The University System of Georgia operates a private cloud called Peachnet, which offers various services such as bandwidth, storage, backup, and virtual data centers to its institutions. This cloud infrastructure enhances agility, cost efficiency, and support for rural and research institutions, empowering educational access and solutions. With a commitment to high availability and user control, Peachnet serves all USG institutions and illustrates the potential of cloud computing in education.

1. Deploying and Utilizing a
Statewide Private Cloud
Dr. Curtis A. Carver Jr.
Vice Chancellor and CIO
John Scoville
Chief Technology Officer
Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia

2. Agenda
• ITS Overview
• Example of a PeachNet Service
• Clouds
• PeachNet Technical Rundown
• Questions, Comments, a Conversation

3. 3,300 mile Private Cloud
Virtual Library
Software Store
Enterprise Security and ePrivacy
Distance Education Learning Management
Enterprise Financials Enterprise BI
Library Operations
Student Information
Collaboration

4. Why a Educational Private Cloud?
• Cost
– Work as a system
– Negotiate as a system
• Agility
– No contracts and thus 15 minute response.
– No set bandwidth, storage, data center, backup.
– Particularly pertinent to rural institutions and
research institutions.
Private
Cloud
Services
Campus
Control
System
Control
Shadow
IT
Control

5. PeachNet Service Example
Desire2Learn
– Deployed as Software as a Service to 30/31 institutions.
– 100% system availability since launch in May 2012.
– 34 million hits a day.
Projected to be 50 million in September.
– 15,000 concurrent sessions pretty much 7 days a week, 24
hours a day.

7. PeachNet
Georgia’s Private Cloud providing:
• Bandwidth as a service
• Storage as a Service
• Backup as a Service
• Virtual Data Centers as a Service
• Used by:
– 31/31 USG institutions,
– 7/28 TCSG institutions,
– Potentially all DOE schools

8. Cloud computing is all the rage. "It's become the phrase du jour," says Gartner
senior analyst Ben Pring, echoing many of his peers. The problem is that (as
with Web 2.0) everyone seems to have a different definition.
As a metaphor for the Internet, "the cloud" is a familiar cliché, but when
combined with "computing," the meaning gets bigger and fuzzier. Some
analysts and vendors define cloud computing narrowly as an updated version
of utility computing: basically virtual servers available over the Internet.
Others go very broad, arguing anything you consume outside the firewall is
"in the cloud," including conventional outsourcing.
What Cloud Computing Really Means
Eric Knorr & Galen Gruman, InfoWorld 2011
What is the Cloud?

9. Cloud computing is a marketing term for technologies that provide
computation, software, data access, and storage services that do not require
end-user knowledge of the physical location and configuration of the system
that delivers the services.
Also, it’s delivery model for IT services is based on Internet protocols.
Wikipedia 2011
What is the Cloud?

10. • Software as a Service (SaaS). Quite simply, SaaS is a software application
hosted in a central location and delivered via a web browser or other thin
client.
• Platform as a Service (PaaS). PaaS is a software-development platform
that is stored in the cloud and can be accessed via a web browser. It makes
a variety of programming languages, operating systems, and tools
available to developers, saving them the cost of purchasing and installing
everything themselves.
• Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS). The capability provided the consumer is
to provision processing, storage, networks, and other fundamental
computing resources where the consumer is able to deploy and run
arbitrary software, which can include operating systems and applications.
Service Models

11. PeachNet Cloud Storage Service
The cloud-based storage service is based on EMC Atmos, and is similar to Amazon's cloud-based storage
service, S3. The native interface is a REST-based (http) API, but there are also a number of other access
methods that you can use (including appliances that you can purchase) that are designed to write data to
Atmos. The service is designed for large, typically archive dataset.
ADVANTAGES
Solution for implementation of NSF mandated Data Management Plans
Export control over privacy from a trusted community
Scalable flexibility based on your growth
Fully replicated, redundant, high availability storage
Multiple access methods (CIFS/NFS/IFS/Web2.0/Sync & Share)
No additional network or bandwidth charges

12. PeachNet Backup Service
Getting data offsite as part of a data protection plan has been difficult in the past. Plans that look
good on paper are often too difficult and cost-prohibitive to implement.
The backup service is based on EMC's Avamar system, which offers source-based de-duplication. But
the idea is the same as with traditional systems: You install a backup agent on each host that you wish
to backup, and backups are streamed to our backup systems here in Athens. You can login to the
backup management system and control various aspects of your backups including the ability to
perform self-service restores.
The price is $.30 / GB / retention-copy / year. For example, if you had 10TB of source data with 5
days of retention (50TB total), the price would be $15,000 annually. However, once you get above
100TB total, we have volume discounts ranging from 25% to over 60%.

13. PeachNet Data Center Service
The Virtual Data Center service provides you with virtual machines that you manage (including
console access, the ability to install operating systems, etc.). It also includes a private firewall that
you can use to control access to and from your virtual machines.
The annual cost of the service is calculated as follows:
• System Administration Personal Services $3,450.00 per Customer
• Virtual Machines $ 115.00 per Virtual Machine
• Server and related infrastructure* $ 49.00 per GB RAM
• Storage $ 1.25 per GB storage
*Note: Server and related infrastructure covers the cost of physical servers, per-server software
licensing, and other data center infrastructure. It is charged based on GB RAM, which is a key
indicator of total infrastructure usage.

14. Summary
The University System of Georgia provides a
private cloud environment called PeachNet to
empower the inspiration and education of the
future leaders of Georgia and the world.

15. Questions, Comments,
a Conversation?