Cloud computing service negotiation: A systematic review

Features of cloud computing services have created a significant trend of organizations opting for these services. In this situation, many consumers, who want a certain service, and many providers, who supply those services, form a competitive market. Consumers compete with each other to get a service with the desired functional and nonfunctional requirements. There is also a competition space among the providers to sell their services to the consumers. Since there is a dynamic competitive market and conflicting requirements of consumers and providers, it is essential that automated negotiation mechanisms be proposed to reach agreements and provide the maximum utility for both trading parties. To the best of our knowledge, no comprehensive study and review of cloud computing service negotiation (CCSN) exist as of now. In this article, we study the CCSN models. We investigate frameworks, techniques, protocols, and strategies proposed by the CCSN researches. Some questions will be proposed, and answers to the questions may help researchers design more efficient models in future works. Valuable innovations are explained and evaluated to find the answers to the questions. Statistics can specify some defects that must be addressed in future researches. The contributions can be summarized as follows: (1) reviewing CCSN works to understand open issues and challenges in providing negotiation systems in the cloud environments, (2) identifying the characteristics of an efficient CCSN that can provide the maximum utility for the trading parties, and (3) pointing out the defects of the current works to help researchers improve the CCSN systems in future researches.