Cloud computing development environment: from code logic to dataflow diagram
Zhenhua LI, Qifan Yang, Yunhao LIU · Scientia Sinica Informationis · 2019
Cloud applications possess excellent flexibility and scalability; however, they often require developers to master various cloud computing techniques and build networked systems from scratch, which is difficult and complex for most developers.Recently, there has been considerable growth in development environments that support the partial or complete life cycle of cloud applications because of the growing demand for cloud applications and services from all sectors of the national economy.On the basis of the study of multiple mainstream development environments for cloud applications, we classify them into three categories: home-brewed development environments by users, spontaneously maintained standard components by communities, and managed development environments by public clouds.The third category (managed environments) is further divided into four generations: editor style, application-level, function-level, and integrated development environments.Through in-depth mining of a series of typical cases, we summarize the four major evolution trends of the development environments for cloud applications: virtualization, lightweight, intelligence, and visualization.Using our implemented development environment, named Cloud Studio,we explore possible forms and paradigms of development environments for cloud applications in the future,especially transformation in terms of core concept: from micro-level code logic to macro-level dataflow diagram.We believe that implementing Cloud Studio can effectively reduce requirements on cloud application developers,accelerate development progress, and promote formation of the core competence of China's cloud computing industry.