DevOps: The Key to Affordable Cloud Computing

With so many companies going all-in on cloud services, it has become important to have a good handle on spending. I want to give you a behind-the-scenes look at how we leverage DevOps practices to manage and optimize cloud bills.

When IT Outposts starts a new big project where we're responsible for the entire cloud infrastructure, clients will often grant us access to their billing accounts if they want us involved in that side of things. Having this access is a game-changer — it allows us to see exactly what resources are already provisioned and what we'll be adding. But even more crucially, it helps us identify any potential cost-culprits, like resources that are just sitting there idly and need to be shut down or removed entirely. I remember one client who had a database instance running for three whole years without a single thing using it — they were essentially just burning money that entire time for no reason!

With billing access, we're able to closely monitor cloud costs as they ebb and flow across different providers like AWS, Azure, GCP, etc. Each provider also has their own built-in billing tools. For example, AWS can predict future costs based on current usage patterns. Such services become increasingly valuable as you keep piling on more and more cloud services over time.

For every project, we make sure to set up billing alerts so we're quickly notified if costs start spiking unexpectedly. Certain services can be used for free, but with monthly limits. If you stay within those limits, it's no charge. But go over, and you're on the hook for the entire month's overage fees. Alerts prevent these kinds of surprise bills — if costs jump, we're able to investigate abnormal activity patterns immediately.

So, cost optimization is an ongoing, ever-evolving effort, that’s why cloud billing should be managed correctly. Plus, cloud providers often roll out new purchasing models and commitment options to help optimize spending. AWS recently launched an even more granular cost optimization feature. We're continually analyzing costs, identifying opportunities to resize resources or migrate to more cost-effective service types wherever it makes sense. This is where DevOps methodologies pull their weight.?