An SLA-based cloud computing that facilitates resource allocation in the distributed data centers of a cloud provider

Abstract

The number of cloud service users has increased worldwide, and cloud service providers have been deploying and operating data centers to serve the globally distributed cloud users. The resource capacity of a data center is limited, so distributing the load to global data centers will be effective in providing stable services. Another issue in cloud computing is the need for providers to guarantee the service level agreements (SLAs) established with consumers. Whereas various load balancing algorithms have been developed, it is necessary to avoid SLA violations (e.g., service response time) when a cloud provider allocates the load to data centers geographically distributed across the world. Considering load balancing and guaranteed SLA, therefore, this paper proposes an SLA-based cloud computing framework to facilitate resource allocation that takes into account the workload and geographical location of distributed data centers. The contributions of this paper include: (1) the design of a cloud computing framework that includes an automated SLA negotiation mechanism and a workload- and location-aware resource allocation scheme (WLARA), and (2) the implementation of an agent-based cloud testbed of the proposed framework. Using the testbed, experiments were conducted to compare the proposed schemes with related approaches. Empirical results show that the proposed WLARA performs better than other related approaches (e.g., round robin, greedy, and manual allocation) in terms of SLA violations and the provider's profits. We also show that using the automated SLA negotiation mechanism supports providers in earning higher profits.