Plan a cloud migration around the workload

Cloud migration begins with understanding what an application needs to run and who will operate it. Moving servers without examining these responsibilities can preserve existing problems while introducing new costs and failure modes. A workload assessment creates the foundation for a sensible hosting decision.

Map the full dependency chain

Inventory the application, database, file storage, identity services, scheduled jobs, email, and external integrations. Identify local filesystem assumptions and background work that may not survive a change in hosting model. Capture traffic patterns and peak demand using observed data where possible instead of treating a single average as representative.

Agree on operational requirements

Define expected availability, recovery objectives, maintenance windows, and data handling requirements with the business owner. Determine who can respond to incidents and which services that team already understands. A sophisticated architecture can be a poor fit if the organization cannot observe or operate it effectively.

Rehearse the cutover and recovery

Plan data synchronization, access changes, DNS behaviour, and validation steps. Assign a decision maker for proceeding or reverting. Test a representative restore and confirm what would happen to new writes during a failed cutover. Keep the old and new systems from independently accepting conflicting updates without a reconciliation plan.

A practical next step

Create a workload diagram with every dependency and its owner. Walk through a normal request and a failure scenario with the operations team before comparing hosting proposals.