CSC 447 - Introduction to Cloud Computing

Catalog Description:
The course will provide an introduction and overview to cloud computing principles and architectures at the undergraduate level. The course will start by reviewing the history of centralized and distributed computing and trace how developments over the years have resulted in today's current cloud computing technology. The course will provide an in-depth overview of cloud types and services, virtualization, cloud architectures for both private and public cloud offerings, computer networking topics of relevance to cloud computing, cloud computing security and both the economic and legal aspects of cloud computing systems along with advanced topics such as cloud storage and cloud hosted databases. The course will also include hands-on installation and operation of the NC State VCL private cloud computing system on a dedicated compute node assigned to each student and an individual account on the Amazon AWS public cloud service for gaining practical experience with cloud computing instances.
Contact Hours: Prerequisites: CSC 246
Co-requisites: None
Restrictions: None
Coordinator:
Textbook: None

Course Outcomes:
By the end of the course the student will become sufficiently familiar with basic cloud computing concepts and technology at the undergraduate Computer Science and Computer Engineering level that they will be able to

  1. Identify and describe the specific present day technologies necessary to support today’s cloud computing systems
  2. List the types of cloud computing services available today and to successfully select and evaluate the appropriate type cloud service for different types of user requirements
  3. Successfully establish a cloud computing account from a commercial cloud vendor or private cloud computing provider and then successfully run a cloud computing instance on that cloud platform using a relevant user application
  4. Summarize the properties of cloud computing architectures, distributed cloud storage systems and cloud hosted databases, analyze and select the appropriate cloud computing computational instances, storage and databases and then successfully access these capabilities on a commercial vendor’s cloud computing in support of user applications that are running on those cloud systems.
  5. Summarize best practices for cloud computing, classify and evaluate common cloud computing computer security threats and then recommend specific actions to maintain a secure cloud computing system


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