverse. It offers us multiple alternatives that adapt to options that range from quite robust in terms of configuration or to the point where we only worry about minimal adjustments.

This second case refers to serverless technologies (“without server”), found in two forms: Backend as a Service (BaaS) and Functions as a Service (FaaS). BaaS has been around for a long time; however, it was FaaS that popularized serverless computing.

How did Serverless technology originate?

During the 80s, client-server models began to boom in desktop computers and their applications, becoming necessary, particularly for companies. With the arrival of the “WWW,” this need was greater due to increased users…

The appearance of Salesforce in 1999 marked a before and after in the industry by offering a Software as a Service (SaaS) as the main product instead of a license to install on computers. This evolved in 2006 with Amazon offering AWS EC2, having Infrastructure as a Service (Iaas), and providing much more flexible computing on demand.

For 2008 Google presents Google App Engine, a way to run code in the cloud without worrying about the Infrastructure in Platform as a Service (PaaS). Other companies were not far behind, with Azure and Heroku also offering similar options.

In 2014 Amazon again marked a milestone with AWS Lambda’s launch, whose focus was on executing chunks of code only when required. Simultaneously, the term micro billing arises, referring to charging only for the consumption used.

Does serverless have … servers?

The concept of “serverless computing” sounds illogical, knowing that servers are running beforehand. Its definition refers to the fact that as users of these systems, we should not worry about configuring Infrastructure, allocating resources, and managing them since the service provider takes care of all this.

In other words, we could define serverless as the use of the cloud that costs for what it is consumed, in which servers are not managed (directly), and its operation is carried out through applications.

What you should worry about and where to apply it

Although the main advantage of this technology is to provide us with a friendly ecosystem for our apps, we must be clear about the delimitation of our responsibility since, in the tech world, there is no silver bullet.

What you will do when working with Serverless technologies is:

· Write code, maybe not too much, because you will seek to have the least amount possible not to compromise your project.

· Define events that trigger the actions to be executed within the project.

· Connect with services that make the project work as a whole.

· Be attentive to server consumption and know what you have to pay for it.

· Given the simplicity they offer in their implementation, you can also imagine where it can be used; some typical cases are:

· Web applications with 3-tier architecture (presentation, application, and data).

· Development of Web APIs.

· Streaming processes.

· Data streams (data pipelines).

· Batch data processing as in ETLs.

· Infrastructure automation.

All this opens up a world of possibilities to make use of Serverless technologies, draws the attention of service providers to offer various options, and opens the market to new service companies.

An example of Serverless computing is those offered by Google that range from storage, database management, analytics, messaging, DevOps, and we can even use some of its Machine Learning APIs and smart assistants.

Public, private, and other clouds

Several cloud provider companies have driven the adoption of serverless computing in the same way they once did for IaaS in the public cloud. But business customers still have inherently hybrid application needs. Some applications will run in the private cloud, some will run in the company’s on-premises data center, and still, others run in public clouds.

By facilitating hybrid serverless models that span data centers and multi-cloud environments, adoption could expand tremendously. Serverless is expected to become more common in business applications and more integrated with other technologies, such as microservices and traditional application architectures. Cloud storage is another possible service, with more advantages than disadvantages.

Serverless technology hands over many data protection and threat prevention activities to the cloud service provider. It also tends to redirect an attacker’s attention to more exposed targets, primarily the applications themselves. As more companies adopt serverless, there is likely to be an even more pressing need to address serverless application security’s unique challenges.

Like any emerging technology, serverless goes through its growth problem phase, causing headaches and confusion in the marketplace. Experts agree that these challenges are more than surmountable, and 2021 will surely be a clear turning point for the model that — slowly but surely — is heading towards the mainstream.