Which is an example of Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS)?

• A. Google Mail
• B. Google App Service
• C. Microsoft Azure Virtual Machines
• D. Platform-as-a-Service

Answer: (C)

The main idea here is distinguishing cloud service models by who manages what. IaaS provides fundamental computing resources like virtual machines, storage, and networks, with you in charge of the operating system, middleware, runtime, and applications, while the provider handles the physical hardware and virtualization.

Microsoft Azure Virtual Machines fits this perfectly because you rent and manage the virtual machines themselves, including the operating system and any software you install on them. The provider takes care of the underlying hardware, virtualization, and basic networking, but you control the guest OS and software stack you run on those VMs.

Gmail is a software-as-a-service offering—you use an email service hosted entirely by the provider with no control over the underlying infrastructure. Google App Service (App Engine) is a platform-as-a-service option where you deploy applications but don’t manage the OS or runtime environment. Platform-as-a-Service, as a category, describes a type of offering rather than a concrete instance of infrastructure.