In this episode host Tyra Peirce chats with Rolando Carrasco, an Oracle ACE Director based in Latin America. Rolando and Tyra speak about Multi-tenant cloud. What it is, what it isn't, and when it should be used.

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Episode Transcript:

00:00:00:00 - 00:00:34:01

Unknown

Welcome to the Oracle Academy Tech Chat. This podcast provides educators and students with in-depth discussions with thought leaders around computer science, cloud technologies, and software design to help students on their journey to becoming industry ready technology leaders of the future. Let's get started. Welcome to Oracle Academy Tech Chat, where we discuss how Oracle Academy prepares the next generation's workforce.

00:00:34:03 - 00:01:02:16

Unknown

I'm your host, Tyra Peirce. Today I'm joined by our Rolando Carrasco. Rolando is an Oracle Ace director based in Latin America. He has been in the IT industry for the past 25 years, working for companies such as Hewlett-Packard and Oracle. Then in 2010, he started his own consulting firm where he is currently the CTO. His work has been focused on distributed systems, working with several integration platforms, API management tools and the cloud.

00:01:02:18 - 00:01:29:06

Unknown

He is a constant speaker at both local and global development conferences. Welcome, Rolando. Oh thank you Tyra. So to start off, can you give me a bit about your background and your current job role? Yes. Thank you Tyra. Now I'm currently the CTO for a Mexican consulting firm here in Mexico. The name is CES, and I've had this role for the past 15 to 16 years now.

00:01:29:08 - 00:02:07:13

Unknown

And as you already mentioned, my experience is focused on distributed systems. And probably, I will say, the evolution of those type of needs in terms of integration in the cloud now. And I will say that I have a mixed profile in terms of, development, if you will, and also experience on sales and pre-sales and architecture, or so I will say that I have that type of hybrid more a rosary and my experience is being focused mostly and in the Latin American region, from Mexico to Brazil.

00:02:07:15 - 00:02:32:21

Unknown

Today our focus is on, multi-tenancy and cloud computing. Can you tell me what a multi-tenancy is and cloud computing and how does it differ from single tenancy? I can say that multi-tenancy is the ability to have different organizations working separately, and that's the key. But we'll be using the same infrastructure okay. Even though they share this infrastructure.

00:02:32:23 - 00:02:57:07

Unknown

The main thing, as I said, we already mentioned is that those different organizations are isolated. They can see each other, they can see their data. And I can say that normally service providers work in this fashion. They offer their services to several gateway stations or customers. And from the infrastructure standpoint, they share the infrastructure now along all those organizations.

00:02:57:09 - 00:03:25:08

Unknown

And the difference, the difference between multi-tenancy and the single tenancy is that which single tenant, every organization use its own infrastructure. I mean, there is nothing to share between them or among them, but you need to deliver on a specific infrastructure for every single organization. So which follows on to my next question. Can you share a real world example of multi-tenant cloud implementations?

00:03:25:10 - 00:04:03:19

Unknown

Yes, absolutely. I will say that the software as a service market and the software as a service, providers and application owns most of them. And I can say that both big companies such as Oracle and small companies or even startups, they use these type of model offering these, those type of services. For example, an email application and the one that we normally use, Outlook or Gmail or any of that type of email application is a clear example of then we all have an account.

00:04:03:21 - 00:04:26:22

Unknown

The infrastructure is the same. We don't care as a user, we just use the service as its own, as it's been, offered to, to us. So, the users are not aware of that. And I will say that probably the users are not even interested in if it is a multi-tenancy or not, but all I what I was trying to I was trying sorry to explain.

00:04:27:00 - 00:04:51:19

Unknown

Is that mostly those type of SaaS applications use this model. For example, maybe you or the audience are aware of applications such as Monday.com or Bitly. The shortener, URL application, or any other type of application that you normally use that you just use and you just subscribe to it. It is so very clear example of behind the scenes is working in a multi-tenancy fashion.

00:04:51:21 - 00:05:15:22

Unknown

That actually makes sense. The Bitly one makes sense to me because I've used it before. And same with like my email. My email. Programs. I understand how that would work. Like, you access it one way, but you might be touching multiple clouds. So that's that's actually really, really fascinating for me. So on to my next question. Why do organizations choose a multi-tenant architecture over a single tenant one?

00:05:16:00 - 00:05:45:22

Unknown

I will answer that in two ways. And the first one is for service providers. These multi-tenancy model may imply the reduction of several cost and operations because instead of provisioning dedicated infrastructure and all the consequences that it that it has, they use just one single, infrastructure and that single infrastructure is the one that they operate. They your grade and then they maintain.

00:05:46:00 - 00:06:13:17

Unknown

But at the same time they isolate the organizations as as we mentioned in, in the past questions or in the previous questions. And the second thing is for organizations who create their own software, I mean, that they are looking to create a solution. They are building, an application they will like to or free to many customers, and they need to deliver it in, in such a way that they need to reduce their own cost.

00:06:13:19 - 00:06:43:18

Unknown

Then probably they are going to choose these type of models because it is going to be not that expensive. And for example, in terms of Oracle technology, a Oracle's database is a very clear example of the unorganized organization, sorry, an organization that is looking to create an application which uses a database. But it happens that these database needs to be separated, be separated because the departments needs to be isolated.

00:06:43:18 - 00:07:10:23

Unknown

Just to give an example, this type of organization can leverage from the Oracle database technology. And in the specific the database multi-tenant option one single database engine, but multiple databases running on that very same engine. So I would say that those two things are the ones that are going to make an organization to use this multi-tenancy model that is that also makes a lot of sense to me.

00:07:10:23 - 00:07:45:09

Unknown

Like if you need to separate your databases, you want to separate your data, you want to make sure that it's controlled and then only accessible by a certain group of people. That also makes sense to me as well. Which leads to the next question how does multi-tenancy impact database management in cloud applications? I will say that it reduces the complexity of managing different databases with a whole set of infrastructure, because if you think about it and you have separate databases, then you need probably different persons to manage those different layers.

00:07:45:11 - 00:08:10:14

Unknown

So in the Oracle database multi-tenancy model or in a database dependency model, it is just one single infrastructure. So you reduce the number of persons or the team that is managing the infrastructure. The second thing is the streamline is streamlining the database provisioning and the provisioning, because you just need to take care about let me say it in this way just as database.

00:08:10:14 - 00:08:38:22

Unknown

So for it that's that's the there's the thing that you need to manage and you need to deploy or, or provision or the provision instead of the whole infrastructure. The third thing is to consolidate the database management. You are consolidating in a single group of persons and sometimes it is just one single DBA. You leave me managing different databases with, you know, very same infrastructure or the very same infrastructure.

00:08:39:00 - 00:09:07:01

Unknown

You can also consolidate database monitoring. So you have a single glass of pane if you will, where you can check the different databases that you are running in this multi tenancy model, instead of having separated monitoring tools or monitoring applications, working on top of these different databases, you have one single glass of paint on modeling of new organization.

00:09:07:01 - 00:09:29:05

Unknown

You will be easier because you already have the infrastructure. You just need to provision the database for this new department or organization and probably already mentioned it, but I think is is okay to repeat it to reduce the number of DBA is managing all that infrastructure. I like that, I like that it's all about streamlining and making sure that they you don't need as many resources.

00:09:29:06 - 00:09:48:01

Unknown

Managing certain types of things like the DBA is can go out and expand into doing different types of work. And it's that's a little bit more interesting. Or you have like a, a person that is just an expert in one area, which I think is kind of helpless. You can spread your resources out and make them a little bit more nimble and flexible.

00:09:48:01 - 00:10:21:21

Unknown

So which leads to my next question. What are the key performance challenges and a multi-tenant system, and how are they addressed in. This is one of the most relevant questions, and I will say that this is something that every time we think about the multi-tenancy model, we need to take care of these because it is good, obviously, and we've been highlighting all these benefits of having not one single infrastructure is sharing it among different organizations, but it happens that it is the same infrastructure.

00:10:21:21 - 00:11:07:15

Unknown

So those multiple, organizations running on these very same infrastructure, are, if you will, fighting for those or competing for those available resources. And those organizations have or may have different dynamics. For example, an organization may be running batch processes while the other organizations are, having or are processing numerous transactions stream simultaneously. So you have different dynamics and that as a consequence, means that the CPU or the memory are using different ways in sometimes those different ways may block a process or may block the CPU.

00:11:07:15 - 00:11:44:05

Unknown

So then you are probably going to hit a problem with that, because one organization problem may cause the other organization, which has nothing to do with the with the one who is having the problem. And then you are creating a little bit of chaos along or among those, those different organizations. So, so you need you need to be very clever on that regard and trying to take care about those different dynamics or identify those different dynamics, and then try to mix the best as you can, the infrastructure that is supporting those different customers.

00:11:44:07 - 00:12:08:23

Unknown

So I will summarize that point, that very relevant point on different organizations, different dynamics. One single blocking process may create a chaos, along your different customers working on your multi-tenancy mode. I think that makes sense. And I think it talks about why communication and collaboration are key as you're going through in and setting up your your cloud.

00:12:08:23 - 00:12:44:17

Unknown

And if you choose to go multi-tenancy, to choose your multi-tenancy cloud is to make sure that we communicate regularly and effectively. So my last question for you, and thank you so much for joining me today is if you could give one piece of advice to faculty or students, what would it be? I always suggest to try to have a fixed time to study technology on a daily basis, to try to have a moment in the day where you just dedicate that time, or on studying something, try to learn something new daily.

00:12:44:19 - 00:13:05:03

Unknown

So try to make an assessment of yourself on a daily basis about what was the thing that you learned that day and if you didn't, and if you continue doing, in the next day, then probably do not going to feel okay. And then if the third day you are not learning something new, then probably you are going to identify a problem.

00:13:05:05 - 00:13:27:18

Unknown

So always try to learn something new on a daily basis. Go to sleep and as yourself if you learn something new, as I already mentioned, try new technology or try technology, maybe this maybe is not new technology, but just try technology. Experiment with it. It's not going to happen anything if you fail with that, just try it and just try to understand it and try to learn.

00:13:27:18 - 00:14:01:20

Unknown

As I mentioned, try to be active in events. No, not doesn't a speaker, but just try to attend different events and try to learn from others. I will say that. Thank you Alondra. I think that's a really wonderful answer. I think that being curious and being willing to try new things is is always really important, cause I think it helps us to learn more about the technology and not to be afraid as we're going through and trying to become, learn the latest and greatest, things, which is is very much one of those newer technologies is coming out.

00:14:01:20 - 00:14:28:15

Unknown

So thank you to Rolando for being the guest today on the Oracle Academy Tech Chat podcast. For more information, visit our website academy.oracle.com and subscribe to our podcast. Thanks for listening. That wraps up this episode. Thanks for listening and stay tuned for the next Oracle Academy Tech Chat podcast.