Название: IT Infrastructure Architecture - Infrastructure Building Blocks and Concepts 4th Edition
Автор: Sjaak Laan
Издательство: Lulu Press
Год: 2023
Страниц: 338
Язык: английский
Формат: pdf, epub
Размер: 11.2 MB

This book is about information technology (IT) infrastructure architecture. Infrastructure refers to all the hardware and system software components required to run IT applications. And infrastructure architecture describes the overall design and evolution of that infrastructure. This book explains how infrastructure components work at the architectural level. This means that components are described in building blocks that are tied to specific infrastructure technologies. Decisions made at this level are architecturally relevant, which means that once decisions are made at the building block level, it is relatively difficult to change them later. For example, the decision to use a particular cabling infrastructure in a data center cannot be easily changed once the data center is in operation.

IT infrastructure has been the foundation for successful application deployments for many decades. However, general and up-to-date infrastructure knowledge is not widespread. Experience shows that software developers, system administrators, and project managers often have little understanding of the major impact that IT infrastructure has on the performance, availability, and security of software applications.

This book explains the concepts, history, and implementation of IT infrastructure. Although there are many books on each of the infrastructure building blocks, this is the first book to describe them all: datacenters, servers, networks, storage, operating systems, and end-user devices.

In the early decades of IT development, most infrastructures were relatively simple. As applications grew in functionality and complexity, hardware basically just got faster. In recent years, IT infrastructures have become more complex due to the rapid development and deployment of new types of applications, such as Big Data, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning, the Internet of Things (IoT), and cloud computing. These applications require new and more sophisticated infrastructure services that are secure, highly scalable, and available 24/7.

Software architects build software that runs on infrastructure. Software architects who understand the challenges an infrastructure architect faces can optimize their software for certain infrastructure characteristics. Understanding infrastructure helps software architects build more reliable, faster, manageable, and secure applications. Systems managers learn to identify key architectural choices and principles in an infrastructure, as well as ways to update and change a running infrastructure without compromising the architecture as a whole.

IT infrastructure has been around for a long time. But surprisingly, there does not seem to be a universally accepted definition of IT infrastructure. I have found that many people are confused by the term IT infrastructure, and a clear definition would help them understand what IT infrastructure is and is not. In literature, many definitions of IT infrastructure can be found. Some of them are:

- IT infrastructure is defined broadly as a set of information technology (IT) components that are the foundation of an IT service; typically physical components (computer and networking hardware and facilities), but also various software and network components. - Wikipedia

- All of the hardware, software, networks, facilities, etc., that are required to develop, test, deliver, monitor, control, or support IT services. The term IT Infrastructure includes all of the Information Technology but not the associated people, processes and documentation. - ITILv3.

- IT infrastructure refers to the composite hardware, software, network resources and services required for the existence, operation and management of an enterprise IT environment. IT infrastructure allows an organization to deliver IT solutions and services to its employees, partners and/or customers and is usually internal to an organization and deployed within owned facilities. - Techopedia

- IT infrastructure is the system of hardware, software, facilities and service components that support the delivery of business systems and IT-enabled processes. - Gartner

- IT infrastructure refers to the combined components needed for the operation and management of enterprise IT services and IT environments. - IBM

- IT infrastructure are the components required to operate and manage enterprise IT environments. IT infrastructure can be deployed within a cloud computing system, or within an organization's own facilities. These components include hardware, software, networking components, an operating system (OS), and data storage, all of which are used to deliver IT services and solutions. - Red Hat

This book is intended for infrastructure architects and designers, software architects, systems managers, and IT managers. It can also be used in education, for example in a computer science class. This book is very suitable for beginners, as almost every term is explained, while for experts and professionals this book is more of a review and overview.

This book can be used as a course book - it is used by a number of universities worldwide as part of their IT courses based on the IS 2020.3 curriculum.