Google Cloud Platform

Google Cloud Platform
Google Cloud Platform, offered by Google, is a suite of cloud computing services that runs on the same infrastructure that Google uses internally for its end-user products, such as Google Search and YouTube. Alongside a set of management tools, it provides a series of modular cloud services including computing, data storage, data analytics and machine learning.Registration requires a credit card or bank account details.

Google Cloud Platform provides Infrastructure as a service, Platform as a service, and Serverless computing environments.

In April 2008, Google announced App Engine, a platform for developing and hosting web applications in Google-managed data centers, which was the first cloud computing service from the company. The service became generally available in November 2011. Since the announcement of App Engine, Google added multiple cloud services to the platform.

Google Cloud Platform is a part of Google Cloud, which includes the Google Cloud Platform public cloud infrastructure, as well as G Suite, enterprise versions of Android and Chrome OS, and application programming interfaces (APIs) for machine learning and enterprise mapping services.

Products
Google lists over 90 products under the Google Cloud brand. Some of the key services are listed below.

Compute

 * App Engine - Platform as a Service to deploy Java, PHP, Node.js, Python, C#, .Net, Ruby and Go applications.
 * Compute Engine - Infrastructure as a Service to run Microsoft Windows and Linux virtual machines.
 * Kubernetes Engine - Containers as a Service based on Kubernetes.
 * Cloud Functions - Functions as a Service to run event-driven code based Node.js.

Storage & Databases

 * Cloud Storage - Object storage with integrated edge caching to store unstructured data.
 * Cloud SQL - Database as a Service based on MySQL and PostgreSQL.
 * Cloud BigTable -  Managed NoSQL database service.
 * Cloud Spanner - Horizontally scalable, strongly consistent, relational database service.
 * Cloud Datastore - NoSQL database for web and mobile applications.
 * Persistent Disk -  Block storage for Compute Engine virtual machines.
 * Cloud MemoryStore - Managed in-memory data store based on Redis.

Networking

 * VPC - Virtual Private Cloud for managing the software defined network of cloud resources.
 * Cloud Load Balancing - Software-defined, managed service for load balancing the traffic.
 * Cloud Armor - Web application firewall to protect workloads from DDos attacks.
 * Cloud CDN - Content Delivery Network based on Google’s globally distributed edge points of presence. As of June 2018, the service is in Beta.
 * Cloud Interconnect - Service to connect a data center with Google Cloud Platform
 * Cloud DNS - Managed, authoritative DNS service running on the same infrastructure as Google.
 * Network Service Tiers - Option to choose Premium vs Standard network tier for higher performing network.

Big Data

 * BigQuery - Scalable, managed enterprise data warehouse for analytics.
 * Cloud Dataflow - Managed service based on Apache Beam for stream and batch data processing.
 * Cloud Dataproc - Big data platform for running Apache Hadoop and Apache Spark jobs.
 * Cloud Composer - Managed workflow orchestration service built on Apache Airflow.
 * Cloud Datalab - Tool for data exploration, analysis, visualization and machine learning.
 * Cloud Dataprep - Data service based on Trifacta to visually explore, clean, and prepare data for analysis.
 * Cloud Pub/Sub - Scalable event ingestion service based on message queues.
 * Cloud Data Studio - Business intelligence tool to visualize data through dashboards and reports.

Cloud AI

 * Cloud AutoML - Service to train and deploy custom machine learning models. As of September 2018, the service is in Beta.
 * Cloud TPU - Accelerators used by Google to train machine learning models.
 * Cloud Machine Learning Engine - Managed service for training and building machine learning models based on mainstream frameworks.
 * Cloud Job Discovery - Service based on Google’s search and machine learning capabilities for recruiting ecosystem.
 * Dialogflow Enterprise -  Development environment based on Google’s machine learning for building conversational interfaces.
 * Cloud Natural Language - Text analysis service based on Google Deep Learning models.
 * Cloud Speech-to-Text - Speech to text conversion service based on machine learning.
 * Cloud Text-to-Speech - Text to speech conversion service based on machine learning.
 * Cloud Translation API - Service to dynamically translate between thousands of available language pairs
 * Cloud Vision API - Image analysis service based on machine learning
 * Cloud Video Intelligence - Video analysis service based on machine learning

Management Tools

 * Stackdriver - Monitoring, logging, and diagnostics for applications on Google Cloud Platform and AWS.
 * Cloud Deployment Manager  - Tool to deploy Google Cloud Platform resources defined in templates created in YAML, Python or Jinja2.
 * Cloud Console - Web interface to manage Google Cloud Platform resources.
 * Cloud Shell - Browser-based shell command line access to manage Google Cloud Platform resources.
 * Cloud Console Mobile App - Android and iOS application to manage Google Cloud Platform resources.
 * Cloud APIs - APIs to programmatically access Google Cloud Platform resources

Identity & Security

 * Cloud Identity - Single sign-on (SSO) service based on SAML 2.0 and OpenID.
 * Cloud IAM - Identity & Access Management (IAM) service for defining policies based on role-based access control.
 * Cloud Identity-Aware Proxy - Service to control access to cloud applications running on Google Cloud Platform without using a VPN.
 * Cloud Data Loss Prevention API - Service to automatically discover, classify, and redact sensitive data.
 * Security Key Enforcement - Two-step verification service based on a security key.
 * Cloud Key Management Service  - Cloud-hosted key management service integrated with IAM and audit logging.
 * Cloud Resource Manager - Service to manage resources by project, folder, and organization based on the hierarchy.
 * Cloud Security Command Center - Security and data risk platform for data and services running in Google Cloud Platform.
 * Cloud Security Scanner - Automated vulnerability scanning service for applications deployed in App Engine.
 * Access Transparency - Near real-time audit logs providing visibility to Google Cloud Platform administrators.

IoT

 * Cloud IoT Core - Secure device connection and management service for Internet of Things.
 * Edge TPU - Purpose-built ASIC designed to run inference at the edge. As of September 2018, this product is in private beta.
 * Cloud IoT Edge - Brings AI to the edge computing layer.

API Platform

 * Maps Platform - APIs for maps, routes, and places based on Google Maps.
 * Apigee API Platform - Lifecycle management platform to design, secure, deploy, monitor, and scale APIs.
 * API Monetization - Solution for API providers to create revenue models, reports, payment gateways, and developer portal integrations.
 * Developer Portal - Self-service platform for developers to publish and manage APIs.
 * API Analytics - Service to analyze API-driven programs through monitoring, measuring, and managing APIs.
 * Apigee Sense -  Enables API security by identifying and alerting administrators to suspicious API behaviors.
 * Cloud Endpoints - An NGINX-based proxy to deploy and manage APIs.

Regions & Zones
Google Cloud Platform is available in 17 regions and 52 zones. A region is a specific geographical location where users can deploy cloud resources.

Each region is an independent geographic area that consists of zones.

A zone is a deployment area for Google Cloud Platform resources within a region. Zones should be considered a single failure domain within a region.

Most of the regions have three or more zones. As of September 2018, Google Cloud Platform is available in the following regions and zones:

Certifications
Similar to offerings by Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, and IBM, a series of Google Cloud Certified programs are available on the Google Cloud Platform. Participants can choose between online learning programs provided by Coursera or Qwiklabs as well as live workshops and webinars. Depending on the program, certifications can be earned online or at various testing centers located globally.


 * Associate Cloud Engineer
 * Professional Data Engineer
 * Professional Cloud Architect
 * G Suite Administrator
 * G Suite