A Taxonomy and Management of Technical Debt for Virtual Machine Migration in Cloud Environments

Efficient resource allocation is crucial in an unpredictable cloud environment to optimize data centers and reduce IT costs. Technical debt, often arising from prioritizing speed over code quality, increases the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO). Cloud computing services rely on massive data centers, but weak software architecture leads to architectural debt, raising long-term maintenance costs. Despite technological advancements, technical debt remains underexplored. This paper proposes a technical debt taxonomy, linking it to VM migration to mitigate debt and lower TCO. We highlight existing definitions, emphasize its relevance in IaaS, and explore the economic aspects of technical debt in VM migration.