RESEARCH GAPS AND TRENDS IN CLOUD COMPUTING: A SYSTEMATIC MAPPING STUDY
Liping Zhao, Liang‐Jie Zhang, Tina X. O. Liu, Credit Suisse, London · Services Transactions on Cloud Computing · 2014
Context: Since 2009 a large number of papers have been presented at IEEE International Conference on Cloud Computing (CLOUD). Studying these papers and identifying relevant research areas from them are both difficult and time consuming. Objective: To address this problem, we aim to provide a structure to the entire collection of fulllength papers published in the proceedings of the past CLOUD conferences (from CLOUD 2009 to CLOUD 2014). Method: We undertake a Systematic Mapping study of these papers by categorizing them. Results: 523 relevant papers are selected and assessed in terms of their research topic, contribution and research type. Thematic and frequency analysis is then conducted to identify research gaps and trends. Conclusions: By research topic, technology oriented papers extensively outnumbered business oriented papers. By contribution, methods significantly outstripped other types of contribution whereas there is a desperate shortage of contribution from practical experience. By research type, empirical research papers have dominated the past six CLOUD conferences whereas theoretical research is close to none.