Linux in the hybrid cloud: Building with digital Lego blocks

Linux, the flexible backbone of the hybrid cloud, combines modularity, security, and cost-efficiency to power modern enterprises' digital transformation

- PRATIMA HARIGUNANI

What if Lego Blocks and Slime Clay got married? Would things get more fun, easier to make-break-repeat, fluid, more creative, and more DIYish?

We could not ask this directly from those toying with new technology frontiers in the cloud playground, so we ask another version of this question: Is Linux a match made for the hybrid cloud?

Before we tell you what we heard, let us first get the ‘hybrid’ part out of the way. Of course, any cloud, by design, needs to be easy to build, with as much modularity as an OS like Linux can provide. But hybrid cloud is a special stripe here. It requires more flexible brickwork on IT and an even more fluid shaft to ship and arrange all the workload furniture. After all, you need to bring in both the control and security strengths of a private cloud and the cost economics and elasticity of a public cloud.

The question is whether Linux is a square peg in the square hole of a hybrid cloud.

THE LINUX TUX: FOR THE HYBRID PARTY

The question has become more relevant today than ever. It is not just hybrid cloud’s terra firma but also its need for an easily configurable IT ecology that is expanding with a new frenzy.

As per the Cloud Native Computing Foundation’s Annual Survey 2023 with Linux Foundation LF Research (that focused on organisations that are not in the cloud business but had a potential or actual reason to consume cloud services), it was seen that large organisations are drawn to all cloud types (public, private, and hybrid) but are the primary consumers of hybrid clouds (56%) compared to medium (44%) and small (27%) organisations. Interestingly, multi-cloud solutions (hybrid and other cloud combinations) were also noted to be used by 56% of organisations.