Towards an Architecture for Reliable Capacity Provisioning for Distributed Clouds

The complexity of computing along the cloud-to-edge continuum presents significant challenges to ICT operations and in particular reliable capacity planning and resource provisioning to meet unpredictable, fluctuating, and mobile demand. This chapter presents a high-level conceptual overview of RECAP---an architectural innovation to support reliable capacity provisioning for distributed clouds---and its operational modes and functional building blocks. In addition, the major design concepts informing its design---namely separation of concerns, model-centricism, modular design, and machine learning and artificial intelligence for IT operations---are also discussed.