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Data Protection Diaries Fundamentals Walking The Data Protection Talk

Data Protection Diaries Walking The Data Protection Talk

Companion to Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials – Cloud, Converged, Virtual Fundamental Server Storage I/O Tradecraft ( CRC Press 2017)

server storage I/O data infrastructure trends

By Greg Schulz – www.storageioblog.com November 26, 2017

This is Part 8 of a multi-part series on Data Protection fundamental tools topics techniques terms technologies trends tradecraft tips as a follow-up to my Data Protection Diaries series, as well as a companion to my new book Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials – Cloud, Converged, Virtual Server Storage I/O Fundamental tradecraft (CRC Press 2017).

Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

Click here to view the previous post Data Protection Tools, Technologies, Toolbox, Buzzword Bingo Trends, and click here to view the next post who’s Doing What ( Toolbox Technology Tools).

Post in the series includes excerpts from Software Defined Data Infrastructure (SDDI) pertaining to data protection for legacy along with software defined data centers ( SDDC), data infrastructures in general along with related topics. In addition to excerpts, the posts also contain links to articles, tips, posts, videos, webinars, events and other companion material. Note that figure numbers in this series are those from the SDDI book and not in the order that they appear in the posts.

In this post the focus is around what I (and Server StorageIO) does for Data Protection besides just talking the talk and is a work in progress that is being updated over time with additional insights.

Walking The Data Protection Talk What I Do

A couple of years back I did the first post as part of the Data Protection Diaries series ( view here), that included the following image showing some data protection needs and requirements, as well as what being done, along with areas for improvement. Part of what I and Server StorageIO does involves consulting (strategy, design, assessment), advising and other influencers activities (e.g. blog, write articles, create reports, webinars, seminars, videos, podcasts) pertaining to data Infrastructure topics as well as data protection.

What this means is knowing about the trends, tools, technologies, what’s old and new, who’s doing what, what should be in the data protection toolbox, as well as how to use those for different scenarios. Its one thing to talk the talk, however I also prefer to walk the talk including eating my own dog food applying various techniques, approaches, tools and technologies discussed.

The following are from a previous Data Protection Diaries post where I discuss my data protection needs (and wants) some of which have evolved since then. Note the image on the left is my Livescribe Echo digital pen and paper tablet. On the right is an example of the digital image created and imported into my computer from the Livescribe. In other words, Im able to protect my hand written notes, diagrams and figures.

Data Protection Diaries Data Protection Diaries Walking The Talk
Via my Livescribe Echo digital pen ( get your Livescribe here at Amazon.com)

My Environment and data protection is always evolving, some based on changing projects, others that are more stable. Likewise the applications along with data are varied after all, everything is not the same. My data protection includes snapshots, replication, mirror, sync, versions, backup, archive, RAID, erasure code among others technologies, tools, and techniques.

Applications range from desktop, office, email, documents, spreadsheets, presentations, video, audio and related items in support of day-to-day activities. Then there are items part of various projects that range from physical to virtual, cloud and container leveraging various tools. This means having protection copies (sync, backup, snapshots, consistency points) of virtual machines, physical machine instances, applications and databases such as SQL Server among many others. Other application workloads include web, word press blog and email among others.

The Server StorageIO environment consists of a mix of legacy on-premises technologies from servers, storage, hardware, software, networks, tools as well as software defined virtual (e.g. VMware, Hyper-V, Docker among others), as well as cloud. The StorageIO data Infrastructure environment consists of dedicated private server (DPS) that I have had for several years now that supports this blog as well as other sites and activity. I also have a passive standby site used for testing of the WordPress based blog on an AWS Lightsail server. I use tools such as Updraft Plus Premium to routinely create a complete data protection view (database, plugins, templates, settings, configuration, core) of my WordPress site (runs on DPS) that is stored in various locations, including at AWS.

Data Protection Diaries Walking The Talk
Some of my past data protection requirements (they have evolved)

Currently the Lightsail Virtual Private Server (VPS) is in passive mode, however plans are to enable it as a warm or active standby fail over site for some of the DPS functions. One of the tools I have for monitoring and insight besides those in WordPress and the DPS are AWS Route 53 alerts that I have set up to monitor endpoints. AWS Route 53 is a handy resource for monitoring your endpoints such as a website, blog among other things and have it notify you, or take action including facilitating DNS fail over if needed. For now, Im simply using Route 53 besides as a secondary DNS as a notification tool.

Speaking of AWS, I have compute instances in Elastic Cloud Compute (EC2) along with associated Elastic Block Storage (EBS) volumes as well as their snapshots. I also have AWS S3 buckets in different regions that are on various tiers from standard to infrequent access (IA), as well as some data on Glacier. Data from my DPS at Bluehost gets protected to a AWS S3 bucket that I can access from AWS EC2, as well as via other locations including Microsoft Azure as needed.

Some on-premises data also gets protected to AWS S3 (as well as to elsewhere) using various tools, for different granularity, frequency, access and retention. After all, everything is not the same, why treat it the same. Some of the data protected to AWS S3 buckets is in native format (e.g. they appear as objects to S3 or object enabled applications), as well as file to file based applications with appropriate tools.

Other data that is also protected to AWS S3 from different data protection or backup tools are stored in vendor neutral or vendor specific save set, zip, tar ball or other formats. In other words, I need the tool or compatible tool that knows the format of the saved data to retrieve individual data files, items or objects. Note that this is similar to storing data on tape, HDDs, SSD or other media in native format vs. in some type of encapsulate save set or other format.

In addition to protecting data to AWS, I also have data at Microsoft Azure among other locations. Other locations include non-cloud based off-site where encrypted removable media is periodically taken to a safe secure place as a master, gold in case of major emergency, ransomeware copy.

Why not just rely on cloud copies?

Simple, I can pull individual files or relatively small amounts of data back from the cloud sometimes faster (or easier) than from on-site copies, let alone my off-site, off-line, air gap copies. On the other hand, if I need to restore large amounts of data, without a fast network, it can be quicker to get the air gap off-line, off-site copy, do the large restore, then apply incremental or changed data via cloud. In other a hybrid approach.

Now a common question I get is why not just do one or the other and save some money. Good point, I would save some money, however by doing the above among other things, they are part of being able to test, try new and different things, gain insight, experience not to mention walk the talk vs. simply talking the talk.

Of course Im always looking for ways to streamline to make my data protection more efficient, as well as effective (along with remove complexity and costs).

  • Everything is not the same, so why treat it all the same with common SLO, RTO, RPO and retention?
  • Likewise why treat and store all data the same way, on the same tiers of technology
  • Gain insight and awareness into environment, applications, workloads, PACE needs
  • Applications, data, systems or devices are protected with different granularity and frequency
  • Apply applicable technology and tools to the task at hand
  • Any data I have in cloud has a copy elsewhere, likewise, any data on-premises has a copy in the cloud or elsewhere
  • I implement the 4 3 2 1 rule by having multiple copies, versions, data in different locations, on and off-line including cloud
  • From a security standpoint, many different things are implemented on a logical as well as physical basis including encryption
  • Ability to restore data as well as applications or image instances locally as well as into cloud environments
  • Leverage different insight and awareness, reporting, analytics and monitoring tools
  • Mix of local storage configured with different RAID and other protection
  • Test, find, fix, remediate improve the environment including leveraging lessons learned

Where To Learn More

Continue reading additional posts in this series of Data Infrastructure Data Protection fundamentals and companion to Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press 2017) book, as well as the following links covering technology, trends, tools, techniques, tradecraft and tips.

Additional learning experiences along with common questions (and answers), as well as tips can be found in Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials book.

Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

What This All Means

Everything is not the same, thats why in my environment I use different technologies, tools and techniques to protect my data. This also means having different RTO, RPO across various applications, data and systems as well as devices. Data that is more important has more copies, versions in different locations as well as occurring more frequently as part of 4 3 2 1 data protection. Other data that does not change as frequently, or time sensitive have alternate RTO and RPO along with corresponding frequency of protection.

Get your copy of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials here at Amazon.com, at CRC Press among other locations and learn more here. Meanwhile, continue reading with the next post in this series Part 9 who’s Doing What (Toolbox Technology Tools).

Ok, nuff said, for now.

Gs

Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert 2010-2017 (vSAN and vCloud). Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio. Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2024 Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved. StorageIO is a registered Trade Mark (TM) of Server StorageIO.

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Data Protection Diaries Fundamentals Who Is Doing What Toolbox Technology Tools

Data Protection Toolbox Whos Doing What Technology Tools

Updated 1/17/2018

Data protection toolbox is a companion to Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials – Cloud, Converged, Virtual Fundamental Server Storage I/O Tradecraft ( CRC Press 2017)

server storage I/O data infrastructure trends

By Greg Schulz – www.storageioblog.com November 26, 2017

This is Part 9 of a multi-part series on Data Protection fundamental tools topics techniques terms technologies trends tradecraft tips as a follow-up to my Data Protection Diaries series, as well as a companion to my new book Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials – Cloud, Converged, Virtual Server Storage I/O Fundamental tradecraft (CRC Press 2017).

Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

Click here to view the previous post Part 8 Walking The Data Protection Talk, and click here to view the next post Part 10 Data Protection Resources Where to Learn More.

Post in the series includes excerpts from Software Defined Data Infrastructure (SDDI) pertaining to data protection for legacy along with software defined data centers ( SDDC), data infrastructures in general along with related topics. In addition to excerpts, the posts also contain links to articles, tips, posts, videos, webinars, events and other companion material. Note that figure numbers in this series are those from the SDDI book and not in the order that they appear in the posts.

In this post the focus is around Data Protection who’s Doing What ( Toolbox Technology Tools).

SDDC, SDI, SDDI data infrastructure
Figure 1.5 Data Infrastructures and other IT Infrastructure Layers

who’s Doing What (Toolbox Technology Tools)

SDDC SDDI data center data protection toolbox
Data Protection Toolbox

Note that this post is evolving with additional tools, technologies, techniques, hardware, software, services being added over time along with applicable industry links.

The following are a sampling of some hardware, software, solution and component vendors along with service providers involved with data protection from RAID, Erasure Codes (EC) to snapshots, backup, BC, BR, DR, archive, security, cloud, bulk object storage, HDDs, SSD, tape among others including buzzword (and buzz term trends) bingo. Acronis, Actifio, Arcserve, ATTO, AWS, Backblaze, Barracuda, Broadcom, Caringo, Chelsio (offload), Code42/Crashplan, Cray, Ceph, Cisco, Cloudian, Cohesity, Compuverde, Commvault, Datadog, Datrium, Datos IO, DDN, Dell EMC, Druva, E8, Elastifile, Exagrid, Excelero, Fujifilm, Fujutsu, Google, HPE, Huawei, Hedvig, IBM, Intel, Iomega, Iron Mountain, IBM, Jungledisk, Kinetic key value drives (Seagate), Lenovo, LTO organization, Mangstor, Maxta, Mellanox (offload), Micron, Microsoft (Azure, Windows, Storage Spaces), Microsemi, Nakivo, NetApp, NooBaa, Nexsan, Nutanix, OpenIO, OpenStack (Swift), Oracle, Panasas, Panzura, Promise, Pure, Quantum, Quest, Qumulo, Retrospect, Riverbed, Rozo, Rubrik, Samsung, Scale, Scality, Seagate (DotHill), Sony, Solarwinds, Spectralogic, Starwind, Storpool, Strongbox, Sureline, Swiftstack, Synology, Toshiba, Tintri, Turbonomics, Unitrends, Unix and Linux platforms, Vantara, Veeam, VMware, Western Digital (Amplidata, Tegile and others), WekaIO, X-IO, Zadara and Zmanda among many others.

Note if you dont see yours, or your favorite, preferred or clients listed above or in the data Infrastructure industry related links send us a note for consideration to be included in future updates, or having a link, or sponsor spot pointing to your site added. Feel free to add a non sales marketing pitch to courteous comments to the comment section below.

View additional IT, data center and data Infrastructure along with data protection related vendors, services, tools, technologies links here.

Where To Learn More

Continue reading additional posts in this series of Data Infrastructure Data Protection fundamentals and companion to Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press 2017) book, as well as the following links covering technology, trends, tools, techniques, tradecraft and tips.

Additional learning experiences along with common questions (and answers), as well as tips can be found in Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials book.

Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

What This All Means

Part of modernizing data protection for various data center and data infrastructure environments is to know the tools, technologies and trends that are part of your data protection toolbox. The other part of modernizing data is protection is knowing the techniques of how to use different tools, technologies to meet various application workload performance, availability, capacity economic (PACE) needs.

Also keep in mind that information services requires applications (e.g. programs) and that programs are a combination of algorithms (code, rules, policies) and data structures (e.g. data and how it is organized including unstructured). What this means is that data protection needs to address not only data, also the applications, configuration settings, metadata as well as protecting the protection tools and its data.

Get your copy of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials here at Amazon.com, at CRC Press among other locations and learn more here. Meanwhile, continue reading with the next post in this series, Part 10 Data Protection Fundamental Resources Where to Learn More.

Ok, nuff said, for now.

Gs

Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert 2010-2017 (vSAN and vCloud). Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio. Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2024 Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved. StorageIO is a registered Trade Mark (TM) of Server StorageIO.

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Data Protection Diaries Fundamental Resources Where to Learn More

Data Protection Diaries Fundamental Resources Where to Learn More

Companion to Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials – Cloud, Converged, Virtual Fundamental Server Storage I/O Tradecraft ( CRC Press 2017)

server storage I/O data infrastructure trends

By Greg Schulz – www.storageioblog.com November 26, 2017

This is the last in a multi-part series on Data Protection fundamental tools topics techniques terms technologies trends tradecraft tips as a follow-up to my Data Protection Diaries series, as well as a companion to my new book Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials – Cloud, Converged, Virtual Server Storage I/O Fundamental tradecraft (CRC Press 2017).

Click here to view the previous post Part 9 – who’s Doing What ( Toolbox Technology Tools).

Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

Post in the series includes excerpts from Software Defined Data Infrastructure (SDDI) pertaining to data protection for legacy along with software defined data centers ( SDDC), data infrastructures in general along with related topics. In addition to excerpts, the posts also contain links to articles, tips, posts, videos, webinars, events and other companion material. Note that figure numbers in this series are those from the SDDI book and not in the order that they appear in the posts.

In this post the focus is around Data Protection Resources Where to Learn More.

SDDC, SDI, SDDI data infrastructure
Figure 1.5 Data Infrastructures and other IT Infrastructure Layers

Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Table of Contents (TOC)

Here is a link (PDF) to the table of contents (TOC) for Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials.

The following is a Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials book TOC summary:

Chapter 1: Server Storage I/O and Data Infrastructure Fundamentals
Chapter 2: Application and IT Environments
Chapter 3: Bits, Bytes, Blobs, and Software-Defined Building Blocks
Chapter 4: Servers: Physical, Virtual, Cloud, and Containers
Chapter 5: Server I/O and Networking
Chapter 6: Servers and Storage-Defined Networking
Chapter 7: Storage Mediums and Component Devices
Chapter 8: Data Infrastructure Services: Access and Performance
Chapter 9: Data Infrastructure Services: Availability, RAS, and RAID
Chapter 10: Data Infrastructure Services: Availability, Recovery-Point Objective, and Security
Chapter 11: Data Infrastructure Services: Capacity and Data Reduction
Chapter 12: Storage Systems and Solutions (Products and Cloud)
Chapter 13: Data Infrastructure and Software-Defined Management
Chapter 14: Data Infrastructure Deployment Considerations
Chapter 15: Software-Defined Data Infrastructure Futures, Wrap-up, and Summary
Appendix A: Learning Experiences
Appendix B: Additional Learning, Tools, and tradecraft Tricks
Appendix C: Frequently Asked Questions
Appendix D: Book Shelf and Recommended Reading
Appendix E: Tools and Technologies Used in Support of This Book
Appendix F: How to Use This Book for Various Audiences
Appendix G: Companion Website and Where to Learn More
Glossary
Index

Click here to view (PDF) table of contents (TOC).

Data Protection Resources Where To Learn More

Learn more about Data Infrastructure and Data Protection related technology, trends, tools, techniques, tradecraft and tips with the following links.

The following are the various posts that are part of this data protection series:

  • Part 1 – Data Infrastructure Data Protection Fundamentals
  • Part 2 – Reliability, Availability, Serviceability ( RAS) Data Protection Fundamentals
  • Part 3 – Data Protection Access Availability RAID Erasure Codes ( EC) including LRC
  • Part 4 – Data Protection Recovery Points (Archive, Backup, Snapshots, Versions)
  • Part 5 – Point In Time Data Protection Granularity Points of Interest
  • Part 6 – Data Protection Security Logical Physical Software Defined
  • Part 7 – Data Protection Tools, Technologies, Toolbox, Buzzword Bingo Trends
  • Part 8 – Data Protection Diaries Walking Data Protection Talk
  • Part 9 – who’s Doing What ( Toolbox Technology Tools)
  • Part 10 – Data Protection Resources Where to Learn More


    • The following are various data protection blog posts:

  • Welcome to the Data Protection Diaries
  • Until the focus expands to data protection, backup is staying alive!
  • The blame game, Does cloud storage result in data loss?
  • Loss of data access vs. data loss
  • Revisiting RAID storage remains relevant and resources
  • Only you can prevent cloud (or other) data loss
  • Data protection is a shared responsibility
  • Time for CDP (Commonsense Data Protection)?
  • Data Infrastructure Server Storage I/O Tradecraft Trends (skills, experiences, knowledge)
  • My copies were corrupted: The [4] 3-2-1 rule and more about 4 3 2 1 as well as 3 2 1 here and here

    • The following are various data protection tips and articles:

  • Via Infostor Cloud Storage Concerns, Considerations and Trends
  • Via Network World What’s a data infrastructure?
  • Via Infostor Data Protection Gaps, Some Good, Some Not So Good
  • Via Infostor Object Storage is in your future
  • Via Iron Mountain Preventing Unexpected Disasters
  • Via InfoStor – The Many Variations of RAID Storage
  • Via InfoStor – RAID Remains Relevant, Really!
  • Via WservNews Cloud Storage Considerations (Microsoft Azure)
  • Via ComputerWeekly Time to restore from backup: Do you know where your data is?
  • Via Network World Ensure your data infrastructure remains available and resilient

    • The following are various data protection related webinars and events:

  • BrightTalk Webinar Data Protection Modernization – Protect, Preserve and Serve you Information
  • BrightTalk Webinar BCDR and Cloud Backup Protect Preserve and Secure Your Data Infrastructure
  • TechAdvisor Webinar (Free with registration) All You Need To Know about ROBO data protection
  • TechAdvisor Webinar (Free with registration) Tips for Moving from Backup to Full Disaster Recovery

    • The following are various data protection tools, technologies, services, vendor and industry resource links:

  • Various Data Infrastructure related news commentary, events, tips and articles
  • Data Center and Data Infrastructure industry links (vendors, services, tools, technologies, hardware, software)
  • Data Infrastructure server storage I/O network Recommended Reading List Book Shelf
  • Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC 2017) Book

    • Additional learning experiences along with common questions (and answers), as well as tips can be found in Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials book.

    What This All Means

    Everything is not the same across environments, data centers, data infrastructures including SDDC, SDX and SDDI as well as applications along with their data.

    Likewise everything is and does not have to be the same when it comes to Data Protection.

    Since everything is not the same, various data protection approaches are needed to address various application performance, availability, capacity economic (PACE) needs, as well as SLO and SLAs.

    Data protection encompasses many different hardware, software, services including cloud technologies, tools, techniques, best practices, policies and tradecraft experience skills (e.g. knowing what to use when, where, why and how).

    Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

    Context is important as different terms have various meanings depending on what they are being discussed with. Likewise different technologies and topics such as object, blob, backup, replication, RAID, erasure code (EC), mirroring, gaps (good, bad, ugly), snapshot, checkpoint, availability, durability among others have various meanings depending on context, as well as implementation approach.

    In most cases there is no bad technology or tool, granted there are some poor or bad (even ugly) implementations, as well as deployment or configuration decisions. What this means is the best technology or approach for your needs may be different from somebody else’s and vice versa.

    Some other points include there is no such thing as an information recession with more data generated every day, granted, how that data is transformed or stored can be in a smaller footprint. Likewise there is an increase in the size of data including unstructured big data, as well as the volume (how much data), as well as velocity (speed at which it is created, moved, processed, stored). This also means there is an increased dependency on data being available, accessible and intact with consistency. Thus the fundamental role of data Infrastructures (e.g. what’s inside the data center or cloud) is to combine resources, technologies, tools, techniques, best practices, policies, people skill set, experiences (e.g. tradecraft) to protect, preserve, secure and serve information (applications and data).

    modernizing data protection including backup, availability and related topics means more than swapping out one hardware, software, service or cloud for whatever is new, and then using it in old ways.

    What this means is to start using new (and old) things in new ways, for example move beyond using SSD or HDDs like tape as targets for backup or other data protection approaches. Instead use SSD, HDDs or cloud as a tier, yet also to enable faster protection and recovery by stepping back and rethinking what to protect, when, where, why, how and apply applicable techniques, tools and technologies. Find a balance between knowing all about the tools and trends while not understanding how to use those toolbox items, as well as knowing all about the techniques of how to use the tools, yet not knowing what the tools are.

    Want to learn more, have questions about specific tools, technologies, trends, vendors, products, services or techniques discussed in this series, send a note (info at storageio dot com) or via our contact page. We can set up a time to discuss your questions or needs pertaining to Data Protection as well as data infrastructures related topics from legacy to software defined virtual, cloud, container among others. For example consulting, advisory services, architecture strategy design, technology selection and acquisition coaching, education knowledge transfer sessions, seminars, webinars, special projects, test drive lab reviews or audits, content generation, videos, podcasts, custom content, chapter excerpts, demand generation among many other things.

    Get your copy of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials here at Amazon.com, at CRC Press among other locations and learn more here.

    Ok, nuff said, for now.

    Gs

    Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert 2010-2017 (vSAN and vCloud). Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio. Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

    All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2024 Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved. StorageIO is a registered Trade Mark (TM) of Server StorageIO.

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    HPE Announces AMD Powered Gen 10 ProLiant DL385 For Software Defined Workloads

    HPE Announces AMD Powered Gen 10 ProLiant DL385 For Software Defined Workloads

    server storage I/O data infrastructure trends

    By Greg Schulz – www.storageioblog.com November 20, 2017

    HPE Announced today a new AMD EPYC 7000 Powered Gen 10 ProLiant DL385 for Software Defined Workloads including server virtualization, software-defined data center (SDDC), software-defined data infrastructure (SDDI), software-defined storage among others. These new servers are part of a broader Gen10 HPE portfolio of ProLiant DL systems.

    HPE AMD EPYC Gen10 DL385
    24 Small Form Factor Drive front view DL385 Gen 10 Via HPE

    The value proposition being promoted by HPE of these new AMD powered Gen 10 DL385 servers besides supporting software-defined, SDDI, SDDC, and related workloads are security, density and lower price than others. HPE is claiming with the new AMD EPYC system on a chip (SoC) processor powered Gen 10 DL385 that it is offering up to 50 percent lower cost per virtual machine (VM) than traditional server solutions.

    About HPE AMD Powered Gen 10 DL385

    HPE AMD EPYC 7000 Gen 10 DL385 features:

    • 2U (height) form factor
    • HPE OneView and iLO management
    • Flexible HPE finance options
    • Data Infrastructure Security
    • AMD EPYC 7000 System on Chip (SoC) processors
    • NVMe storage (Embedded M.2 and U.2/8639 Small Form Factor (SFF) e.g. drive form factor)
    • Address server I/O and memory bottlenecks

    These new HPE servers are positioned for:

    • Software Defined, Server Virtualization
    • Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) workspaces
    • HPC, Cloud and other general high-density workloads
    • General Data Infrastructure workloads that benefit from memory-centric or GPUs

    Different AMD Powered DL385 ProLiant Gen 10 Packaging Options

    Common across AMD EPYC 7000 powered Gen 10 DL385 servers are 2U high form factor, iLO management software and interfaces, flexible LAN on Motherboard (LOM) options, MicroSD (optional dual MicroSD), NVMe (embedded M.2 and SFF U.2) server storage I/O interface and drives, health and status LEDs, GPU support, single or dual socket processors.

    HPE AMD EPYC Gen10 DL385 Look Inside
    HPE DL385 Gen10 Inside View Via HPE

    HPE AMD EPYC Gen10 DL385 Rear View
    HPE DL385 Gen10 Rear View Via HPE

    Other up to three storage drive bays, support for Large Form Factor (LFF) and Small Form Factor (SFF) devices (HDD and SSD) including SFF NVMe (e.g., U.2) SSD. Up to 4 x Gbe NICs, PCIe riser for GPU (optional second riser requires the second processor). Other features and options include HPE SmartArray (RAID), up to 6 cooling fans, internal and external USB 3. Optional universal media bay that can also add a front display, optional Optical Disc Drive (ODD), optional 2 x U.2 NVMe SFF SSD. Note media bay occupies one of three storage drive bays.

    HPE AMD EPYC Gen10 DL385 Form Factor
    HPE DL385 Form Factor Via HPE

    Up to 3 x Drive Bays
    Up to 12 LFF drives (2 per bay)
    Up to 24 SFF drives ( 3 x 8 drive bays, 6 SFF + 2 NVMe U.2 or 8 x NVMe)

    AMD EPYC 7000 Series

    The AMD EPYC 7000 series is available in the single and dual socket. View additional AMD EPYC speeds and feeds in this data sheet (PDF), along with AMD server benchmarks here.

    HPE AMD EPYC Specifications
    HPE DL385 Gen 10 AMD EPYC Specifications Via HPE

    AMD EPYC 7000 General Features

    • Single and dual socket
    • Up to 32 cores, 64 threads per socket
    • Up to 16 DDR4 DIMMS over eight channels per socket (e.g., up to 2TB RAM)
    • Up to 128 PCIe Gen 3 lanes (e.g. combination of x4, x8, x16 etc)
    • Future 128GB DIMM support

    AMD EPYC 7000 Security Features

    • Secure processor and secure boot for malware rootkit protection
    • System memory encryption (SME)
    • Secure Encrypted Virtualization (SEV) hypervisors and guest virtual machine memory protection
    • Secure move (e.g., encrypted) between enabled servers

    Where To Learn More

    Learn more about Data Infrastructure and related server technology, trends, tools, techniques, tradecraft and tips with the following links.

  • AMD EPYC 7000 System on Chip (SoC) processors
  • Gen10 HPE portfolio and ProLiant DL systems.
  • Various Data Infrastructure related news commentary, events, tips and articles
  • Data Center and Data Infrastructure industry links
  • Data Infrastructure server storage I/O network Recommended Reading List Book Shelf
  • Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC 2017) Book

    • What This All Means

    With the flexible options including HDD, SSD as well as NVMe accessible SSDs, large memory capacity along with computing cores, these new solutions provide good data infrastructure server density (e.g., CPU, memory, I/O, storage) per cubic foot or meter per cost.

    I look forward to trying one of these systems out for software-defined scenarios including virtualization, software-defined storage (SDS) among others workload scenarios. Overall the HPE announcement of the new AMD EPYC 7000 Powered Gen 10 ProLiant DL385 looks to be a good option for many environments.

    Ok, nuff said, for now.

    Gs

    Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert 2010-2017 (vSAN and vCloud). Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio. Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

    All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2024 Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved. StorageIO is a registered Trade Mark (TM) of Server StorageIO.

    Posted on

    AWS Announces New S3 Cloud Storage Security Encryption Features

    AWS Announces New S3 Cloud Storage Security Encryption Features

    server storage I/O data infrastructure trends

    Updated 1/17/2018

    Amazon Web Services (AWS) recently announced new Simple Storage Service (S3) e.g. AWS S3 encryption and security enhancements including Default Encryption, Permission Checks, Cross-Region Replication ACL Overwrite, Cross-Region Replication with KMS and Detailed Inventory Report. Another recent announcement by AWS is for PrivateLinks endpoints within a Virtual Private Cloud (VPC).

    AWS Dashboard
    AWS Service Dashboard

    Default Encryption

    Extending previous security features, now you can mandate all objects stored in a given S3 bucket be encrypted without specifying a bucket policy that rejects non-encrypted objects. There are three server-side encryption (SSE) options for S3 objects including keys managed by S3, AWS KMS and SSE Customer ( SSE-C) managed keys. These options provide more flexibility as well as control for different environments along with increased granularity. Note that encryption can be forced on all objects in a bucket by specifying a bucket encryption configuration. When an unencrypted object is stored in an encrypted bucket, it will inherit the same encryption as the bucket, or, alternately specified by a PUT required.

    AWS S3 Bucket Encryption
    AWS S3 Buckets

    Permission Checks

    There is now an indicator on the S3 console dashboard prominently indicating which S3 buckets are publicly accessible. In the above image, some of my AWS S3 buckets are shown including one that is public facing. Note in the image above how there is a notion next to buckets that are open to public.

    Cross-Region Replication ACL Overwrite and KMS

    AWS Key Management Service (KMS) keys can be used for encrypting objects. Building on previous cross-region replication capabilities, now when you replicate objects across AWS accounts, a new ACL providing full access to the destination account can be specified.

    Detailed Inventory Report

    The S3 Inventory report ( which can also be encrypted) now includes the encryption status of each object.

    PrivateLink for AWS Services

    PrivateLinks enable AWS customers to access services from a VPC without using a public IP as well as traffic not having to go across the internet (e.g. keeps traffic within the AWS network. PrivateLink endpoints appear in Elastic Network Interface (ENI) with private IPs in your VPC and are highly available, resiliency and scalable. Besides scaling and resiliency, PrivateLink eliminates the need for white listing of public IPs as well as managing internet gateway, NAT and firewall proxies to connect to AWS services (Elastic Cloud Compute (EC2), Elastic Load Balancer (ELB), Kinesis Streams, Service Catalog, EC2 Systems Manager). Learn more about AWS PrivateLink for services here including  VPC Endpoint Pricing here. 

    Where To Learn More

    Learn more about related technology, trends, tools, techniques, and tips with the following links.

    What This All Means

    Common cloud concern considerations include privacy and security. AWS S3 among other industry cloud service and storage providers have had their share of not so pleasant news coverage involving security.

    Keep in mind that data protection including security is a shared responsibility (and only you can prevent data loss). This means that the vendor or service provider has to take care of their responsibility making sure their solutions have proper data protection and security features by default, as well as extensions, and making those capabilities known to consumers.

    The other part of shared responsibility is that consumers and users of cloud services need to know what the capabilities are, defaults and options as well as when to use various approaches. Ultimately it is up to the user of a cloud service to implement best practices to leverage cloud as well as their own on-premises technologies so that they can support data infrastructure that in turn protect, preserve, secure and serve information (along with their applications and data).

    These are good enhancements by AWS to make their S3 cloud storage security encryption features available as well as provide options and awareness for users on how to use those capabilities.

     

    Ok, nuff said, for now.

    Gs

    Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert 2010-2017 (vSAN and vCloud). Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio. Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

    All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2024 Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved. StorageIO is a registered Trade Mark (TM) of Server StorageIO.

    Posted on

    October 2017 Server StorageIO Data Infrastructure Update Newsletter



    Server StorageIO October 2017 Data Infrastructure Update Newsletter

    Volume 17, Issue 10 (October 2017)

    Hello and welcome to the October 2017 issue of the Server StorageIO data infrastructure update newsletter.

    Software-Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials SDDI SDDC

    October has been a busy month pertaining data infrastructure including server storage I/O related trends, activities, news, perspectives and related topics, so let’s have a look at them.

    In This Issue

    Enjoy this edition of the Server StorageIO data infrastructure update newsletter.

    Cheers GS

    Data Infrastructure and IT Industry Activity Trends

    Some recent Industry Activities, Trends, News and Announcements include:

    Startup Aparavi launched with a SaaS platform for managing long-term data retention. As part of a move to streamline the acquisition of Brocade by Broadcom (formerly known as Avago), the Brocade data center Ethernet networking business is being sold to Extreme networks. Datacore also updated their software defined storage solutions in October.

    Cisco announced new storage networking products and acquisition of Brodsoft (cloud calling and contact center solutions). As part of continued support for Fibre Channel based data infrastructure environments, Cisco has announced a 1U MDS 9132T 32 port 32 Gbps Fibre Channel Switch with FCP (SCSI Fibre Channel Protocol) now, and emerging FC-NVMe future support. Also announced are SAN telemetry activity monitoring, insight and event streaming for analysis in MDS 9700 32Gbps module.

    Cisco also announced interoperability for data center and data infrastructure insight, activity monitoring and telemetry with Virtual Instruments Virtual Wisdom technology eliminating the reliance on hardware based probes, along with Fibre Channel N-Port virtualization on Nexus 9300-FX DC switch.

    Commvault announced scale-out data protection with ScaleProtect for Cisco UCS platforms, along with their HyperScale appliance and HyperScale software.

    IBM had several October announcements include LTO 8 related, FlashSystem V9000 updates (e.g. All Flash Array) enclosure as well as hardware based compression, FlashSystem A9000 leveraging 3D TLC NAND flash (lower cost, higher capacity) among others.

    There is plenty of content (blogs, articles, podcasts, webinars, videos, white papers, presentations) on when to do containers, microservices and serverless compute including mesos, kubernetes and docker among others. What about when not to use those approaches or caveats to be aware of, here is such a piece (via Redhat) to have a look at.

    Granted if you are part of the micro services cheerleading bandwagon crowd you might not agree with the authors points, after all, everything is not the same in data centers and data infrastructures. Speaking of serverless, containers, here is a good post about Docker Swarm vs. Kubernetes management over at Upcloud.

    In Microsoft and Azure related activity, despite some early speculation in some venues that Storage Spaces Direct (S2D) was being discontinued as it was not part of Server release 1709, the reality is S2D is very much alive.

    Microsoft LTSC and SAC release cycles
    Image via Microsoft.com

    However some clarification is needed that might have lead to some initial speculation due to lack of understanding the new Microsoft release cycle.

    Microsoft has gone to Semi Annual Channel (SAC) releases that introduce new features in advance of the Long Term Support Channel (LTSC). LTSC are what you might be familiar with Windows and Windows Server releases that are updates spread out over time for a given major version (e.g. going from Server 2012 to Server 2012 R2 and so forth). The current Windows Server LTSC is the base introduced fall of 2016 along with incremental updates.

    By comparison, think of SAC as a branch channel for early adopters to get new features and with 1709 (e.g. September 2017), the focus is on containers. A mistake that has been made is to assume that a SAC release is actually a new major LTSC release, thus probably why some thought S2D was dead as it is not in SAC 1709. Indications from Microsoft are that there will be S2D enhancements in the next SAC, as well as future LTSC.

    For those interested in IoT, check out this Microsoft Azure IoT Hub and device twin document. Here is a post by Thomas Mauer looking at 10 hidden Hyper-V features to know about.

    In other activity, Minio announced experimental AWS S3 API support for Backblaze storage service. Software Defined Serverless Storage startup OpenIO gets $5M USD in additional funding. Quantum and other LTO Organization vendors have announced support for the new LTO version 8 tape drives and media. In addition to LTO 8, new roadmaps including out to LTO 12 are outlined here, and VMware vCloud Air is hosted by OVH. Western Digital Corporation (WDC) announced Microwave Assisted Magnetic Recording (MAMR) enabled Hard Disk Drives (HDD) that will enable future, larger capacity devices to be brought to market.

    Check out other industry news, comments, trends perspectives here.

    Server StorageIO Commentary in the news

    Recent Server StorageIO industry trends perspectives commentary in the news.

    Via HPE Insights: Comments on Public cloud versus on-prem storage
    Via arsTechnica: Comments on cloud backup disaster recovery
    Via Gizmodo: Comments on WDC 40TB HDD
    Via CDW: Comments on Is Your Network About To Fail?
    Via EnterpriseStorageForum: Comments on Trends for Data Storage with Big Data Analytics
    Via EnterpriseStorageForum: Comments on 8 ways to save on cloud storage
    Via EnterpriseStorageForum: Comments on Google Cloud Platform and Storage

    View more Server, Storage and I/O trends and perspectives comments here

    Server StorageIOblog Posts

    Recent and popular Server StorageIOblog posts include:

    In Case You Missed It #ICYMI

    View other recent as well as past StorageIOblog posts here

    Server StorageIO Data Infrastructure Tips and Articles

    Recent Server StorageIO industry trends perspectives commentary in the news.

    Via EnterpriseStorageForum: Comments on Who Will Rule the Storage World?
    Via InfoGoto: Comments on Google Cloud Platform Gaining Data Storage Momentum
    Via InfoGoto: Comments on Singapore High Rise Data Centers
    Via InfoGoto: Comments on New Tape Storage Capacity
    Via EnterpriseStorageForum: Comments on 8 ways to save on cloud storage
    Via EnterpriseStorageForum: Comments on Google Cloud Platform and Storage

    View more Server, Storage and I/O trends and perspectives comments here

    Server StorageIO Recommended Reading (Watching and Listening) List

    In addition to my own books including Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press 2017), the following are Server StorageIO recommended reading, watching and listening list items. The list includes various IT, Data Infrastructure and related topics.

    Intel Recommended Reading List (IRRL) for developers is a good resource to check out.

    Its October which means that it is also Blogtober, check out some of the blogs and posts occurring during October here.

    For those involved with VMware, check out Frank Denneman VMware vSphere 6.5 host resource guide-book here at Amazon.com.

    Docker: Up & Running: Shipping Reliable Containers in Production by Karl Matthias & Sean P. Kane via Amazon.com here.

    Essential Virtual SAN (VSAN): Administrator’s Guide to VMware Virtual SAN,2nd ed. by Cormac Hogan & Duncan Epping via Amazon.com here.

    Hadoop: The Definitive Guide: Storage and Analysis at Internet Scale by Tom White via Amazon.com here.

    Cisco IOS Cookbook: Field tested solutions to Cisco Router Problems by Kevin Dooley and Ian Brown Via Amazon.com here.

    Watch for more items to be added to the recommended reading list book shelf soon.

    Events and Activities

    Recent and upcoming event activities.

    Nov. 9, 2017 – Webinar – All You Need To Know about ROBO Data Protection Backup
    Nov. 2, 2017 – Webinar – Modern Data Protection for Hyper-Convergence
    Sep. 21, 2017 – MSP CMG – Minneapolis MN
    Sep. 20, 2017 – Webinar – BC, DR and Business Resiliency (BR) tips
    Sep. 14, 2017 – Fujifilm IT Executive Summit – Seattle WA
    Sep. 12, 2017 – SNIA Software Developers Conference (SDC) – Santa Clara CA
    Sep. 7, 2017 – Wipro SDX – Enabling, Planning Your Software Defined Journey

    See more webinars and activities on the Server StorageIO Events page here.

    Server StorageIO Industry Resources and Links

    Useful links and pages:
    Microsoft TechNet – Various Microsoft related from Azure to Docker to Windows
    storageio.com/links – Various industry links (over 1,000 with more to be added soon)
    objectstoragecenter.com – Cloud and object storage topics, tips and news items
    OpenStack.org – Various OpenStack related items
    storageio.com/downloads – Various presentations and other download material
    storageio.com/protect – Various data protection items and topics
    thenvmeplace.com – Focus on NVMe trends and technologies
    thessdplace.com – NVM and Solid State Disk topics, tips and techniques
    storageio.com/converge – Various CI, HCI and related SDS topics
    storageio.com/performance – Various server, storage and I/O benchmark and tools
    VMware Technical Network – Various VMware related items

    Ok, nuff said, for now.

    Gs

    Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert 2010-2017 (vSAN and vCloud). Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio. Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

    All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2023 Server StorageIO(R) and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved.

    Posted on

    Data Infrastructure server storage I/O network Recommended Reading #blogtober

    server storage I/O data infrastructure trends recommended reading list

    Updated 7/30/2018

    The following is an evolving recommended reading list of data infrastructure topics including, server, storage I/O, networking, cloud, virtual, container, data protection and related topics that includes books, blogs, podcast’s, events and industry links among other resources.

    Various Data Infrastructure including hardware, software, services related links:

    Links A-E
    Links F-J
    Links K-O
    Links P-T
    Links U-Z
    Other Links

    In addition to my own books including Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press 2017), the following are Server StorageIO recommended reading list items . The recommended reading list includes various IT, Data Infrastructure and related topics.

    Intel Recommended Reading List (IRRL) for developers is a good resource to check out.

    Duncan Epping (@DuncanYB), Frank Denneman (@FrankDenneman) and Neils Hagoort (@NHagoort) have released their VMware vSphere 6.7 Clustering Deep Dive book available at venues including Amazon.com. This is the latest in a series of Cluster and deep dive books from Frank and Duncan which if you are involved with VMware, SDDC and related software defined data infrastructures these should be on your bookshelf.

    Check out the Blogtober list of check out some of the blogs and posts occurring during October 2017 here.

    Preston De Guise aka @backupbear is Author of several books has an interesting new site Foolsrushin.info that looks at topics including Ethics in IT among others. Check out his new book Data Protection: Ensuring Data Availability (CRC Press 2017) and available via Amazon.com here.

    Brendan Gregg has a great site for Linux performance related topics here.

    Greg Knieriemen has a must read weekly blog, post, column collection of whats going on in and around the IT and data infrastructure related industries, Check it out here.

    Interested in file systems, CIFS, SMB, SAMBA and related topics then check out Chris Hertels book on implementing CIFS here at Amazon.com

    For those involved with VMware, check out Frank Denneman VMware vSphere 6.5 host resource guide-book here at Amazon.com.

    Docker: Up & Running: Shipping Reliable Containers in Production by Karl Matthias & Sean P. Kane via Amazon.com here.

    Essential Virtual SAN (VSAN): Administrator’s Guide to VMware Virtual SAN,2nd ed. by Cormac Hogan & Duncan Epping via Amazon.com here.

    Hadoop: The Definitive Guide: Storage and Analysis at Internet Scale by Tom White via Amazon.com here.

    Systems Performance: Enterprise and the Cloud by Brendan Gregg Via Amazon.com here.

    Implementing Cloud Storage with OpenStack Swift by Amar Kapadia, Sreedhar Varma, & Kris Rajana Via Amazon.com here.

    The Human Face of Big Data by Rick Smolan & Jennifer Erwitt Via Amazon.com here.

    VMware vSphere 5.1 Clustering Deepdive (Vol. 1) by Duncan Epping & Frank Denneman Via Amazon.com here. Note: This is an older title, but there are still good fundamentals in it.

    Linux Administration: A Beginners Guide by Wale Soyinka Via Amazon.com here.

    TCP/IP Network Administration by Craig Hunt Via Amazon.com here.

    Cisco IOS Cookbook: Field tested solutions to Cisco Router Problems by Kevin Dooley and Ian Brown Via Amazon.com here.

    I often mention in presentations a must have for anybody involved with software defined anything, or programming for that matter which is the Niklaus Wirth classic Algorithms + Data Structures = Programs that you can get on Amazon.com here.

    Seven Databases in Seven Weeks including NoSQL

    Another great book to have is Seven Databases in Seven Weeks (here is a book review) which not only provides an overview of popular NoSQL databases such as Cassandra, Mongo, HBASE among others, lots of good examples and hands on guides. Get your copy here at Amazon.com.

    Additional Data Infrastructure and related topic sites

    In addition to those mentioned above, other sites, venues and data infrastructure related resources include:

    aiim.com – Archiving and records management trade group

    apache.org – Various open-source software

    blog.scottlowe.org – Scott Lowe VMware Networking and topics

    blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/virtual_pc_guy – Ben Armstrong Hyper-V blog

    brendangregg.com – Linux performance-related topics

    cablemap.info – Global network maps

    CMG.org – Computer Measurement Group (CMG)

    communities.vmware.com – VMware technical community and resources

    comptia.org – Various IT, cloud, and data infrastructure certifications

    cormachogan.com – Cormac Hogan VMware and vSAN related topics

    csrc.nist.gov – U.S. government cloud specifications

    dmtf.org – Distributed Management Task Force (DMTF)

    ethernetalliance.org – Ethernet industry trade group

    fibrechannel.org – Fibre Channel trade group

    github.com – Various open-source solutions and projects

    Intel Reading List – recommended reading list for developers

    ieee.org – Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers

    ietf.org – Internet Engineering Task Force

    iso.org – International Standards Organizations

    it.toolbox.com – Various IT and data infrastructure topics forums

    labs.vmware.com/flings – VMware Fling additional tools and software

    nist.gov – National Institute of Standards and Technology

    nvmexpress.org – NVM Express (NVMe) industry trade group

    objectstoragecenter.com – Various object and cloud storage items

    opencompute.org – Open Compute Project (OCP) servers and related topics

    opendatacenteralliance.org – Open Data Center Alliance (ODCA)

    openfabrics.org – Open-fabric software industry group

    opennetworking.org – Open Networking Foundation (ONF)

    openstack.org – OpenStack resources

    pcisig.com – Peripheral Component Interconnect (PCI) trade group

    reddit.com – Various IT, cloud, and data infrastructure topics

    scsita.org – SCSI trade association (SAS and others)

    SNIA.org – Storage Network Industry Association (SNIA)

    Speakingintech.com – Popular industry and data infrastructure podcast

    Storage Bibliography – Collection of Dr. J. Metz storage related content

    technet.microsoft.com – Microsoft TechNet data infrastructure–related topics

    thenvmeplace.com – various NVMe and related tools, topics and links

    thevpad.com – Collection of various virtualization and related sites

    thessdplace.com – various NVM, SSD, flash, 3D XPoint related topics, tools, links

    tpc.org – Transaction Performance Council benchmark site

    vmug.org – VMware User Groups (VMUG)

    wahlnetwork.com – Chris Whal Networking and related topics

    yellow-bricks.com – Duncan Epping VMware and related topics

    Additional Data Infrastructure Venues

    Additional useful data infrastructure related information can be found at BizTechMagazine, BrightTalk, ChannelProNetwork, ChannelproSMB, ComputerWeekly, Computerworld, CRN, CruxialCIO, Data Center Journal (DCJ), Datacenterknowledge, and DZone. Other good sourses include Edtechmagazine, Enterprise Storage Forum, EnterpriseTech, Eweek.com, FedTech, Google+, HPCwire, InfoStor, ITKE, LinkedIn, NAB, Network Computing, Networkworld, and nextplatform. Also check out Reddit, Redmond Magazine and Webinars, Spiceworks Forums, StateTech, techcrunch.com, TechPageOne, TechTarget Venues (various Search sites, e.g., SearchStorage, SearchSSD, SearchAWS, and others), theregister.co.uk, TheVarGuy, Tom’s Hardware, and zdnet.com, among many others.

    Where To Learn More

    Learn more about related technology, trends, tools, techniques, and tips with the following links.

    Additional learning experiences along with common questions (and answers), as well as tips can be found in Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials book.

    Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

    What This All Means

    The above is an evolving collection of recommended reading including what I have on my physical and virtual bookshelves, as well as list of web sites, blogs and podcasts worth listening, reading or watching. Watch for more items to be added to the book shelf soon, and if you have a suggested recommendation, add it to the comments below.

    By the way, if you have not heard, its #Blogtober, check out some of the other blogs and posts occurring during October here as part of your recommended reading list.

    Ok, nuff said, for now.

    Gs

    Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert 2010-2017 (vSAN and vCloud). Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio. Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

    All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2023 Server StorageIO(R) and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved.

    Posted on

    Cloud Conversations AWS Azure Service Maps via Microsoft

    Cloud Conversations AWS Azure Service Maps via Microsoft

    server storage I/O data infrastructure trends

    Updated 1/21/2018

    Microsoft has created an Amazon Web Service AWS Azure Service Map. The AWS Azure Service Map is a list created by Microsoft looks at corresponding services of both cloud providers.

    Azure AWS service map via Microsoft.com
    Image via Azure.Microsoft.com

    Note that this is an evolving work in progress from Microsoft and use it as a tool to help position the different services from Azure and AWS.

    Also note that not all features or services may not be available in different regions, visit Azure and AWS sites to see current availability.

    As with any comparison they are often dated the day they are posted hence this is a work in progress. If you are looking for another Microsoft created why Azure vs. AWS then check out this here. If you are looking for an AWS vs. Azure, do a simple Google (or Bing) search and watch all the various items appear, some sponsored, some not so sponsored among others.

    Whats In the Service Map

    The following AWS and Azure services are mapped:

    • Marketplace (e.g. where you select service offerings)
    • Compute (Virtual Machines instances, Containers, Virtual Private Servers, Serverless Microservices and Management)
    • Storage (Primary, Secondary, Archive, Premium SSD and HDD, Block, File, Object/Blobs, Tables, Queues, Import/Export, Bulk transfer, Backup, Data Protection, Disaster Recovery, Gateways)
    • Network & Content Delivery (Virtual networking, virtual private networks and virtual private cloud, domain name services (DNS), content delivery network (CDN), load balancing, direct connect, edge, alerts)
    • Database (Relational, SQL and NoSQL document and key value, caching, database migration)
    • Analytics and Big Data (data warehouse, data lake, data processing, real-time and batch, data orchestration, data platforms, analytics)
    • Intelligence and IoT (IoT hub and gateways, speech recognition, visualization, search, machine learning, AI)
    • Management and Monitoring (management, monitoring, advisor, DevOps)
    • Mobile Services (management, monitoring, administration)
    • Security, Identity and Access (Security, directory services, compliance, authorization, authentication, encryption, firewall
    • Developer Tools (workflow, messaging, email, API management, media trans coding, development tools, testing, DevOps)
    • Enterprise Integration (application integration, content management)

    Down load a PDF version of the service map from Microsoft here.

    Where To Learn More

    Learn more about related technology, trends, tools, techniques, and tips with the following links.

    Additional learning experiences along with common questions (and answers), as well as tips can be found in Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials book.

    Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

    What This All Means

    On one hand this can and will likely be used as a comparison however use caution as both Azure and AWS services are rapidly evolving, adding new features, extending others. Likewise the service regions and site of data centers also continue to evolve thus use the above as a general guide or tool to help map what service offerings are similar between AWS and Azure.

    By the way, if you have not heard, its Blogtober, check out some of the other blogs and posts occurring during October here.

    Ok, nuff said, for now.

    Gs

    Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert 2010-2017 (vSAN and vCloud). Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio. Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

    All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2024 Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved. StorageIO is a registered Trade Mark (TM) of Server StorageIO.

    Posted on

    Amazon Web Service AWS September 2017 Software Defined Data Infrastructure Updates

    Amazon Web Service AWS September 2017 Software Defined Data Infrastructure Updates

    server storage I/O data infrastructure trends

    Amazon Web Service AWS September 2017 Software Defined Data Infrasture Updates

    September was a busy month pertaining to software defined data infrastructure including cloud and related AWS announcements. One of the announcements included VMware partnering to deliver vSphere, vSAN and NSX data infrastructure components for creating software defined data centers (SDDC) also known as multi cloud, and hybrid cloud leveraging AWS elastic bare metal servers (read more here in a companion post). Unlike traditional partner software defined solutions that relied on AWS Elastic Cloud Compute (EC2) instances, VMware is being deployed using private bare metal AWS elastic servers.

    What this means is that VMware vSphere (e.g. ESXi) hypervisor, vCenter, software defined storage (vSAN), storage defined network (NSX) and associated vRealize tools are deployed on AWS data infrastructure that can be used for deploying hybrid software defined data centers (e.g. connecting to your existing VMware environment). Learn more about VMware on AWS here or click on the following image.

    VMware on AWS via Amazon.com

    Additional AWS Updates

    Amazon Web Services (AWS) updates include, coinciding with VMworld, the initial availability of VMware on AWS (using virtual private servers e.g. think along the lines of Lightsail, not EC2 instances) was announced. Amazon Web Services (AWS) continues its expansion into database and table services with Relational Data Services (RDS) including various engines (Amazon Auora,MariaDB, MySQL, Oracle, PostgreSQL,and SQL Server along with Database Migration Service (DMS). Note that these RDS are in addition to what you can install and run your self on Elastic Cloud Compute (EC2) virtual machine instances, Lambda serverless containers, or Lightsail Virtual Private Servers (VPS).

    AWS has published a guide to database testing on Amazon RDS for Oracle plotting latency and IOPs for OLTP workloads here using SLOB. If you are not familiar with SLOB (Silly Little Oracle Benchmark) here is a podcast with its creator Kevin Closson discussing database performance and related topics. Learn more about SLOB and step by step installation for AWS RDS Oracle here, and for those who are concerned or think that you can not run workloads to evaluate Oracle platforms, have a look at this here.

    EC2 enhancements include charging by the second (previous by the hour) for some EC2 instances (see details here including what is or is not currently available) which is a growing trend by private cloud vendors aligning with how serverless containers have been billed. New large memory EC2 instances that for example support up to 3,904GB of DDR4 RAM have been added by AWS. Other EC2 enhancements include updated network performance for some instances, OpenCL development environment to leverage AWS F1 FPGA enabled instances, along with new Elastic GPU enabled instances. Other server and network enhancements include Network Load Balancer for Elastic Load Balancer announced, as well as application load balancer now supports load balancing to IP address as targets for AWS and on premises (e.g. hybrid) resources.

    Other updates and announces include data protection backups to AWS via Commvault and AWS Storage Gateway VTL announced. IBM has announced their Spectrum Scale (e.g. formerly known as SONAS aka GPFS) Scale Out Storage solution for high performance compute (HPC) quick start on AWS. Additional AWS enhancements include new edge location in Boston and a third Seattle site, while Direct Connect sites have been added in Boston and Houston along with Canberra Australia. View more AWS announcements and enhancements here.

    Where To Learn More

    Learn more about related technology, trends, tools, techniques, and tips with the following links.

    What This All Means

    AWS continues to grow and expand, both in terms of number of services, also the extensiveness of them. Likewise AWS continues to add more regions and data center availability zones, enhanced connectivity, along with earlier mentioned service features. The partnership with VMware should enable enterprise organizations to move towards hybrid cloud data infrastructures, while giving AWS an additional reach into those data centers. Overall a good set of enhancements by AWS who continues to evolve their cloud and software defined data infrastructure portfolio of solution offerings.

    By the way, if you have not heard, its Blogtober, check out some of the other blogs and posts occurring during October here.

    Ok, nuff said, for now.
    Gs

    Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert 2010-2017 (and vSAN). Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio.

    Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

    All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2023 Server StorageIO(R) and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved.

    Posted on

    Dell EMC VMware September 2017 Software Defined Data Infrastructure Updates

    Dell EMC VMware September 2017 Software Defined Data Infrastructure Updates

    server storage I/O data infrastructure trends

    Dell EMC VMware September 2017 Software Defined Data Infrastructure Updates

    vmworld 2017

    September was a busy month including VMworld in Las Vegas that featured many Dell EMC VMware (among other) software defined data infrastructure updates and announcements.

    A summary of September VMware (and partner) related announcements include:

    VMware on AWS via Amazon.com
    VMware and AWS via Amazon Web Services

    VMware and AWS

    Some of you might recall VMware earlier attempt at public cloud with vCloud Air service (see Server StorageIO lab test drive here) which has since been depreciated (e.g. retired). This new approach by VMware leverages the large global presence of AWS enabling customers to set up public or hybrid vSphere, vSAN and NSX based clouds, as well as software defined data centers (SDDC) and software defined data infrastructures (SDDI).

    VMware Cloud on AWS exists on a dedicated, single-tenant (unlike Elastic Cloud Compute (EC2) multi-tenant instances or VMs) that supports from 4 to 16 underlying host per cluster. Unlike EC2 virtual machine instances, VMware Cloud on AWS is delivered on elastic bare-metal (e.g. dedicated private servers aka DPS). Note AWS EC2 is more commonly known, AWS also has other options for server compute including Lambda micro services serverless containers, as well as Lightsail virtual private servers (VPS).

    Besides servers with storage optimized I/O featuring low latency NVMe accessed SSDs, and applicable underlying server I/O networking, VMware Cloud on AWS leverages the VMware software stack directly on underlying host servers (e.g. there is no virtualization nesting taking place). This means more robust performance should be expected like in your on premise VMware environment. VM workloads can move between your onsite VMware systems and VMware Cloud on AWS using various tools. The VMware Cloud on AWS is delivered and managed by VMware, including pricing. Learn more about VMware Cloud on AWS here, and here (VMware PDF) and here (VMware Hands On Lab aka HOL).

    Read more about AWS September news and related updates here in this StorageIOblog post.

    VMware PKS
    VMware and Pivotal PKS via VMware.com

    Pivotal Container Service (PKS) and Google Kubernetes Partnership

    During VMworld VMware, Pivotal and Google announced a partnership for enabling Kubernetes container management called PKS (Pivotal Container Service). Kubernetes is evolving as a popular open source container microservice serverless management orchestration platform that has roots within Google. What this means is that what is good for Google and others for managing containers, is now good for VMware and Pivotal. In related news, VMware has become a platinum sponsor of the Cloud Native Compute Foundation (CNCF). If you are not familiar with CNCF, add it to your vocabulary and learn more here at www.cncf.io.

    Other VMworld and September VMware related announcements

    Hyper converged data infrastructure provider Maxta has announced a VMware vSphere Escape Pod (parachute not included ;) ) to facilitate migration from ESXi based to Red Hat Linux hypervisor environments. IBM and VMware for cloud partnership, along with Dell EMC, IBM and VMware joint cloud solutions. White listing of VMware vSphere VMs for enhanced security combine with earlier announced capabilities.

    Note that both VMware with vSphere ESXi and Microsoft with Hyper-V (Windows and Azure based) are supporting various approaches for securing Virtual Machines (VMs) and the hosts they run on. These enhancements are moving beyond simply encrypting the VMDK or VHDX virtual disks the VMs reside in or use, as well as more than password, ssh and other security measures. For example Microsoft is adding support for host guarded fabrics (and machine hosts) as well as shielded VMs. Keep an eye on how both VMware and Microsoft extend the data protection and security capabilities for software defined data infrastructures for their solutions and services.

    Dell EMC Announcements

    At VMworld in September Dell EMC announcements included:

    • Hyper Converged Infrastructure (HCI) and Hybrid Cloud enhancements
    • Data Protection, Goverence and Management suite updates
    • XtremIO X2 all flash array (AFA) availability optimized for vSphere and VDI

    HCI and Hybrid Cloud enhancements include VxRail Appliance, VxRack SDDC (vSphere 6.5, vSAN 6.6, NSX 6.3) along with hybrid cloud platforms (Enterprise Hybrid Cloud and Native Hybrid Cloud) along with vSAN Ready Nodes (vSAN 6.6 and encryption) and VMware Ready System. Note that Dell EMC in addition to supporting VMware hybrid clouds also previously announced solutions for Microsoft Azure Stack back in May.

    Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials at VMworld Bookstore

    xxxx

    Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press) at VMworld bookstore

    My new book Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press) made its public debut in the VMware book store where I did a book signing event. You can get your copy of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials which includes Software Defined Data Centers (SDDC) along with hybrid, multi-cloud, serverless, converged and related topics at Amazon among other venues. Learn more here.

    Where To Learn More

    Learn more about related technology, trends, tools, techniques, and tips with the following links.

    What This All Means

    A year ago at VMworld the initial conversations were started around what would become the VMware Cloud on AWS solution. Also a year ago besides VMware Integrated Containers (VIC) and some other pieces, the overall container and in particular related management story was a bit cloudy (pun intended). However, now the fog and cloud seem to be clearing with the PKS solution, along with details of VMware Cloud on AWS. Likewise vSphere, vSAN and NSX along with associated vRealize tools continue to evolve as well as customer deployment growing. All in all, VMware continues to evolve, let’s see how things progress now over the year until the next VMworld.

    By the way, if you have not heard, its Blogtober, check out some of the other blogs and posts occurring during October here.

    Ok, nuff said, for now.
    Gs

    Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert 2010-2017 (and vSAN). Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio.

    Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

    All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2023 Server StorageIO(R) and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved.

    Posted on

    September 2017 Server StorageIO Data Infrastructure Update Newsletter



    Server StorageIO September 2017 Data Infrastructure Update Newsletter

    Volume 17, Issue IX (September 2017)

    Hello and welcome to the September 2017 issue of the Server StorageIO update newsletter.

    With September being generally known as back to school month, the two September event bookends were VMware VMworld and Microsoft Ignite with many other things in between. Needless to say, a lot has happened in and around data infrastructure topic areas since the August newsletter (here if you missed it). Here is a post covering some of the things that I participated with during September including presentations at events in Las Vegas (VMworld), New York City (Wipro SDx Summit), SNIA SDC in Santa Clara, Fujifilm Executive Summitt in Seattle, Minneapolis/St. Paul CMG along with other activities.

    Software-Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials SDDI SDDC

    One of the activities I participated in with while at VMworld in Las Vegas was a book signing event at the VMware bookstore of my new book Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press) available at Amazon.com and other global venues.

    September has been a busy month pertaining data infrastructure including server storage I/O related trends, activities, news, perspectives and related topics, so let’s have a look at them.

    In This Issue

    Enjoy this edition of the Server StorageIO data infrastructure update newsletter.

    Cheers GS

    Data Infrastructure and IT Industry Activity Trends

    Some recent Industry Activities, Trends, News and Announcements include:

    The month started out with VMworld in Las Vegas (e.g. one of the event bookends for the month). Rather than a long list of announcements in this newsletter, check out this StorageIOblog post covering VMworld, VMware and Dell EMC and related news. As part of VMworld, VMware and Amazon Web Services (AWS) announced news about their partnership. AWS also had several other enhancements and new product announcements during september that can be found in this StorageIOblog post here.

    AWS, Dell EMC and VMware were not the only ones making news or announcements during September. Startup NVMe based storage startup Apeiron has announced a Splunk appliance to boost log and analytics processing performance. Gigamon has extended its public cloud monitoring, insight awareness and analytics capabilities including support for Microsoft Azure.

    For those looking for the latest new emerging data infrastructure vendors to watch, add Vexta to your list of NVMe based storage systems. Vexta talks a lot about NVMe particular for their backend (e.g. where data stored on NVM based devices accessed via NVMe), access of their storage system is via traditional Fibre Channel (FC) or emerging NVMe over fabric.

    Long time data infrastructure server and storage vendor HDS (Hitachi Data Systems) is no more (at least in name) having re branded themselves as Vantara focusing on IoT and Cloud analytics besides their traditional data center focus. Vantara combines what was HDS, Hitachi Insight Group and Pentaho into a single unit effectively based in what was HDS as a new, repackaged, refocused business unit.

    Another longtime data infrastructure solution and service provider IBM announced a new Linux only zSeries (ZED) mainframe solution. Some might think the Mainframe is dead, others that it can only run Linux as a virtual guest in a virtual machine. On the other hand some might recall that there are native Linux implementations on the ZED including Ubuntu among others.

    Also note that while IBM zOS mainframe operating systems use FICON for storage access, native ZED Linux systems can use open systems based Fibre Channel (FC) e.g. SCSI command set protocols. Is the ZED based Linux for everybody or every environment? Probably not, however for those who have large-scale Linux needs, it might be worth a look to do a total cost of ownership analysis. If nothing else, do your homework, play your cards right and you might have some leverage with the x86 based server crowd when it comes to negotiating leverage.

    Cloud storage gateway vendor Nasuni has landed another $38 Million USD in funding, hopefully that will enable them to start landing some new and larger customer revenues growing their business. Meanwhile storage startup Qumulo has announced extending their global file fabric name space to include spanning AWS.

    Attala Systems has announced next generation software defined storage for data infrastructures for Telco environments. Percona has added an experimental release of their MySQL engine enhancing performance for high volume, write intensive workloads along with improved cost effectiveness.

    Software defined storage vendor Datacore announced enhancements to support fast databases for online transaction processing (OLTP) along with analytics. Meanwhile Linux provider SUSE continues to expand its software defined storage story based around Ceph. Panasas has enhanced its scale out high performance cluster file system global name space for HPC environments with 20 PByte support. Another longtime storage vendor X-IO (formerly known as Xiotech) announced their 4th generation of their Intelligent Storage Element (ISE).

    September wrapped up with Microsoft Ignite conference along with many updated, enhancements and new features for Azure, Azure Stack, Windows among others. Read more about those and other Microsoft September announcements here in this StorageIOblog post.

    Check out other industry news, comments, trends perspectives here.

    Server StorageIO Commentary in the news

    Recent Server StorageIO industry trends perspectives commentary in the news.

    Via CDW: Comments on Is Your Network About To Fail?
    Via EnterpriseStorageForum: Comments on Data Storage and Big Data Analytics
    Via InfoGoto: Comments on Cloud FOMO (Fear of missing out)
    Via InfoGoto: Comments on Building a Modern Data Strategy
    Via InfoGoto: Comments on the future of Multi-Cloud Computing
    Via InfoGoto: Comments on AI, Machine Learning and Data management
    Via InfoGoto: Comments on Your riskiest data might be in plain sight
    Via InfoGoto: Comments on Data Management Too Much To Handle
    Via InfoGoto: Comments on Google Cloud Platform Gaining Data Storage Momentum
    Via InfoGoto: Comments on Singapore High Rise Data Centers
    Via InfoGoto: Comments on New Tape Storage Capacity
    Via EnterpriseStorageForum: Comments on 8 ways to save on cloud storage
    Via EnterpriseStorageForum: Comments on Google Cloud Platform and Storage

    View more Server, Storage and I/O trends and perspectives comments here

    Server StorageIOblog Posts

    Recent and popular Server StorageIOblog posts include:

    In Case You Missed It #ICYMI

    View other recent as well as past StorageIOblog posts here

    Server StorageIO Data Infrastructure Tips and Articles

    Recent Server StorageIO industry trends perspectives commentary in the news.

    Via EnterpriseStorageForum: Comments on Who Will Rule the Storage World?
    Via InfoGoto: Comments on Google Cloud Platform Gaining Data Storage Momentum
    Via InfoGoto: Comments on Singapore High Rise Data Centers
    Via InfoGoto: Comments on New Tape Storage Capacity
    Via EnterpriseStorageForum: Comments on 8 ways to save on cloud storage
    Via EnterpriseStorageForum: Comments on Google Cloud Platform and Storage

    View more Server, Storage and I/O trends and perspectives comments here

    Server StorageIO Recommended Reading (Watching and Listening) List

    In addition to my own books including Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press 2017), the following are Server StorageIO recommended reading, watching and listening list items. The list includes various IT, Data Infrastructure and related topics.

    Intel Recommended Reading List (IRRL) for developers is a good resource to check out.

    Its October which means that it is also Blogtober, check out some of the blogs and posts occurring during October here.

    Preston De Guise aka @backupbear is Author of several books has an interesting new site Foolsrushin.info that looks at topics including Ethics in IT among others. Check out his new book Data Protection: Ensuring Data Availability (CRC Press 2017).

    Brendan Gregg has a great site for Linux performance related topics here.

    Greg Knieriemen has a must read weekly blog, post, column collection of whats going on in and around the IT and data infrastructure related industries, Check it out here.

    Interested in file systems, CIFS, SMB, SAMBA and related topics then check out Chris Hertels book on implementing CIFS here at Amazon.com

    For those involved with VMware, check out Frank Denneman VMware vSphere 6.5 host resource guide-book here at Amazon.com.

    I often mention in presentations a must have for anybody involved with software defined anything, or programming for that matter which is the Niklaus Wirth classic Algorithms + Data Structures = Programs that you can get on Amazon.com here.

    Another great book to have is Seven Databases in Seven Weeks which not only provides an overview of popular NoSQL databases such as Cassandra, Mongo, HBASE among others, lots of good examples and hands on guides. Get your copy here at Amazon.com.

    Watch for more more items to be added to the book shelf soon.

    Events and Activities

    Recent and upcoming event activities.

    Nov. 2, 2017 – Webinar – Modern Data Protection for Hyper-Convergence
    Sep. 21, 2017 – MSP CMG – Minneapolis MN
    Sep. 20, 2017 – Webinar – BC, DR and Business Resiliency (BR) tips
    Sep. 14, 2017 – Fujifilm IT Executive Summit – Seattle WA
    Sep. 12, 2017 – SNIA Software Developers Conference (SDC) – Santa Clara CA
    Sep. 7, 2017 – Wipro SDX – Enabling, Planning Your Software Defined Journey
    August 28-30, 2017 – VMworld – Las Vegas

    See more webinars and activities on the Server StorageIO Events page here.

    Server StorageIO Industry Resources and Links

    Useful links and pages:
    Microsoft TechNet – Various Microsoft related from Azure to Docker to Windows
    storageio.com/links – Various industry links (over 1,000 with more to be added soon)
    objectstoragecenter.com – Cloud and object storage topics, tips and news items
    OpenStack.org – Various OpenStack related items
    storageio.com/downloads – Various presentations and other download material
    storageio.com/protect – Various data protection items and topics
    thenvmeplace.com – Focus on NVMe trends and technologies
    thessdplace.com – NVM and Solid State Disk topics, tips and techniques
    storageio.com/converge – Various CI, HCI and related SDS topics
    storageio.com/performance – Various server, storage and I/O benchmark and tools
    VMware Technical Network – Various VMware related items

    Ok, nuff said, for now.

    Cheers
    Gs

    Greg Schulz – Multi-year Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert (and vSAN). Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio.

    Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

    All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2023 Server StorageIO(R) and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved.

    Posted on

    August 2017 Server StorageIO Data Infrastructure Update Newsletter



    Server StorageIO August 2017 Data Infrastructure Update Newsletter

    Volume 17, Issue VII (Pre VMworld 2017)

    Hello and welcome to the August 2017 issue of the Server StorageIO update newsletter.

    Its end of summer season here in north america which means wrapping up holidays, vacations, back to school shopping (and going to school), as well as the start of the fall IT technology conference season. VMworld 2017 USA is this week in Las Vegas and there will be several announcements coming out of that event. Given all of the activity so far this month, I’m going to cover the VMworld and related topics in a special early September issue of this newsletter.

    Speaking of VMworld 2017, if you are going to be there in Las Vegas, stop by the book store located in the community village area on Tuesday at 1PM I will be doing a book signing, meet and greet, stop by and say hello.

    Thanks to all who participated in the recent thevPad top 100 vBloggers event, I am honored to have StorageIOblog listed in the top 100 vBlogs. Also congratulations to new and returning fellow Microsoft MVPs and VMware vExperts. There is a lot going on in the industry, lets get to it in this Server StorageIO Data Infrastructure Update Newsletter.

    In This Issue

    Enjoy this edition of the Server StorageIO update newsletter (pre VMworld edition).

    Cheers GS

    Data Infrastructure and IT Industry Activity Trends

    Acronis announced True Image 2018 for home based data protection (backup), while Crashplan aka code42 announced they were getting out of the consumer, small office home office (SOHO) backup and data protection space to focus on the enterprise.

    Cisco bought software defined storage converged infrastructure software vendor Springpath for about $320M USD. Cisco and Swiftstack (object storage software) also announced interoperability news with the UCS S32600 storage server platform.

    GPU vendor NVIDIA announced Quadro Virtual Data Center workstation technology.

    Meanwhile ioFABRIC announced their new Vicinity 3.0 software defined management solution.

    Microsemi (remember PMC Sierra) announced release of its Flashtec PCIe controllers to help speed adoption deployment of SSDs including NVMe based.

    Microsoft bought Cycle Computing to enhance Azure services, while also making Azure Blob storage tiering available as part of an ongoing public preview. For those not aware, Azure Blob is similar to what other services call objects. Get in on the public preview here. For those who live in a hybrid world where your environment and experience include both Windows and Linux, check out Windows Services for Linux here. With this service which can install onto an Windows 10 system along side Win32 (e.g. it co-exists, its not a virtual machine), you can choose from the Windows Store which Linux distro you want (e.g. Centos, Ubuntu, etc).

    Need to learn, refresh or simply gain a better understanding of Microsoft PowerShell for software defined management of Windows, Azure and other environments? Check out this great post from Microsoft Blogs.

    For those who work in a Windows or Azure environment, here are some useful icons for Powerpoint, Visio, PNG and SVG from Microsoft. With Microsoft Ignite coming up in September, watch for some interesting update enhancements to Windows Server from a server storage I/O perspective.

    NextPlatform.com has an interesting article on Exascale Timeline for Storage and I/O systems worth a read. Panzura global name space and scale out software defined storage management software announced mobile client file sharing. After dropping their own cloud business, Verizon is now a virtual network services partner with Amazon.

    Over at all flash array (AFA) SSD vendor Pure, revenues are growing closer to an annual $1B USD rate despite loss per share, Pure also announced a change in leadership with current CEO Scott Dietzen stepping aside for Charles Giancarlo to take the lead spot.

    VMware has been talking about the continued increase in customer adoption and deployment of VSAN now they are showing they eat their own dog food. Check out this post here from VMware that shows how many and what size VSAN clusters they are using for various internal operations. Also on the VMware storage front, learn more about enhancements for large and small file allocation blocks with vSphere VMFS6.

    With all of the pre and post VMworld related announcements, remember to check out the tools available over at the VMware flings site including vSphere HTML5 Web Client, HCIBench, vRealize Operations Export, VisualEsxtop, ESXi Embedded Host Client, VMware OS Optimization Tool and many others. Watch for VMworld coverage in the September newsletter along with posts at www.storageioblog.com

    Check out other industry news, comments, trends perspectives here.

    Server StorageIO Commentary in the news

    Recent Server StorageIO industry trends perspectives commentary in the news.

    Via EnterpriseStorageForum: Comments on Who Will Rule the Storage World?
    Via InfoGoto: Comments on Google Cloud Platform Gaining Data Storage Momentum
    Via InfoGoto: Comments on Singapore High Rise Data Centers
    Via InfoGoto: Comments on New Tape Storage Capacity

    View more Server, Storage and I/O trends and perspectives comments here

    Server StorageIOblog Posts

    Recent and popular Server StorageIOblog posts include:

    In Case You Missed It #ICYMI

    View other recent as well as past StorageIOblog posts here

    Server StorageIO Data Infrastructure Tips and Articles

    Recent Server StorageIO industry trends perspectives commentary in the news.

    Via NetworkWorld: Do you have an IT trade craft skills gap?

    View more Server, Storage and I/O trends and perspectives comments here

    Events and Activities

    Recent and upcoming event activities.

    Sep. 21, 2017 – MSP CMG – Minneapolis MN
    Sep. 20, 2017 – Redmond Data Protection and Backup – Webinar
    Sep. 14, 2017 – Fujifilm IT Executive Summit – Seattle WA
    Sep. 12, 2017 – SNIA Software Developers Conference (SDC) – Santa Clara CA
    Sep. 7, 2017 – WiPro – Planning Your Software Defined Journey – New York City
    August 29, 2017 – VMworld – Las Vegas

    See more webinars and activities on the Server StorageIO Events page here.

    Server StorageIO Industry Resources and Links

    Useful links and pages:
    Microsoft TechNet – Various Microsoft related from Azure to Docker to Windows
    storageio.com/links – Various industry links (over 1,000 with more to be added soon)
    objectstoragecenter.com – Cloud and object storage topics, tips and news items
    OpenStack.org – Various OpenStack related items
    storageio.com/protect – Various data protection items and topics
    thenvmeplace.com – Focus on NVMe trends and technologies
    thessdplace.com – NVM and Solid State Disk topics, tips and techniques
    storageio.com/converge – Various CI, HCI and related SDS topics
    storageio.com/performance – Various server, storage and I/O benchmark and tools
    VMware Technical Network – Various VMware related items

    Ok, nuff said, for now.

    Cheers
    Gs

    Greg Schulz – Multi-year Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert (and vSAN). Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio.

    Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

    All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2023 Server StorageIO(R) and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved.

    Posted on

    Announcing Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book by Greg Schulz

    New SDDI Essentials Book by Greg Schulz of Server StorageIO

    Cloud, Converged, Virtual Fundamental Server Storage I/O Tradecraft

    server storage I/O data infrastructure trends

    Update 1/21/2018

    Over the past several months I have posted, commenting, presenting and discussing more about Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials aka SDDI or SDDC and SDI. Now it is time to announce my new book (my 4th solo project), Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book (CRC Press). Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials is now generally available at various global venues in hardcopy, hardback print as well as various electronic versions including via Amazon and CRC Press among others. For those attending VMworld 2017 in Las Vegas, I will be doing a book signing, meet and greet at 1PM Tuesday August 29 in the VMworld book store, as well as presenting at various other fall industry events.

    Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book Announcement

    (Via Businesswire) Stillwater, Minnesota – August 23, 2017  – Server StorageIO, a leading independent IT industry advisory and consultancy firm, in conjunction with publisher CRC Press, a Taylor and Francis imprint, announced the release and general availability of “Software-Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials,” a new book by Greg Schulz, noted author and Server StorageIO founder.

    Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials

    The Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials book covers physical, cloud, converged (and hyper-converged), container, and virtual server storage I/O networking technologies, revealing trends, tools, techniques, and tradecraft skills.

    Data Infrastructures Protect Preserve Secure and Serve Information
    Various IT and Cloud Infrastructure Layers including Data Infrastructures

    From cloud web scale to enterprise and small environments, IoT to database, software-defined data center (SDDC) to converged and container servers, flash solid state devices (SSD) to storage and I/O networking,, the book helps develop or refine hardware, software, services and management experiences, providing real-world examples for those involved with or looking to expand their data infrastructure education knowledge and tradecraft skills.

    Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials book topics include:

    • Cloud, Converged, Container, and Virtual Server Storage I/O networking
    • Data protection (archive, availability, backup, BC/DR, snapshot, security)
    • Block, file, object, structured, unstructured and data value
    • Analytics, monitoring, reporting, and management metrics
    • Industry trends, tools, techniques, decision making
    • Local, remote server, storage and network I/O troubleshooting
    • Performance, availability, capacity and  economics (PACE)

    Where To Purchase Your Copy

    Order via Amazon.com and CRC Press along with Google Books among other global venues.

    What People Are Saying About Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book

    “From CIOs to operations, sales to engineering, this book is a comprehensive reference, a must-read for IT infrastructure professionals, beginners to seasoned experts,” said Tom Becchetti, advisory systems engineer.

    "We had a front row seat watching Greg present live in our education workshop seminar sessions for ITC professionals in the Netherlands material that is in this book. We recommend this amazing book to expand your converged and data infrastructure knowledge from beginners to industry veterans."

    Gert and Frank Brouwer – Brouwer Storage Consultancy

    "Software-Defined Data Infrastructures provides the foundational building blocks to improve your craft in several areas including applications, clouds, legacy, and more.  IT professionals, as well as sales professionals and support personal, stand to gain a great deal by reading this book."

    Mark McSherry- Oracle Regional Sales Manager

    "Greg Schulz has provided a complete ‘toolkit’ for storage management along with the background and framework for the storage or data infrastructure professional (or those aspiring to become one)."
    Greg Brunton – Experienced Storage and Data Management Professional

    “Software-defined data infrastructures are where hardware, software, server, storage, I/O networking and related services converge inside data centers or clouds to protect, preserve, secure and serve applications and data,” said Schulz.  “Both readers who are new to data infrastructures and seasoned pros will find this indispensable for gaining and expanding their knowledge.”

    SDDI and SDDC components

    More About Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials
    Software Defined Data Infrastructures (SDDI) Essentials provides fundamental coverage of physical, cloud, converged, and virtual server storage I/O networking technologies, trends, tools, techniques, and tradecraft skills. From webscale, software-defined, containers, database, key-value store, cloud, and enterprise to small or medium-size business, the book is filled with techniques, and tips to help develop or refine your server storage I/O hardware, software, Software Defined Data Centers (SDDC), Software Data Infrastructures (SDI) or Software Defined Anything (SDx) and services skills. Whether you are new to data infrastructures or a seasoned pro, you will find this comprehensive reference indispensable for gaining as well as expanding experience with technologies, tools, techniques, and trends.

    Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials SDDI SDDC content

    This book is the definitive source providing comprehensive coverage about IT and cloud Data Infrastructures for experienced industry experts to beginners. Coverage of topics spans from higher level applications down to components (hardware, software, networks, and services) that get defined to create data infrastructures that support business, web, and other information services. This includes Servers, Storage, I/O Networks, Hardware, Software, Management Tools, Physical, Software Defined Virtual, Cloud, Docker, Containers (Docker and others) as well as Bulk, Block, File, Object, Cloud, Virtual and software defined storage.

    Additional topics include Data protection (Availability, Archiving, Resiliency, HA, BC, BR, DR, Backup), Performance and Capacity Planning, Converged Infrastructure (CI), Hyper-Converged, NVM and NVMe Flash SSD, Storage Class Memory (SCM), NVMe over Fabrics, Benchmarking (including metrics matter along with tools), Performance Capacity Planning and much more including whos doing what, how things work, what to use when, where, why along with current and emerging trends.

    Book Features

    ISBN-13: 978-1498738156
    ISBN-10: 149873815X
    Hardcover: 672 pages
    (Available in Kindle and other electronic formats)
    Over 200 illustrations and 70 plus tables
    Frequently asked Questions (and answers) along with many tips
    Various learning exercises, extensive glossary and appendices
    Publisher: Auerbach/CRC Press Publications; 1 edition (June 19, 2017)
    Language: English

    SDDI and SDDC toolbox

    Where To Learn More

    Learn more about related technology, trends, tools, techniques, and tips with the following links.

    Data Infrastructures Protect Preserve Secure and Serve Information
    Various IT and Cloud Infrastructure Layers including Data Infrastructures

    Additional learning experiences along with common questions (and answers), as well as tips can be found in Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials book.

    Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

    What This All Means

    Data Infrastructures exist to protect, preserve, secure and serve information along with the applications and data they depend on. With more data being created at a faster rate, along with the size of data becoming larger, increased application functionality to transform data into information means more demands on data infrastructures and their underlying resources.

    Software-Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials: Cloud, Converged, and Virtual Fundamental Server Storage I/O Tradecraft is for people who are currently involved with or looking to expand their knowledge and tradecraft skills (experience) of data infrastructures. Software-defined data centers (SDDC), software data infrastructures (SDI), software-defined data infrastructure (SDDI) and traditional data infrastructures are made up of software, hardware, services, and best practices and tools spanning servers, I/O networking, and storage from physical to software-defined virtual, container, and clouds. The role of data infrastructures is to enable and support information technology (IT) and organizational information applications.

    Additional learning experiences along with common questions (and answers), as well as tips can be found in Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials book.

    Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

    Everything is not the same in business, organizations, IT, and in particular servers, storage, and I/O. This means that there are different audiences who will benefit from reading this book. Because everything and everybody is not the same when it comes to server and storage I/O along with associated IT environments and applications, different readers may want to focus on various sections or chapters of this book.

    If you are looking to expand your knowledge into an adjacent area or to understand whats under the hood, from converged, hyper-converged to traditional data infrastructures topics, this book is for you. For experienced storage, server, and networking professionals, this book connects the dots as well as provides coverage of virtualization, cloud, and other convergence themes and topics.

    This book is also for those who are new or need to learn more about data infrastructure, server, storage, I/O networking, hardware, software, and services. Another audience for this book is experienced IT professionals who are now responsible for or working with data infrastructure components, technologies, tools, and techniques.

    Learn more here about Software Defined Data Infrastructure (SDDI) Essentials book along with cloud, converged, and virtual fundamental server storage I/O tradecraft topics, order your copy from Amazon.com or CRC Press here, and thank you in advance for learning more about SDDI and related topics.

    Ok, nuff said, for now.

    Gs

    Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert 2010-2017 (vSAN and vCloud). Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio. Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

    All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2024 Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved. StorageIO is a registered Trade Mark (TM) of Server StorageIO.

    Posted on

    Microsoft Azure Software Defined Data Infrastructure Reference Resources

    Azure Software Defined Data Infrastructure Architecture Resources

    server storage I/O data infrastructure trends

    Need to learn more about Microsoft Azure Cloud Software Defined Data Infrastructure topics including reference architecture among other resources for various application workloads?

    Microsoft Azure has an architecture and resources page (here) that includes various application workload reference tools.

    Microsoft Azure Software Defined Cloud
    Azure Reference Architectures via Microsoft Azure

    Examples of some Azure Reference Architecture for various application and workloads include among others:

    For example, need to know how to configure a high availability (HA) Sharepoint deployment with Azure, then check out this reference architecture shown below.

    Microsoft Azure Sharepoint HA reference architecture
    Sharepoint HA via Microsoft Azure

    Where To Learn More

    Learn more about related technology, trends, tools, techniques, and tips with the following links.

    Data Infrastructures Protect Preserve Secure and Serve Information
    Various IT and Cloud Infrastructure Layers including Data Infrastructures

    What This All Means

    Data Infrastructures exist to protect, preserve, secure and serve information along with the applications and data they depend on. Software Defined Data Infrastructures span legacy, virtual, container, cloud and other environments to support various application workloads. Check out the Microsoft Azure cloud reference architecture and resources mentioned above as well as the Azure Free trial and getting started site here.

    Ok, nuff said, for now.
    Gs

    Greg Schulz – Multi-year Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert (and vSAN). Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio.

    Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

    All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2023 Server StorageIO(R) and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved.