Alibaba ACA Cloud Operator key terms

A geographically separate area where Alibaba Cloud deploys its data centers and services. Resources in different regions are isolated, and choosing a region close to users reduces latency.

An isolated physical location with independent power and network within a region. Deploying resources across multiple zones improves fault tolerance and availability of applications.

A logical container used to group cloud resources belonging to a project, team, or environment. It simplifies permission assignment, cost tracking, and bulk management.

A key-value label attached to a resource for organization, filtering, and cost allocation. Tags help operators identify ownership, environment, and billing responsibility across many resources.

Alibaba Cloud's virtual server service that provides scalable computing capacity. Operators choose instance types, images, disks, and networking to run workloads in the cloud.

A predefined combination of vCPU, memory, and network capability that determines an ECS instance's performance profile. Families are optimized for general, compute, memory, or GPU workloads.

A template containing an operating system and optional preinstalled software used to create ECS instances. Custom images capture a configured server for repeatable deployments.

A stateful virtual firewall controlling inbound and outbound traffic for ECS instances. Rules specify protocol, port range, and source or destination, and apply at the instance level.

A service that automatically adjusts the number of ECS instances based on demand, scaling rules, and schedules. It maintains application availability while controlling compute costs.

A collection of ECS instances managed together by Auto Scaling, sharing configuration such as instance type and image. It defines minimum, maximum, and desired instance counts.

A script or configuration passed to an ECS instance at first boot to automate setup tasks. It enables repeatable initialization such as installing packages or joining clusters.

Block storage attached to an ECS instance that persists independently of the instance lifecycle. Disks can be resized, snapshotted, and reattached to other instances.

A point-in-time backup of a cloud disk used for data protection and restoring volumes. Snapshots can also create custom images or roll back after failed changes.

Alibaba Cloud's scalable object storage for unstructured data such as files, backups, and static assets. Data is organized into buckets and accessed via API or URL.

A namespace container in OSS that holds objects and defines region, access control, and storage settings. Bucket names are globally unique within the service.

A policy that automatically transitions objects to cheaper storage classes or deletes them after a set period. It reduces storage cost for aging or temporary data.

A logically isolated network in Alibaba Cloud where you define IP ranges, subnets, and routing. It provides control over network segmentation and connectivity for cloud resources.

A subnet within a VPC that defines an IP address range and is bound to a single zone. Instances in different vSwitches communicate through routing rules.

A set of rules determining where network traffic from subnets is forwarded. Operators adjust routes to direct traffic to gateways, peers, or appliances.

A managed service that lets instances in a private VPC subnet access the internet without public IP addresses. It supports SNAT for outbound and DNAT for inbound traffic.

A public IP address that can be allocated and bound to cloud resources independently. It can be remapped between instances to support failover and migration.

A service that distributes incoming traffic across multiple backend servers to improve availability and scale. Health checks remove unhealthy backends automatically.

Alibaba Cloud's monitoring service that collects metrics, events, and alerts for cloud resources. It supports dashboards, threshold alarms, and notification channels for operators.

A monitoring configuration that triggers notifications or automated actions when a metric crosses a threshold. Rules specify conditions, evaluation periods, and contact groups.

A numeric measurement collected over time, such as CPU utilization or network throughput. Metrics are the basis for dashboards, trend analysis, and alarm evaluation.

A service that records API calls and console actions taken on cloud resources. Audit logs help with security investigation, compliance, and troubleshooting changes.

A managed platform for collecting, storing, and querying logs from applications and cloud services. It supports real-time search, analysis, and alerting on log data.

Alibaba Cloud's identity and access service for creating users, groups, and roles with fine-grained permissions. It supports temporary credentials and cross-account access control.

A JSON document defining which actions are allowed or denied on specified resources for a principal. Policies attach to users, groups, or roles to enforce least privilege.

An identity with permissions that can be assumed by trusted entities such as ECS instances or other accounts. Roles issue temporary credentials, avoiding long-term access keys.

A credential pair of an identifier and secret used for programmatic API access. Secrets must be protected and rotated, since leaked keys can compromise account resources.

A default protection service that defends public IP addresses against common distributed denial-of-service attacks. It applies automatic scrubbing with limited capacity before advanced protection is needed.

A centralized service providing internet, VPC, and host-level traffic filtering across cloud resources. It enforces consistent security policies and supports intrusion detection.

The practice of attributing cloud spending to teams, projects, or environments using tags and resource groups. It enables budget accountability and informed optimization decisions.

A prepaid commitment to a certain instance configuration in a region for a term, offered at a discount. It reduces compute cost for steady, predictable workloads.

A category of OSS storage defining durability, availability, and retrieval cost, such as standard or archive tiers. Choosing the right class lowers cost for infrequently accessed data.