See also Characteristics of cloud computing

Also cloud computing definition, definition of cloud computing.

NIST Document SP 800-145

Date Published: September 2011

Author(s): Peter Mell (NIST), Tim Grance (NIST)

NIST's working definition of cloud computing, the 16th and final definition has been published as The NIST Definition of Cloud Computing (NIST Special Publication 800-145).

“Cloud computing is a model for enabling ubiquitous, convenient, on-demand network access to a shared pool of configurable computing resources (e.g., networks, servers, storage, applications, and services) that can be rapidly provisioned and released with minimal management effort or service provider interaction. This cloud model is composed of:

• Five essential cloud characteristics: 1. on-demand self-service, 2. broad network access, 3. resource pooling, 4. rapid elasticity or expansion, and 5. measured service
• Three service models ((SaaS | software, PaaS | platform and IaaS | infrastructure), and
• Four deployment models: private, community, public and hybrid”

• Cloud Computing - Azure, AWS, Google Cloud
• SaaS - Software as a Service - Office 365, Microsoft 365, SalesForce
• PaaS - Platform as a Service - Functions as a Service (FaaS), Serverless Microservices
• IaaS - Infrastructure as a Service - Infrastructure as Code
• On-demand Self Service - Cloud automation via DevOps
• Reserve Pooling
• Rapid Elasticity - Auto-scaling
• Measured Service - Cloud cost management

• https://csrc.nist.gov/publications/detail/sp/800-145/final
• https://www.nist.gov/news-events/news/2011/10/final-version-nist-cloud-computing-definition-published