It all starts with bits: digital units of information. It is about how we store these bits, how we move these bits, and how we transform or process these bits.
The three major elements of digital infrastructures are:
- Storage
- Networks
- Processors
In the cloud security world, it is customary to talk about data at rest, data in motion, and data in use. This introduces data as the key common element. But more on cloud security later.
All of these elements have a wide variety of different manifestations, with associated quality and performance attributes that matter enormously in the design and management of digital infrastructures.
You’ll also have to understand that these three concepts are very entangled. A storage system is connected to a network, but it also has network and processing elements inside. The same is true for the other two concepts. Once again, it is a way to draw maps of digital systems, and any map is inaccurate. As said elsewhere, this inaccuracy actually can make it a good map! It reduces complexity so that we can more easily think about it.