CloudBox is an extension of the public cloud into your on-premises data center (IDC). It consists of compute, storage, and network resources. CloudBox inherits the core capabilities and rich application marketplace of the Alibaba Cloud public cloud. You can use public cloud services to manage the resources in your CloudBox. This topic describes the cloud services that CloudBox supports.
Cloud services deployed with CloudBox hardware
When you purchase a CloudBox, you purchase an Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) service. Compute, storage, and network infrastructure is deployed in your on-premises data center. The following cloud services are available:
Category | Cloud service | Description | References |
Compute | Elastic Compute Service | Elastic Compute Service (ECS) is a simple and efficient computing service that provides scalable processing power. CloudBox provides the vCPUs and memory resources required for servers in the form of compute SKUs. The following ECS instance families are supported:
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Dedicated Host | A Dedicated Host (DDH) is a cloud host whose physical resources are exclusively used by a single tenant. You can obtain the physical attributes of the server, including the number of CPUs (sockets), physical CPU cores, and memory size. You can then create ECS instances of specific instance families based on the dedicated host type. | ||
Storage | Elastic Block Storage | Elastic Block Storage (EBS) is a block device product that features high performance and low latency. It supports random read and write operations and meets the data storage requirements of most general-purpose scenarios. CloudBox supports standard SSDs and PL0 ESSDs. | |
Object Storage Service | Object Storage Service (OSS) is a secure, cost-effective, and highly reliable cloud storage service that can store massive amounts of data. OSS provides CloudBox with the capabilities for local storage, access, and processing of unstructured data. You can create buckets in CloudBox. | ||
Network | Virtual Private Cloud | Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) is a custom private network that you create based on Alibaba Cloud. Different VPCs are isolated from each other at Layer 2. | |
Server Load Balancer | Server Load Balancer (SLB) is a traffic distribution service that distributes incoming traffic across multiple backend ECS instances based on forwarding rules. SLB includes Application Load Balancer (ALB), Network Load Balancer (NLB), and Classic Load Balancer (CLB). CloudBox supports only CLB. | ||
Express Connect | Express Connect establishes high-speed, stable, and secure private network connections between on-premises IDCs and VPCs. Data transmission over Express Connect circuits is reliable and controllable. This prevents issues caused by unstable network quality and protects data from being intercepted during transmission. | ||
Smart Access Gateway | Smart Access Gateway (SAG) is a one-stop solution provided by Alibaba Cloud for quick cloud access. Enterprises can use SAG to establish nearby encrypted connections to the Internet for a more intelligent, reliable, and secure cloud experience. |
Cloud services that are deployed on and consume resources in CloudBox
CloudBox provides basic compute and storage resources. You can use these resources to run Platform as a Service (PaaS) services from Alibaba Cloud, such as database and container services. The following cloud services are available:
Category | Cloud service | Description | References |
Database | ApsaraDB RDS for MySQL | Alibaba Cloud provides ApsaraDB RDS, a stable, reliable, and scalable relational cloud database service. CloudBox supports the MySQL engine and provides a full suite of solutions for disaster recovery, backup, recovery, and migration. | |
Tair | Tair is a cloud-native in-memory database developed by Alibaba Cloud. It is fully compatible with Redis and provides rich data models and enterprise-grade features to help customers build real-time online applications. | ||
Container | Container Service for Kubernetes | ACK Pro clusters are an enhanced version of standard managed Container Service for Kubernetes (ACK) clusters. They provide improved reliability and security for large-scale enterprise production environments and offer a Service-Level Agreement (SLA) with compensation. ACK clusters can use resources in a deployed CloudBox by creating a CloudBox node pool. | |
File storage | Cloud Storage Gateway | Cloud Storage Gateway (CSG) is a gateway product that can be deployed in your on-premises data center and on Alibaba Cloud. CSG on CloudBox provides file services (NFS and SMB) that comply with de facto standards. It lets you access OSS in CloudBox using the same file protocols as the public cloud. | |
Middleware | Enterprise Distributed Application Service | Enterprise Distributed Application Service (EDAS) is a cloud-native PaaS platform for application hosting and microservice management. It provides a full-stack solution for application development, deployment, monitoring, and O&M. EDAS supports hybrid cloud ECS clusters. You can build a hybrid cloud ECS cluster for EDAS using ECS instances in CloudBox and the public cloud. This helps meet the requirements for data security, local data processing, and low latency for applications in hybrid cloud scenarios. It also enables unified management of different ECS instances and applications in a hybrid cloud environment. |
Cloud services that manage local CloudBox resources from the public cloud
CloudBox shares management and service nodes with the Alibaba Cloud public cloud. You can use public cloud services to manage resources in your CloudBox. For example, you can use Security Center to protect your ECS instances or Resource Orchestration Service (ROS) to automate deployment. The following are commonly used cloud services:
Category | Cloud service | Description | References |
Security | Security Center | Security Center is a unified security management system that detects, analyzes, and provides alerts for security threats in real time. It provides security features such as anti-ransomware, anti-virus, tamper-proofing, and compliance checks. This creates a closed-loop security operations system with automated threat detection, alert response, and attack tracing. Security Center protects your cloud assets and local servers and helps you meet regulatory compliance requirements. | |
Bastionhost | Bastionhost is a comprehensive O&M and security audit platform. It provides features such as O&M identity authentication, account management, and system operation auditing. Bastionhost helps you ensure that O&M permissions are controlled, operations are audited, and your cloud environment is secure and compliant. | ||
O&M | Application Real-Time Monitoring Service | Application Real-Time Monitoring Service (ARMS) is an application performance management (APM) product from Alibaba Cloud. With ARMS, you can quickly build application monitoring capabilities with second-level response times based on frontend, application, and custom business dimensions. | |
Cloud Monitor | Cloud Monitor (CMS) is a service that monitors Alibaba Cloud resources and internet applications. You can use Cloud Monitor to collect metrics for your Alibaba Cloud resources, check the availability of internet services, and set alerts for specific metrics. | ||
Middleware | Microservices Engine | Microservices Engine (MSE) is a one-stop microservice platform for mainstream open source microservice ecosystems. It provides capabilities such as a registration and configuration center that natively supports Nacos, ZooKeeper, and Eureka. | Instructions for using the microservice registration and configuration center |
Tools | Resource Orchestration Service | Resource Orchestration Service (ROS) is an Alibaba Cloud service that simplifies cloud resource management. Developers and administrators can write templates to define required Alibaba Cloud resources, such as ECS instances and ApsaraDB RDS database instances, and their dependencies. The ROS orchestration engine automatically creates and configures all resources based on the template to achieve automated deployment and O&M. | |
CloudOps Orchestration Service | CloudOps Orchestration Service (OOS) is an automated O&M service provided by Alibaba Cloud that can automatically manage and execute tasks. You can use templates to define tasks, execution orders, inputs, and outputs. Then, you can execute the template to automate the tasks. OOS can be used across different products. You can use OOS to manage Alibaba Cloud services such as ECS, RDS, SLB, and VPC. | ||
Server Migration Center | Server Migration Center (SMC) is a migration platform developed by Alibaba Cloud. You can use SMC to migrate one or more migration sources to Alibaba Cloud. Migration sources include IDC servers, virtual machines, hosts from other cloud platforms, or other types of servers. | ||
Auto Scaling | Auto Scaling (ESS) is an Alibaba Cloud service that automatically adjusts computing resources based on your business needs and policies. With ESS, you can seamlessly add ECS instances to meet computing demands during traffic spikes and automatically remove instances to reduce costs when demand decreases. | ||
Cloud Assistant | Cloud Assistant is a native automated O&M tool designed for ECS. It lets you perform batch operations on ECS instances, such as executing commands (Shell, PowerShell, and Bat) and sending files, without requiring passwords, logons, or jump servers. Typical scenarios include installing or uninstalling software, distributing configuration files, and running general commands or scripts. | ||
Deployment sets | A deployment set is a policy that controls the distribution of ECS instances. You can use a deployment set to distribute the ECS instances for your application across different physical servers. This ensures high availability and underlying disaster recovery capabilities for your business. |